Pattern

Big, horizontal elliptic shapes, like pear quarters or lips, create a repeatable pattern in this landscape.  The rounded shapes in this picture's land-forms are also mirrored by the rounded shapes of trees and bushes.

Pattern is the way you would compose your picture if it were a quilt top.  Lay it out in some discernible motif.  Often, patterns in art can be repeated shapes, and may involve the comparison of shapes, lines and colors. Think of the word: counterpoise.  One shape predicts another.


The Golden Ratio is also a pattern found in nature.


The first artist I think of when I think of pattern is Henri Matisse.  Born and raised in a textile producing region in northern France, he constantly described patterns on wall paper, dresses, and carpets.  Then, he would create an elaborate design, weaving the whole picture into a pattern.


Let's review the elements of art so far..


Consider the image posted at the top of this post, Upland Fields.  The elements we have covered so far in our posts are pattern, line, shape, and form.

Long, horizontal lines are obvious, and the shapes are long pears or lips, which are very organic.  They are repeated to create a pattern. As respects form, there are five horizontal shapes from bottom to top, and three masses of trees or bushes.  The asymmetric, or odd numbered, quantity work to suggest the randomness of nature and the aerial feeling of faded colors, encroaching over the ridge in places, establishes a feeling of upland atmosphere.

Form

  The illusion of 3 dimensional shape is called form. Shading, perspective and color properties are all in the toolkit artists use to "form" objects.  


  Color temperature is a good way to suggest form.  Warm plays next to cool to create vibration and separation.  Cool can recede and warm proceed towards you, except where other drawing tricks overcome these "rules."  Note how the color temperatures, along with shading, create form on the trees in this pastel.


But wait, there's more!  Form relates to the formal aspects of painting, which is our broader topic in these lessons.  The form of an artwork is the piece in its rudimentary state: unified, visual, and independent of the meaning or context.  Take away Norman Rockwell's narrative of a family at Thanksgiving (pregnant with meaning) and observe the way his objects work together to make a fine painting.  These are the formal aspects, and the holiday sentiment is the informal aspect of this iconic painting.

Study Hall:

About.com.

Shape

Shapes:  organic or non-organic and geometric shapes are
lines with identities.

Shape is a 2-dimensional outline of your subject, sometimes described as the contour.  To be more specific, a line drawing of a shape may include both the interior and boundary lines of a subject.


Shape is the line become something identifiable.  It is an important genesis for making representational art.  However, Modernists focused on shapes as a way to organize the flat plane of a picture.  As with all the elements of art, in these definitions there are deeper meanings than what is evident on the surface of things.


Pay attention to the shapes created on your surface, and use them to harness the dynamics of your picture plane.


When we add dimension, then form begins to emerge.  That we will save for the next post.

Line

Pastel Workshop will be posting some basic art elements for the benefit of workshop and art students. Today, we look at the basic line. 

Fluid Corner, Pastel, Casey Klahn.  

The line in art directs your attention and expresses movement, perspective and compositional elements.  Along with the point, or dot, it is a basic component in art.

"A line is a dot that went for a walk."  

Paul Klee.

The line in art is a construct of the basic thing:  the point or the dot.  Lines do not occur in nature, we are told, yet artists still make much of them.  Is this an abstract thought?  Yes, I think so.


We use lines to suggest and stand in for other things, and we use them to be expressive.  Other dynamics in art that fall from the line are gesture and linear perspective.


Lines restrict and bind.  Just ask Johnny Cash.










Further reading: 

Stephen Farthing R.A on John Ruskin and the line.

Diane Mize -http://visualcomposing.blogspot.com/2011/11/power-of-direction.html

Elements and Dynamics of Design

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Prairie Pink

Pink & Green Prairie

@4" x 9"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

More Workshop News

Denver-May 19th. & 20th.
Maui - August.  


Details TBA.