Art can take many forms and is defined as the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power. The elements of art that are used to create works include line, shape, color, value, texture, form, space, and can be organized using principles such as balance, rhythm, movement, emphasis, pattern, contrast and unity. Art is often examined based on these interactions between elements and principles.
Art can take many forms and is defined as the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power. The elements of art that are used to create works include line, shape, color, value, texture, form, space, and can be organized using principles such as balance, rhythm, movement, emphasis, pattern, contrast and unity. Art is often examined based on these interactions between elements and principles.
Art can take many forms and is defined as the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power. The elements of art that are used to create works include line, shape, color, value, texture, form, space, and can be organized using principles such as balance, rhythm, movement, emphasis, pattern, contrast and unity. Art is often examined based on these interactions between elements and principles.
Art can take many forms and is defined as the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power. The elements of art that are used to create works include line, shape, color, value, texture, form, space, and can be organized using principles such as balance, rhythm, movement, emphasis, pattern, contrast and unity. Art is often examined based on these interactions between elements and principles.
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What is Art?
Art is a highly diverse range of human activities
engaged in creating visual, auditory, or performed artifacts— artworks—that express the author’s imaginative or technical skill, and are intended to be appreciated for their beauty or emotional power.
The oldest documented forms of art are visual arts,
which include images or objects in fields like painting, sculpture, printmaking , photography, and other visual media . Architecture is often included as one of the visual arts; however, like the decorative arts, it involves the creation of objects where the practical considerations of use are essential, in a way that they usually are not in another visual art, like a painting.
Art may be characterized in terms of mimesis (its representation of reality), expression,
communication of emotion, or other qualities. Though the definition of what constitutes art is disputed and has changed over time, general descriptions center on the idea of imaginative or technical skill stemming from human agency and creation. When it comes to visually identifying a work of art, there is no single set of values or aesthetic traits. A Baroque painting will not necessarily share much with a contemporary performance piece, but they are both considered art.
Despite the seemingly indefinable nature of art, there have always existed certain formal guidelines for its aesthetic judgment and analysis. Formalism is a concept in art theory in which an artwork’s artistic value is determined solely by its form, or how it is made. Formalism evaluates works on a purely visual level, considering medium and compositional elements as opposed to any reference to realism , context, or content.
Art is often examined through the interaction of the principles and elements of art. The principles of art include movement, unity, harmony, variety, balance, contrast, proportion and pattern. The elements include texture, form, space, shape, color, value and line. The various interactions between the elements and principles of art help artists to organize sensorially pleasing works of art while also giving viewers a framework within which to analyze and discuss aesthetic ideas.
The 7 principles of art
Balance refers to the visual weight of the elements of the composition. It is a sense that the painting feels stable and "feels right." Imbalance causes a feeling of discomfort in the viewer.
Contrast is the difference between elements of art in a composition,
such that each element is made stronger in relation to the other. When placed next to each other, contrasting elements command the viewer's attention. Areas of contrast are among the first places that a viewer's eye is drawn. Contrast can be achieved by juxtapositions of any of the elements of art. Negative/Positive space is an example of contrast. Complementary colors placed side by side is an example of contrast. Notan is an example of contrast.
Emphasis is when the artist creates an area of the composition that
is visually dominant and commands the viewer's attention. This is often achieved by contrast. Movement is the result of using the elements of art such that they move the viewer's eye around and within the image. A sense of movement can be created by diagonal or curvy lines, either real or implied, by edges, by the illusion of space, by repetition, by energetic mark-making.
Pattern is the uniform repetition of any of the elements of art or any
combination thereof. Anything can be turned into a pattern through repetition. Some classic patterns are spirals, grids, weaves. For examples of different pattern types see the Artlandia Glossary of Pattern Design. A popular drawing practice is Zentangles, in which an abstract or representational outline is divided into different areas, each of which contains a unique pattern.
Rhythm is created by movement implied through the repetition of elements of art in a
non-uniform but organized way. It is related to rhythm in music. Unlike pattern, which demands consistency, rhythm relies on variety.
Unity/Variety You want your painting to feel unified such that all the elements fit together comfortably. Too much unity creates monotony, too much variety creates chaos.You need both. Ideally, you want areas of interest in your composition along with places for your eye to rest.
Elements of Arts
Color
DescriptionColor, or colour, is the characteristic of human visual
perception described through color categories, with names such as red, orange, yellow, green, blue, or purple. This perception of color derives from the stimulation of cone cells in the human eye by electromagnetic radiation in the visible spectrum.
Texture
Visual arts
DescriptionIn the visual arts, texture is the perceived surface quality
of a work of art. It is an element of two-dimensional and three- dimensional designs and is distinguished by its perceived visual and physical properties. Use of texture, along with other elements of design, can convey a variety of messages and emotions.
Shape
DescriptionA shape is the form of an object or its external boundary,
outline, or external surface, as opposed to other properties such as color, texture or material type.
Line
DescriptionThe notion of line or straight line was introduced by ancient
mathematicians to represent straight objects with negligible width and depth. Lines are an idealization of such objects. Space
Description Space is the boundless three-dimensional extent in
which objects and events have relative position and direction. Physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions, although modern physicists usually consider it, with time, to be part of a boundless four-dimensional continuum known as spacetime.
Typography
Description Typography is the art and technique of arranging type to
make written language legible, readable, and appealing when displayed. The arrangement of type involves selecting typefaces, point sizes, line lengths, line-spacing, and letter-spacing, and adjusting the space between pairs of letters.
Size
Think about a piece of art – wouldn’t it be boring if every shape and
object in the composition was the same size? Size, which is commonly associated with scale, is an important tool for artists to add emphasis and interest to their designs.
