White Objects Thumbnail Sketches

  

These are three possible compositions for my White Objects Painting. I chose the horizontal one because I liked the symmetry of the two pitchers facing in opposite directions.

Using composition as a tool

We have been and will be using everyday objects as the subjects of our paintings. At times you might feel like you're not getting to tell a story or create an exciting painting because you aren't always able to select the objects you paint. One way to make a required still life YOURS is to use composition as a tool.

Composition is the placement or arrangement of visual elements or ingredients in a work of art. It can also be thought of as the organization of the elements of art (color, line, shape, form, space, texture) according to the principles of art (movement, balance, emphasis, contrast, proportion, pattern, rhythm).

Look carefully at the paintings below. In which painting does the composition take the painting beyond being just a picture of everyday objects? Which composition is the most interesting and why? 

Choose the painting you think answers these questions and paste it into a post on your blog (don't forget to add the title, artist, and date). Answer the questions above using the vocabulary we've been building in class.

Still Life With Three Puppies, by Paul Gaughin, 1888

Custard Cascade, by Will Cotton, 2001

Still Life With Watermelon, by Fernando Botero, 1992

Lemons on a Pewter Plate, Henri Matisse, 1926

This is week 3.

This week we'll be aiming to get our color charts and Studies in Smallness finished so we can start a larger painting of all White Objects. Students last year across the board said the White Objects Painting was the most frustrating assignment of the course, but that they also learned the most from doing it. The learning curve is about to get steeper!

Also, make sure your blog is up-to-date by checking the blog roll hanging next to the bulletin board in the studio and in the BLOG BLOG BLOG folder on First Class. It's time to get into the routine of posting homework and works-in-progress to your blog by Friday and commenting on two of your classmates' blogs by Monday.

I'll continue to post examples of what you should be posting to your blog here on the class blog and label those posts TO DO ON YOUR BLOG.

Studies in Smallness: finished paintings

  

These are my three finished paintings.

I struggled with _______________ because of _______________. I felt successful about ___________________________ because of ______________.