By that analogy abstraction is like pillowshading for rendering. If it was not for that I would not even know to whether to take you even a little serious or not.
I'm pretty sure what he meant by that was "when artists don't know how to shade correctly, they pillow shade. When artists don't know how to choose their colors correctly, they simply hue shift [even when hue shifting isn't appropriate.]"
I understood the analogy, and it made me laugh. It's true, I think!
Hue shifting is simply exaggaration of reality, as Ryumaru already pointed out. Art which just apes reality gets pretty old pretty fast. Knowing the tools to make realistic art is good, but there are many good artists who can not do this convincingly but still are so much better in other areas than some which can do stuff that looks photoreal. It is all relative.
I think most people would agree with this, Alex included! =)
Alex is simply saying "hue shifting" is the knee-jerk reaction bad artists have to "oh my god, what color would be best here?" I think he's trying to say we shouldn't even have the term hue-shifting, because it teaches new artists that simply sliding the hue over to the left or the right will produce good color selections for us, when that's obviously not true. He's saying to learn how colors actually work, instead of relying on cheap tricks. I agree that hue-shifting IS used as a cheap trick a lot of the time, with bad results. I see the advice posted here constantly, by artists who don't know any better. "Hey, your drawing looks dull. You should make all the shadows purple! That's called hue-shifting! If the object's brighter, make it more yellow, instead!" Half the time, that advice makes absolutely no sense, hence (from what I gather), Alex's aversion to using the term at all. (Sorry for putting words into your mouth, Alex!)
About Alex's "Hippie color choices," I think his art makes it obvious he's followed his own advice; he's very familiar with how colors work, and because of that, I think he does a fantastic job of bending (and even breaking!) the rules. =)
I'm just some dude.
Don't worry about such things.
Just keep a clear mind, be humble, pace yourself, try new things, learn, make a plan, draw stuff and have fun.
Oh, don't worry, I know.
If I didn't plan on surpassing your current (very high!) level one day, I'd quit drawing now, heheheh. ;P
I used you as an example, because you're a good artist with a very idiosyncratic artstyle. =)