I began with dry paper and a brush loaded with Payne’s gray. I laid down gray squiggles, ending with a diagonal stroke from lower left to upper right. Somehow the gray foreground suggested a yellow background. I used Indian yellow (a pigment tinted toward the orange part of the spectrum) to color in the more central islands of white amidst the gray. The outer sections I colored in with a pigment more on the yellow side of the spectrum. At the very center, I mixed cadmium red with the Indian yellow to make orange-red.

Yellow Orange Gray
16″x12″ 140# Cold Pressed Watercolor Block

I see the gray marks as a grid in front of, or containing, the warm yellows and oranges. Perhaps the gray is a mask disguising the hot emotions of the person behind it.