Gustav Klimt · 1907–08
The Kiss
The most famous gold in painting is mostly not gold, and none of it is a pigment.
Belvedere, Vienna
Tap any swatch to copy. Ground colours are the three largest areas of the canvas; accent colours are chosen for intensity and may cover very little — which is exactly why they carry the painting. Percentages are each colour's share of the whole canvas, so these six will not add up to 100%: they are six of the 26 distinct colour regions measured, not a division of the surface. How these were sampled
Every swatch here is an approximation of something a hex code cannot really hold. The golds in this painting are metal leaf, not paint: they change with viewing angle and lighting in a way flat colour cannot reproduce. What the extraction can tell you is the colour the leaf reads as under gallery light, which is genuinely useful if you are designing something that has to sit beside a reproduction.
The green, orange and violet notes come from the ornamental patterning in the robes, and they are what stop the scheme collapsing into a single metallic hue. Those small chromatic interruptions are the reason the painting reads as rich rather than merely shiny.
What the artist actually used
- Gold, silver and platinum leaf
- Within the figures.
- Brass imitation gold ('composition gold')
- The background. Actual fine-gold content across the work amounts to only grams.
- Oil paint
- Flesh, foliage and the patterned colour notes.
Has the colour changed?
Cross-sections show Klimt laying leaf directly onto a still-tacky resin-bound imprimatur, without the traditional oil mordant used in classical gilding — timing the application to the tack of the layer beneath so that gilding became part of the painting process rather than a step after it. Metal leaf does not fade the way organic pigments do, but it does tarnish and abrade selectively.
Sources
Accessibility
WCAG contrast ratios between every color pair. Use the strongest combinations for text; the weakest ones make good decorative backgrounds.
Strongest pair: #C3A749 on #6156A3 — 2.66:1 (Fail)
- #C3A749·#66893E
- #C3A749·#8B7740
- #C3A749·#BA5932
- #C3A749·#7A642D
- #C3A749·#6156A3
- #66893E·#8B7740
- #66893E·#BA5932
- #66893E·#7A642D
- #66893E·#6156A3
- #8B7740·#BA5932
- #8B7740·#7A642D
- #8B7740·#6156A3
- #BA5932·#7A642D
- #BA5932·#6156A3
- #7A642D·#6156A3
How to read this
- AAA
- Passes WCAG 2.1 AAA for normal text — the highest accessibility bar.
- AA
- Passes WCAG 2.1 AA for normal text. Standard production requirement.
- AA Large
- Passes WCAG 2.1 AA for large text only (18pt+ or 14pt+ bold). Avoid for body copy.
- Fail
- Below WCAG 2.1 AA. Fine for decorative use — not for text.
Export
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Studio
Paint this palette
These are the materials a colour study actually gets made with.
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When a palette leaves the screen, this is the shared vocabulary between you and the press. Coated and uncoated because the same ink is not the same colour on both.
Listed on Amazon as Pantone Formula Guide – Coated & Uncoated | Professional PMS Color Matching System for Print, Packaging & Graphic Design | GP1601B
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This site hands you hex codes. Color Bridge is the deck that shows what an RGB or HTML value becomes as CMYK ink, and which Pantone spot sits nearest it — the translation step between a screen palette and a printed one. Coated and uncoated because the same ink is not the same colour on both stocks.
Listed on Amazon as Pantone GP6102B Color Bridge Guide Set Coated & Uncoated, Multi-Colour
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Pantone
Color Bridge Guide — coated
The coated half on its own — Pantone to CMYK, RGB and HTML in a single fan. The smaller entry point if your work only ever goes onto coated stock.
Listed on Amazon as Pantone Color Bridge Guide Coated | Pantone to CMYK, RGB & HTML Color Matching Fan Deck for Graphic Design, Branding & Print | GG6103B
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Calibrite
ColorChecker Studio spectrophotometer
A spectrophotometer profiles the whole chain — display, printer, projector, scanner — so the colour you picked is the colour that comes out the other end. The full-fidelity option for work that ends up printed.
Listed on Amazon as Calibrite ColorChecker Studio Spectrophotometer for Complete Color Management for Display, Projector, Printer and Scanner Profiling
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Calibrite
Display Plus HL colorimeter kit
A colorimeter calibrates the monitor itself. Worth saying plainly: an uncalibrated screen is the most common reason a palette that looked right on your desk looks wrong everywhere else.
Listed on Amazon as Calibrite Video Photo Kit with Display Plus HL Colorimeter and ColorChecker Passport Video 2, 10,000 Nit Monitor Calibration, Camera Color Matching
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Calibrite
ColorChecker Passport Photo 2
A pocket target for fixing white balance and exposure at the moment of capture — the step before any colour correction, if your palette starts from a photograph rather than a screen.
Listed on Amazon as Calibrite ColorChecker Passport Photo 2 Portable Color Calibration Kit for Photo and Video, 4 Target Set for White Balance, Exposure and Creative Look
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Kuretake
Gansai Tambi 24 — Art Nouveau
Gansai are traditional Japanese watercolour pans — dense, matte and easy to mix, the closest everyday medium to the flat printed colour Wada's plates were made in. This is the Art Nouveau-themed 'II' edition, a different 24 to the standard set.
Listed on Amazon as Kuretake GANSAI TAMBI Watercolor Paint Set 24 Colors II - Art Nouveau
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Kuretake
Gansai Tambi 36
The larger pan set. More range means mixing toward a specific plate rather than approximating it from six colours.
Listed on Amazon as Kuretake GANSAI TAMBI Watercolor Paint Set 36 Colors
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140 lb cold press is the weight that takes a wet wash without buckling — the paper most colour studies end up on.
Listed on Amazon as Strathmore 300 Series Tape Bound Watercolor Pad, 140 lb. Cold Press, 11 X 15 inches, White, 12 Sheets (360-111)
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Pentel
Fude Touch brush sign pen
A felt brush tip for the labelling and linework around a swatch study — the annotation half of a colour notebook.
Listed on Amazon as Pentel Fude Touch Sign Pen, Black, Felt Pen Like Brush Stroke (SES15C-A) 3 Pieces
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Library
Further reading
Torn between the two Wada dictionaries? Vol 1 vs Vol 2, compared plate by plate →
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