In visual perception a color is almost never seen as it physically is, making color the most relative medium in art.

Evidence

Interaction of Color (Josef & Anni Albers Foundation)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: White is the most inferior of colors of morals of superiority. It follows that whiteness is the lack of characteristics that make a theme and give it its facets of colors. ; There is generally no fixed relation between spectral distribution and perceived color, though a surface does have a determinable color under fixed viewing conditions. — What Color is it?; Spectral reflectance does not determine perceived color, since any achromatic paper can be made to appear any shade of white, gray, or black, the physics of reflectance diverging from color perception. — A Spectral Reflectance Doth Not a Color Make (+1 more)

Related

• Colors are not properties of objects but of perceptual processes, and one proposal identifies them with physical ‘spectral surface reflectance.’ (similarity 0.92)
• Spectral reflectance does not determine perceived color, since any achromatic paper can be made to appear any shade of white, gray, or black, the physics of reflectance diverging from color… (similarity 0.90)
• There is generally no fixed relation between spectral distribution and perceived color, though a surface does have a determinable color under fixed viewing conditions. (similarity 0.89)
• Philosophers examine whether whiteness is a color at all, distinguishing the physics of spectral reflectance from the perception of color, a divide that determines whether white counts as ‘a… (similarity 0.84)
• Two gray squares with identical reflectance appear different shades because one lies in cast shadow, showing perceived lightness does not track spectral reflectance. (similarity 0.84)
• White has special status among colors, experienced as achromatic or an absence of hue, and its perception is not explained by a simple null point of cone-opponent mechanisms but involves… (similarity 0.82)
• Newton subscribed to the doctrine that physical objects do not actually have the colors we ordinarily take them to possess, treating color as a sensation rather than a property of objects. (similarity 0.81)
• White is ‘the unblemished marker of purity’ and ‘the ideal foil — the contrast against which all other colors look more vibrant,’ while standing in stark opposition to black. (similarity 0.80)
• Perceived white reflects a response norm that varies with adaptation, and individual differences in perceived white shrink when observers share a common white adapting stimulus — the white point… (similarity 0.80)
• White and black are also colors, with Newton himself noting ‘The first of all simple colours is White, though philosophers will not acknowledge either White or Black to be colours.’ (similarity 0.80)
• Opponent channels must be calibrated to the average color of the scene (von Kries adaptation), which discounts illuminant changes and is an initial component of color constancy. (similarity 0.79)
• Because of adaptation, observers exposed to different environments should perceive color in significantly and systematically different ways, including differences in achromatic settings. (similarity 0.79)
• White, physically, is light seen when all visible wavelengths combine; lacking hue, it is considered an achromatic color. (similarity 0.78)