WASSCE SHS
Colour has a source, a place on the wheel, and a job in the picture. Name the relationship before you say the mood.
Red, yellow and blue are the primary colours. They are not mixed from other colours. A secondary colour is mixed from two primaries. Red and yellow make orange. Yellow and blue make green. Blue and red make violet. A tertiary colour is mixed from a primary and a neighbouring secondary, such as red orange. A tint is a colour plus white. A shade is a colour plus black. Hue is the name of the colour itself. The twelve point wheel sets these hues in order so that relationships can be seen. Complementary colours sit opposite each other: red and green, blue and orange, yellow and violet. They strengthen each other when placed side by side. Analogous colours sit next to each other and harmonise more quietly.
Warm colours, red, orange and yellow, tend to come forward. Cool colours, blue, green and violet, tend to recede. That is one way painters show distance, and it is not the same as linear perspective, which uses lines meeting as they go back. A Ghanaian cloth can tie a colour to an occasion or an object. State that meaning only when you know the people and the cloth. Do not invent a proverb for a colour, and do not treat one community's meaning as the meaning for every Ghanaian. If you are not sure, describe what the colour does in the work: it contrasts, it repeats, or it cools the distance.
The General Knowledge in Art tips guide is the written paper: the objective items, the essay, and how to build a point. The Visual Arts tips guide covers the studio papers that sit beside it. Start practising on glearn.now with Kevin and Anna. WASSCE General Knowledge in Art tips
Primary, secondary and tertiary are different marks. White does not create orange. It lightens a colour that is already there. Complementary is opposite, not "any two colours that look nice". Warm and cool are a temperature idea, not a moral one. A Ghanaian meaning needs the people and the cloth. A guessed meaning is not safer than a description of what the colour does.
These are practice questions in the style of the paper, with a model answer and a mark scheme. They are not a promise of what your paper will ask.
4 marks
(a) Name the three primary colours. (3 marks)
(b) State which two primaries mix to make green. (1 mark)
(a) Red, yellow and blue.
(b) Yellow and blue.
2 marks
Distinguish between a tint and a shade. (2 marks)
A tint is a colour mixed with white, so it is lighter. A shade is a colour mixed with black, so it is darker.
3 marks
Explain how warm and cool colours can suggest distance. (3 marks)
Warm colours such as red and orange tend to come forward. Cool colours such as blue tend to go back. A painter can place warm colour near the viewer and cooler, paler colour farther away. That is different from lines that meet at a vanishing point.
More questions on this topic are inside glearn, marked as you answer, with the reason written out. The first ones need no account.
Practise General Knowledge in Art freeColours opposite each other on the wheel: red and green, blue and orange, yellow and violet. Colours that sit side by side are analogous. They are a quieter harmony, not a complement.
Start on glearn.now with Kevin and Anna. Anna marks WASSCE written answers. Kevin marks BECE answers, including Creative Arts and Design. The first questions need no account. The Visual Arts guide covers this written paper and the studio papers. All WASSCE General Knowledge in Art past questions