1. Line The line, one of the seven elements of art, is crucial for shape and form. Traditional definitions suggest a moving dot overlapping to create a straight line, while dotted lines are not. Lines are often mixed for visual texture.
2. Shape Shapes, formed when a line returns to its starting point, can be geometric or organic, and can be negative or positive. They have no depth, height, or width, and can be seen as synthetic or man-made. Rectilinear shapes symbolize stability, while curvilinear shapes create a chaotic yet malleable feeling.
3. Form Forms are advanced shapes, three-dimensional with depth, and can be geometric or organic. Incorporating forms in paintings is challenging, but painters, illustrators, and draughts use visual illusions through lines, colours, and value.
4. Space Space is essentially the surroundings of forms. It represents volume or the area around the focal object. Space can be connoted through the following techniques:
5. Value Value in art refers to the lightness and darkness of a color, typically between white and pitch black. It creates contrast between two-dimensional objects and the background, with higher contrast making subjects stand out and lower contrast making them blend in.
6. Colour Colour, a reflection of light, comprises three primary, three secondary, and six tertiary colours. Colour theory, based on color wheel, color value, and scheme, aids artists. Hue, chroma, saturation, brightness, purity, and temperature influence perception.
7. Texture Texture is the tactile sensation of an object, often represented through brush strokes or marks. It reflects light differently, like popcorn walls. Modern texture in painting can be achieved using impasto techniques, first used by Titian.