Balance

The image below is a 1610 painting by Michelangelo called "Doubting Thomas (Incredulity of Saint Thomas)" and it shows asymmetrical balance.

 

 

 As the arrows show, the painting can be divided into two sections both vertically and horizontally. The yellow arrow splits the painting into two balanced sections. Both above and below the line, there is a great deal of light very close to the arrow. These areas of light essentially cancel each other out. The same can be said of the dark areas in the corners of the painting. Since each side of the arrow contains a similar amount of darkness, balance is achieved. Looking at the white arrow, we can see that there is balance between the areas to the left and right of it. The arrow is off center due to the amount of darkness there is on the right side of the painting. It is counterbalanced by the bright light that appears at the far left.

Visual Movement (Continuation)

The image seen below is "The Hurdy-Gurdy Player" and it is an oil painting that was completed by George de la Tour sometime between 1628 and 1630. It is a great example of visual movement as the arrows on the second picture show.

 

 

Below, the arrows, alternating between the colors white and red, show the pathway that the viewers eyes take when looking at the painting. The combination of light and shadows takes the viewer on a path that starts near the toe of the musician's left foot, travels up his left leg to the bottom of the instrument, follows the light up to the top of his head, goes down through his chin and right hand until it reaches his right knee where it cuts back down toward his right foot before finally following the shadow from his foot to the original point that we started at. This clear pathway that takes the viewer throughout the painting and then back to the original point is a good example of how visual movement can be implemented into a piece of artwork.



Impasto

Impasto is "paint applied very thickly to canvas or support."

Above is an untitled, 1961 work done by Robert Ryman. It is an oil painting on unstretched linen. In the image, you can see the brush strokes that the artist used as the paint as been applied very thickly to the linen, giving it an actual, physical texture. The way Ryman applied the paint appears to have created layers of paint on top of one another, giving it the look and feel of a textured surface.

Pattern

Pattern is defined as "a repetitive motif or design."

One of Andy Warhol's most famous paintings, "Campbell's Soup Cans," is a group of synthetic polymer paintings on thirty-two canvases that were completed in 1962. This is a great example of pattern because it is just the same image repeated onto 32 different canvases. As a whole, they become one piece of patterned work featuring a single design repeated many times.

Complementary Color Palette

A complementary color palette would be a range of colors consisting of colors that are opposite of each other on a color wheel (i.e. blue and orange).

 

 

Seen above, "Wall Drawing 853" is an acrylic painting by Sol LeWitt from 1998. It consists of three panels, with each panel consisting of two complementary colors placed side by side. To the left, green and red are placed together. In the middle panel, blue is seen above orange. All the way to the right, the complementary colors purple and yellow are juxtaposed.

This image was found at http://www.massmoca.org/lewitt/walldrawing.php?id=853

Primary Color Palette

A Primary Color Palette would best be described as a range of colors consisting of red, yellow, and blue.

This here is "Bear" by Brice Marden. It is an oil painting that was completed in 1997. This clearly uses a primary color palette because it is comprised entirely of reds, blues, and yellows, which are all primary colors. There are no other colors within the painting, meaning that it does not contain any secondary colors, further verifying that Marden used a primary color palette.

Cross Hatching

Cross Hatching is when "one set of hatches (parallel lines) are crossed at an angle by a second, and sometimes third, set of hatches." The closer that the hatches are together, the darker the area in the drawing appears.

The image here is "A Sibyl" by Michelangelo Buonarroti and it is a pen and ink on paper drawing from around 1520. This is a great example of cross hatching because, as a viewer, you can see that there are several instances throughout the work where hatches meet each other at an angle in order to create a sense of depth. In the mid-section of the subject, you can see that it is very dark. This is where multiple hatches are drawn very close together. In areas where it is not as dark, the hatches are further apart. The key difference between cross hatching and hatching is the fact that, as is the case here, there are multiple sets of hatches that cross each other.