ABSTRACT
In his book, ‘Zur Farbenlehre’ (On the Doctrine of Colours), Goethe claimed that the complementary relationship of colours was based on after-images of the colours. This effect was called successive contrast. Both successive contrast, and the detailed studies on simultaneous contrast, formed his theory of colour harmony (Green-Armytage 1996; Zollinger 1999). Goethe developed his idea with his six-colour circles that comprised of two sides; the positive side (i.e. red, orange, yellow) and the negative side (i.e. green, blue, and violet). According to him, the analogous pairs of colour combinations did not have a character and their combinations were not fully harmonious (Kuehni 2005; O’Connor 2010; Ou 2004). Kuehni explains Goethe’s statement as follows;
In accordance, Goethe claimed that, when colours were selected from both sides of the colour circle, opposite to each other, their combinations produced a splendid effect, thus, this resulted in full harmony (Ou 2004). Afterwards, in the mid19th century, Chevreul developed a more systematic theory of colour harmony.
