Shell World: The 'Formal Elements'

There are 7 formal elements with which an artist can create whole worlds of visual experience.

The formal elements of art, also called the visual elements, are the basic units and the means artists use to create and design works of art. These are:

•LINE
•COLOUR
•FORM
•SPACE
•TEXTURE
•LIGHT

EXPLORING LINE

Line is a record of vision and feeling. It is also a human invention which allows the ability to communicate what we see. The path made by a moving point can be described as two basic line types: straight and curved. Line may also consist of actual marks that can be drawn, or it can refer to the external edges of a shape or form.

In paintings lines also occur by contrasts of light and shadow or through colour or shape. Whether seen or implied, line is unquestionably one of the artist's most articulate tools.

It encloses or liberates space, expresses feeling, conveys movement, suggests mass or volume and creates an image. It is a way to express a wide range of qualities from fast to slow, from serene to frenetic, or rigid to relaxed.

In Amiria Gale's painting the curved lines seem to have been drawn smoothly and with a flow, creating a sense of movement in the image.

EXPLORING COLOUR

Colour is the most emotional element of art. It effects our emotions directly, conditioning our moods, thoughts, actions and even our health. In previous centuries colour was termed the sensual part of art because it attacked emotions directly and had no boundaries or rules. Today terms like "seeing red" and "feeling blue" are part of contemporary language.

-For the artist colour is most usually the light reflected from a surface; however, it may be generated from an electric source, white light (sunlight) or even fire.

John Martin 'The Great Day of His Wrath' is a good example of a use of colour. This painting attacks emotions directly and has no boundaries or rules. We straight away think of something evil and dangerous as the main colours used are the dark colours.

THE COLOUR WHEEL

The British scientist, Sir Isaac Newton, discovered the colour spectrum in 17th c. which was turned into the colour wheel. The colour wheel enables us to see colours that are similar; they lie next to each other.

This circular colour spectrum best describes our perception of and the continuous flow of colours, while it establishes opposites across the diameters. The colours directly opposite of each other provide the greatest colour contrast. They are called the complimentary colours. In this way, the primary red is directly opposite the secondary green, which contains the primaries of red yellow and blue. When placed near one another they accent each other, making the other appear more vivid.

EXPLORING FORM

•The term form is usually used to describe three-dimensional solids and contained spaces. Form has both mass and volume, whereas, shape has only mass. To illustrate this, consider a flat piece of paper. It has two sides, each of which have equal mass. When the same piece of paper is rolled into a cylinder, it possesses both mass and volume.

The sculpturer Wendy Taylor creates amazing sculptures of different seeds. She formed bronze into a seed shape sculpture, which made the actual form of her work elegant, and interesting.

EXPLORING SHAPE

Like line, shape is an important element in both the rendering and seeing of art, it is used by the artist for three fundamental purposes:

•1. To suggest or represent a physical form.
•2. To achieve order, variety, and harmony in the composition.
•3. To express different qualities of moods and feelings.

The term shape refers to any area of a real or imagined object which is defined and rendered by other elements such as line, texture, colour, space or light. Shapes may be either organic, geometric, symmetrical, or non-symmetrical or a combination of both symmetrical and non-symmetrical. Flat shapes may create the illusion of three dimensions on a two dimensional surface and also appear on the surface of a three dimensional form. Unlike form, shape is actually two dimensional, possessing mass but not volume.

EXPLORING SPACE

Everything exists within space. Space can be thought of as the distance or area around, between, above, below or within places. In art, space can be described as either two-dimensional or three dimensional.

The space in two-dimensional artworks such as paintings, drawings, prints and photographs (flat space) is essentially limited to height and width. While there is no actual depth or distance in such works, artists have created techniques to create the illusion of depth or distance on these flat surfaces.

Through this application distant objects are rendered proportionately smaller than closer ones. The determining factors of this space depends upon the horizon line and vanishing points.

Another technique is known as atmospheric perspective.

This application renders distant objects and spaces with less detail and intensity than closer objects. For example, the use of bluer colours for distant shapes can suggest space between the viewer and the shapes.

Mona Lisa, 1504-1506 Leonardo da Vinci

What creates an illusion of space?

- Placement of objects

- Overlapping of objects

The flatness is destroyed in the picture and trasports the viewer into what appears to be a world of actual space.

Three Dimensional Space

Henry Moore

It is recognized as having height, width, depth, and is referred to as actual space. This would include sculpture, furniture, architecture, ceramics and jewellery. In the setting of a three dimensional work of art the viewer can freely move around and (in the case of architecture) through it.

Three dimensional art may use both positive and negative space as a means of revealing content and meaning. For example, in sculpture the spaces in and around the form can be described as negative space. Whereas the form itself may be described as occupying a positive space.

The consideration of how the artist uses both positive and negative space in the articulation of their expression is an important factor.

EXPLORING TEXTURE

Van Gogh

Texture can be both real and imagined. In two-dimensional artworks, the artist may produce a smooth or a rough surface in the application of the medium.

In the painting of Van Gogh, The Starry Night, the whole painting calls our attention to the methods of paint application or the painted surface. He created a variety of textures through the application of rapid bruch strokes and thick layers of oil paint.

Also in the painting of Vincent Van Gogh, Wheat Field With Ravens, 1890, the paint application creates a consistently rough surface which draws attention to the paint and its method of application. The high viscosity of the paint is apparent in this work and contributes significantly to the aesthetic content of the painting.

Texture often becomes an important clue to the material, its character, weight, and solidity. More importantly, the materials chosen by the sculptor have a great deal to do with its aesthetic content and its expressive quality.

Vincent Van Gogh, Wheat Field With Ravens, 1890

Oppenheim, Object (Le Déjeuner en fourrure), 1936

EXPLORING LIGHT

There are different feelings about light and dark when looking at a painting.

Light in our culture expresses goodness, intelligence, clarity and completeness. Darkness is just the opposite, expressing mystery, ignorance, evil and emptiness. The contrast between dark and light not only describes space and defines forms in art, it also conveys feelings, drama and a psychological as well as an aesthetic dynamic.

Artists often want to create a three dimensional illusion on a two dimensional surface. One of the ways this can be done is by rendering the effects of light and shadow as they fall on solid forms.

Aspects of the forms, blocked from the light, will cast shadows. Perhaps nowhere is this effect more dramatic than in the work of the Italian artist Caravaggio. This effect, called chiaroscuro, makes the forms and figures come alive through the dramatic contrasting values of light and dark.