Field MarksPlate book, 2026

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COLORS

❧

A schematic manual for the bench, drawn from the jewelry, for students of colour and of old plates.

Latrese Davis

Kansas City · polymer clay · not a product catalogue

Preface

This book is a set of plates. It is not a rainbow wheel and it is not a brand chart. Colour, here, is a law you can cut: black as paper, two or three hues, an eye that still glows, heat that still reads as a wing. The jewelry on the table is the proof. The drawings are so you can practice when the jewelry is in another city.

Old schematics are honest. They number the parts. They show a section. They tell you where to stop. That is how this class is taught. Keep one plate face-up on the tile. Do the work of that plate. Then turn the page.

The tints on these pages are specimens, not gospel mixes. Premo names in the laboratory table are jobs — field, core, ring, heat, tick — not loyalty to a package.

I. Of the field

Matte black is the paper. Colour sits in it. Grey mixed from black and white is a different ground and will kill the lime. Do not fill every gap: if the field disappears, the plate has failed, even if the cane is technically full.

Plate I. — Ground plan of the field. Colour occupies; it does not replace the paper. Dashed inner line: leave a margin of black.

II. Of value (two colours)

A Skinner blend is a value story. Two colours, folded so the stripes run the long way of the cane. A rainbow is not a blend; it is a mud postponed. Heat path: orange into rust. Glow path: yellow into lime. Pearl is a hairline, never the core.

Plate II. — Two Skinner sections. Fold until the blend is a set of stripes that can be stacked as barbs or wrapped as a ring. The field is the third colour, not a stripe in this loaf.

III. Of simultaneous contrast

The same lime is two different colours: one on black, one on white. Chevreul named this; the rings prove it. On black the yellow core advances. On white it dies. That is why the field is not a preference. It is a machine for the glow.

Plate III. — Simultaneous contrast. Cut two identical lime squares in class. Lay one on black, one on white. Believe the tile, not the package.

IV. Of the eye (concentric colour)

The disc on the middle finger is a bullseye pinched oval. Yellow core, lime wrap, black field. Number the wraps. Do not pearl the core. Reduction is a colour event: past a point the yellow is gone and you have a pea.

Plate IV. — The eye-spot in section. Reduce to about 12–15 mm. Stop while 1 still reads. If 1 vanishes, the plate is over-reduced.

V. Of heat (the monarch margin)

Heat is orange into rust, split by veins thinner than the cells, then a leading edge of black with white ticks. The ticks are the field mark that reads from across the table. Flooded white is a different animal.

Plate V. — Wing in elevation, cells of heat. Same drawing as a feather barb; dressed as monarch. Slice straight for cells, on a bias for shards.

VI. Of the glow limit

Reduction shrinks and it mixes. Past the glow limit the core is gone. This is the whole colour class: knowing the stop. Three states, same cane.

Plate VI. — The glow limit. Slice a witness face before each reduction pass. Compare to 6a. If you meet 6c, cut a window and restack. Do not panic-reduce.

VII. Laboratory

Jobs, not brands. Four ounces of black in the room. Acid lime, not forest. White is ticks, not a ground.

Job	Specimen	Notes for the bench
Field	Premo Black, uncut	The paper. Do not grey it.
Core	Cadmium or Zinc yellow	No pearl in this snake.
Ring	Wasabi / Bright Green / yellow + a dot of green	Acid. Forest green is a different plate.
Heat	Cadmium Orange → rust (orange + pea of black)	Two colours only in the loaf.
Tick	White, rice-grain snakes	Margin. Do not flood.
Sheen	Pearl or gold hairline	Wrap or mokume fleck. Never the core.
Optional teal	Peacock wrap only	If the plate is finished early.

VIII. Clock of the day

Five hours. Cap 10. Pasta machine required. The textbook stays on the tile; the jewelry stays in sight as the answer key.

Time	Plate	Work
0:00	Preface	Rings and trays on the table. Safety. Name: glow path or heat path.
0:20	I & III	Sheet black. Cut two lime squares. Contrast test on black vs white.
0:50	II	Skinner, two colours, fold to stripes.
1:40	IV or V	One path: eye wraps, or monarch cells. Not both.
3:00	—	Lunch. Oven preheat. Witness-slice marked on the tile.
3:20	VI	Light reduce. Slice. Compare to 6a / 6b / 6c out loud.
4:10	I	Four thin keepers on black. Field must still show.
4:30	—	Bake 15–20 min if the oven is honest; else wrap with the bake law.
4:50	Book	Textbook goes home. Optional: point at Field Marks 02 if they want overlay next.

Bake: 275°F / 135°C, tile or parchment, not a food oven. Cool on the tile.

IX. Exercises (to be ruled in the margin)

1. Cut Plate III in clay. Write which square advances. Do not argue with it.
2. Make Plate II, glow or heat. Count the stripes. If you cannot count them, you rainbowed.
3. Build Plate IV or V. Take a witness slice before reducing.
4. Reduce once. Witness. Reduce once more only if 6a still holds.
5. Lay four thin slices on black. If you cannot see field, remove two.

X. What this book is not

• A Munsell reprint, a Chevreul facsimile, or anyone else’s geometry class.
• A cartoon bird, a bargello, or a 14-piece silhouette.
• Permission to pearl the core or to grey the field.

For veins, overlay, and the sister pair, use the Field Marks deck. This manual is colour. Those cards are construction.