In Johansson's Honkey Kong, there is what appears to be a photo of a girl sitting on a wood-paneled ground, her back facing the camera.  She is painting the wood panels a vibrant blue color.  What is interesting about the picture however, is that the panels seem to continue on forever into the background and they are colored a vibrant blue in a black and white photo.   Johansson uses color contrast to not only draws attention, but create symbolism and convey his message that imagination and creativity is a critical element in human life and its application to reality gives the world meaning.

Johansson puts an overwhelmingly huge emphasis on these blue panels.  It is the clearest element in the photo and it is also in the very center, where one's eyes tend to gravitate to.  The subject, the girl painting, focuses her attention on the panels as well, creating object oriented attention   The color contrast plays a huge factor to catch attention, having the blue against the black and white photo, it automatically draws the audience.  Through this one, out of several, effects of the color contrast, it tells the reader that there is a significance, the first step to understanding the message of the artist.

The color adds intrigue for the reader by differentiating or separating the panels form the surroundings.  This differentiation creates symbolism.  When the blue color is added to the photo, it no longer seems like the girl is painting panels, but an ocean.  From here, several different interpretations can be made or connected.  For example, it can change the perspective from  a boring tedious monotone task into a complex, yet simplistic blue mosaic.  This can create two differing attitudes, one of work, and one of recreation.  Another connection can be made that the blue, or the ocean is a representation of her artistry and imagination.  The vastness of her work turns into the vastness of her imagination.  From this inference, another can be made that the black and white portion of the photo represents reality, defining reality as her surroundings or environment.  She uses her imagination to bring color to, to bring meaning to and make sense of the world around her.

To support such a claim of creative symbolism from the color scheme, take a closer look at the bottom portion of the photo concerning the paint can, the brush and the girl painting it.  The girl uses her blue paint, her own "imagination" and applies it to her reality, using the paintbrush and the act of painting to paint what she sees, making it her own, showing her individuality through her creativity.  The blue in the can is imagination, the paintbrush or act of painting, creativity, which represents individuality and what is painted, the world through ones individual perspective.

It is no coincidence either that the color chosen, blue represents serenity, intelligence, aloofness, idealism, that an ocean is often symbolic of power, strength, and even life.  With those meanings in mind, can't the same be said for the power of creativity?  If not for creativity and imagination, science would not be a thing, for any scientific discovery has started out from curiosity, a question.  Every scientific law or principle, just a thought, an idea conjured up within their own minds, where they use their imagination to create connections and to fill in the dots.  It is this idea that is then applied to the real world to create what is now.  Many aspects of reality were not merely always there from the beginning, but an idea, a creation was developed and publicized to give structure, to create meaning for the individual and for the world.

Johansson is able to use a contrast of a highly pigmented blue color against a black and white background to draw attention and create symbolism ultimately to send a message that it is critical to use and embrace ones imagination to add meaning to life, to create and expand upon the environment, the world in which they live in.  Ultimately, without this blue, this imagination, there is no creativity, there is no individualism, leaving only a grey dullness to the world.  Johansson sends a message that peoples imagination brings life and creates meaning to an otherwise dull and insignificant world of realities.  Without this choice in color scheme, the image is just of a girl, painting wood panels.  