Like Goldilocks, we want to create a composition with shapes, colors, textures and other elements that are not too dull, not too distressing, but "just right." Greg Albert
Are you feeling any closer to knowing what "just right" is yet? As I mentioned in the last class, it's a lifelong process. If you continue to do the Finding Your Voice exercises periodically, after this class, you will continually come closer to just right. It's all about your awareness, knowing yourself, what you want to express and how you want to express it.
It appears no one opted to post the optional homework of a self-portrait. It's never to late! We all learn from and teach each other. Hope to "see" you there via your self-portrait soon!
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That's what I mean when I say that what you are looking for being right under your nose. It could be just that simple!
If you don't already, I suggest you begin using a journal now. It need not be every day, but keep it handy for any art related thoughts, images, etc. (For ideas and inspiration, visit the Sketchbook Challenge blog.)
While we are now moving on to the elements and principles of composition, don't forget about everything from the last class. Piece it into your patchwork, weave it into your cloth, mix it into your paint, your collage and your very being.
I call this class Composition Ingredients because creating art is like cooking. There are recipies to follow but you are free to improvise and encouraged to add things you prefer and leave out those you don't.
While you are learning you are a cook, and just as I'm sure you do when you cook, you should not hesitate to put your own spin on things. Don't be so serious about what's right or worried about being wrong. It's just art. There's room for error. In fact you need to experiment in order to succeed (unlike in brain surgery).
COMPOSITION INGREDIENTS
Our ears are much more sensitive than our eyes. You know right away when something is off in the art of music. Listen (click to play)
Our eyes are not as attuned. Right now, when you look at your artwork, you may feel something's not quite right, but you don't know what it is. Well that's about to change!
Learning these ingredients, the elements and principles of art, will give you a checklist that you can run through when trying to figure out what's not quite right and how to improve your work.
Why?
Because first and foremost the one ingredient that must always be present and never tweaked, is you. The genuine you. 100% natural, organic, pure you.
It's one thing to break a rule because you don't know any better. But your skill and talent will soar when you break the rule because you have a reason to.
Deliberate and purposeful spins off the prescribed elements and principles of composition is how art is created.
Picasso was very well versed in all the rules. When he broke them he did so to further his vision. I'm not suggesting you need to go as far as Picasso did, but let me tell you, I'm sure people thought he was bizarre and crazy when he started. That didn't stop him. Your efforts to be true to your vision should not stop you either. I cannot stress enough that you have to risk creating work that speaks to YOU. Please yourself and you will please others.
So many of you have written that you are taking this class because you want to create work that resonates with the viewer. Often, that leads you to try to please everyone which then leads to generic work, the kind you find at Pier One or Bed Bath and Beyond. That artwork rarely makes you gasp but it is safe. Safe enough to put in Joe Q. Citizen's home.
Remember what Abe Lincoln said:
You can please some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot please all of the people all of the time.
I guarantee that if you please yourself first and not worry about what others think, that your work will resonate with the right audience. We'll get more into that in Class 7. I just wanted to bring it up here because Picasso made me......
(PS I never could get the sound to work on this video so I added the text at the beginning. Enjoy the silent contemplation.)
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The Elements of Composition
- Line
- Shape & Form
- Value & Light
- Texture
- Space
- Movement/Time
- Color
These elements are a result of creating art. You create composition (good or bad) every time you create art. You draw, you create line. You collage, you use shape. You paint, stitch or glue things on a canvas or quilt, you create space. These are the tools that you use when you create your art.
They become the elements of composition because when you are trying to improve what you are creating, or you have indecision about placement or color or direction, you consult what you know about these elements.
The work comes first. Holding your work up to your checklist of elements is secondary. Once you know and understand the elements (and principles), they will eventually become a part of your thinking and way of working.
Painter Carol Marine, of A Painting a Day blog, told me she can spend up to two hours composing the arrangement for the still lifes she paints each day. And she's been doing this for years! Listen in on our conversation here:
The Principles of Composition
- Dominance
- Balance
- Proportion/Scale
- Repetition
- Rhythm
- Variety
- Harmony & Unity
The principles are the rules that you apply to the elements. These principles are the visual components that give structure to expression.
Learn to recognize them in action by looking at artwork, both art that speaks to you and art that doesn't.
