• Special message If you would like in-depth instruction on working with warm and cool colors, we have
just launched a new Academy course called Working with Warm and Cool. Throughout the month of February, you can take advantage of our introductory price of $95. After then, it will revert to the regular price of $130. Every brushstroke we place on our paintings influences how the eye sees the painting's componants. To some painters, the direction of the brushstrokes is as important to the painting as the images are. Van Gogh ranks high among those! But even painters like Vermeer, whose brushstrokes remain relatively subdued, were still paying close attention to the direction in which the brush was moving and what it was
doing to the painting. WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES THAT MAKE? Think about this: any visible change in direction causes the eye to follow the path of that direction, no matter how large (such as the bend of an arm) or how small (such as a single visible stroke of the brush). Van Gogh's brushstrokes, for the most part, follow the direction of the shape he is describing whereas Vermeer used a change in value to show
that. Compare how Van Gogh's brush direction follows the bends and folds in the man's shoulder to how Vermeer's direction of value change causes us to see bends and folds in the girl's
shoulder, without visible strokes. When we are painting, the way we arrange all images and what we do to them creates an overall direction that guides the eye throughout the piece. Within that major path, we create varying directions of minor paths that lead the eye to wander within the images, and from one area to another. Below are two crude diagrams to illustrate that. Both show the same kinds of images arranged almost identically in a gray space. The top one suggests how brushstrokes like Van Gogh's might guide the eye within the larger shapes, and the bottom one illustrates how changes in value
like Vermeer used do a similar thing. Same kind of subject, different methods of creating directional movement. Enjoy a awe inspiring weekend! During my Language of Painting series, I explained the role of our visual elements. If you'd like to review those roles to better understand the behavior of elements, here are the links to each of those
discussions: Color --Value -- Shape -- Texture -- Size -- Line and Direction
You can access the archive of all my newsletters (as well as the Quick Tips and other stuff) at any time by going HERE.
|
