Homage to the Square: Promise

Josef Albers's Homage to the Square: Promise (1967) is an oil on board painting from Albers's ongoing series. The title Promise suggests a quality of anticipation or potential, perhaps reflected in the particular combination of colors Albers chose for this work. The nested squares format is consistent with the rest of the series: squares of different colors are arranged concentrically, the interactions between them creating complex perceptual effects. The colors here may be cooler or more subdued than the Yellow Signal, creating a different mood and different optical effects. The oil on board technique is precise and controlled, the colors applied smoothly and evenly. Albers believed that color was the most relative medium in art, and that the perception of any color was affected by the colors surrounding it. The Homage to the Square series was his systematic demonstration of this principle, each painting offering a different combination of colors that revealed the relativity of color perception.

Albers's color investigations were crucial to the development of color theory in art and design, influencing not only painting but also graphic design, architecture, and education.

This Homage to the Square explores the perceptual promise of a particular color combination, the nested squares creating a composition of quiet authority and optical complexity.