I do this all the time when looking at art or through a book or magazine. I pretend it's a Where's Waldo of composition principles and elements. It keeps my eye trained the same way shooting hoops would for a basketball player or they way doing scales on the piano keeps a pianist on the top of their game.
Learn to treat these principles like a checklist when trying to figure out what's "off" about your work. We'll be doing a lot of that in the next class.
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It is hard to discuss the elements and principles of composition and design individually because they are so interrelated. They are always working together in a piece of art or craft. They borrow from each other as well - line can have shape; light can have pattern. Line creates shape and repetition creates harmony.
Your job here is to:
- become familiar with each element and principle
- recognize them when they are used and/or applied
- learn to use and apply them in ways to improve your art
I could talk/write about this for days but it won't do you any good. This is visual art so the rest of the lesson will be visual. (I can hear you now... "Yay!")
Run through the videos once to get the big picture. Watch them another time or two (or three) to let it really sink in. Start playing the Where's Waldo game with each image to see how many elements and principles you can apply to each work of art and craft other than the category I have placed it in.
This piece, Silk Road 69, encaustic on panel, by Joanne Mattera fits into at least eight categories. Can you identify them all yet?
After you watch the videos enough times to give you some clarity, get to work on your Home Work & Play.
Composition Ingredients - Part 1
Elements of Art
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Composition Ingredients - Part 2
Elements of Art continued
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Composition Ingredients - Part 3
Principles of Art
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Composition Ingredients - Part 4
Principles of Art continued
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Home Work & Play
1. Use your chalk to draw these pairs of lines on a page of black paper.
happy line + sad line
nervous line + calm line
dotted line + hole line
heavy line + thin line
delicate line + strong line
friendly line + enemy line
angry line + elated line
rhythmic line + offbeat line
Make up some pairs of your own now. Continue until you run out of room on the page. Glue this page into your CY journal.
2. Divide a journal page into a grid of 12 boxes. Draw, color, paint, cut from paper, fabric or magazines, 6 geometric shapes and 6 organic shapes.
3. Open your journal to a fresh spread and divide each of the two pages into two sections. (see video). Cut a number of squares, circles and triangles out of black paper. Try placing these in different positiions and different relationships in each of the picture borders. When the arrangement (composition) feels right, glue them in place. TIP: one everything is in place, first run your glue stick over the TOP of any smaller top layer pieces and flip them over to glue in place onto any larger back pieces.
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Study each composition you have created and write the overall feeling you get from each arrangement (ie calm, excited, bored, happy, hopeful, confused, etc.) right inside the box.
4. Get a few copies of your own artwork or use an art book or magazine for this exercise.
Lay (or tape) a sheet of tracing paper over each image and with a black marker, trace over/outline all the shapes you see in the piece. Don't forget the negative space! When you are done, place a + (plus) in the positive shapes and a - (minus) in the negative spaces.
Do this at least 5 times or until you get a good feel for it.
5. Remember your scribble page from Class 2. If you didn't do it yet. STOP RIGHT NOW AND GO SCRIBBLE before you read any further.
Your scribble page is a line composition! And probably a messy one at that. Now it's time to crop your scribble-scrabble and find the sweet spot.
Cropping is a form of editing that you will turn to again and again in order to perfect your compositions. I'll be talking about this more in Class 4, but for now, just complete the exercise below.
Fold a piece of construction paper or cardstock in half. Following the photos above, 1. start on the fold, inside the marked line and 2. cut out the inside area. 3. Open the folded paper to create a frame. Cut two Ls by cutting the upper and lower opposite corners as shown.
4. Using the Ls as a "viewfinder," adjust them to create a frame around an area of the scribble page that is pleasing to your eye. That's the sweet spot. 5. Glue the frame in place around your sweet spot.
There's also another lesson in this exercise.
Look at all the "arting" you had to go through in order to arrive at this sweet spot. You cannot start out intending to create the sweet spot in your art. It is the result of all the effort you go through to create it.
No work is ever wasted because it all leads you to the sweet spot.
6. Carol Marine posted this painting (below) on her A Painting a Day blog the other day. She said,
"I had to add the spoon to balance it all. The composition just would not work without it."
Remembering the elements and principles of art you learned in this lesson, study this composition. In the class Google Group, under the Class 3, Homework 6 Discussion, share your thoughts on why including the spoon in the compositon was necessary.
See you next week for
Class #4
Putting the Tools to Work for You
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