Artist Tip #13 - Principles of Design (Part 3)

We've been discussing the seven Principles of Design:

• Contrast
• Gradation
• Repetition with Variation
• Harmony
• Balance
• Dominance
• Unity

We saw how contrast, gradation, and repetition with variation help us to make our paintings more interesting and less boring.  We'll now begin discussing the final four principles that balance these first three, and help us pull our painting together into a unified whole.

Harmony refers to elements that are similar, and mainly applies to color.  For example, green is harmonious with yellow or blue, since it is near them on the color wheel.  Harmony need not be applied to the entire painting, and can provide peace and rest even when used only in parts of our paintings, but let's look at some extreme cases - paintings with a strong harmonious overall color-temperature scheme.

In Country Christmas, the overall purple, blue, and green colors - near one another on the color wheel - give the entire painting a cool feel.  Notice that there are touches of warm, mainly in the wooden fence and the distant trees, to provide some color contrast:

In The Old Guard, on the other hand,  reds, yellows, and browns dominate, giving the overall painting a warm feel:

The principle of Balance that we will discuss next applies mostly to shapes, though it can also apply to other elements - particularly value.  An unbalanced painting, with most of its shapes on one side, is disturbing to view.  If we think of balance in terms of weight, large shapes "feel" heavier than small shapes, and dark shapes "feel" heavier than light shapes.  In addition, balance can be either formal, with similar shapes in similar positions on both sides of the painting, or informal, with larger shapes on one side close to the center, and small shapes on the other side, nearer the painting edge.  Think of informal balance on a seesaw or teeter-totter, with a large child near the fulcrum balancing a smaller child near the end, and you'll have the idea.  We generally find informal balance more pleasing than formal balance.  Balance applies to paintings horizontally, not vertically - a painting that is "heavier" on the bottom "feels" fine.  But if it's heavier on the top, it can seem odd.

The painting Making Headway is a very good example of informal balance:

The small sailboat on the left further from the center balances the larger sailboat on the right which is closer to the center, making the painting feel well-balanced.  Another example is Hobie, where the large sailboat near the center is balanced by the two smaller sailboats further away:

The balance does not need to be this carefully contrived to make the painting feel right.  Our final example is Concentration:

In this painting, most of the weight of the painting, in terms of shapes and value, is on the left.  But just having the fishing rod extending to the right, out of the painting, is enough to give the painting a balanced feel.  The "weights" need not be accurately computed, there just must be something to balance a large weight on one side of the painting.

Our next artist tip will cover dominance and unity, finishing up our discussion of the principles of design.  Stay tuned!  And if you've found the discussions of the elements and principles of design worthwhile, realize that in this blog I can only scratch the surface.  If you want "the whole story", attend my upcoming 1-day seminar titled Design for Painters on April 30 in Hot Springs Village, Arkansas.  For a description of this seminar, go to my Workshops web page, and for more information about registering, go to my Events web page.

If you've missed some of my artist tips, you can retrieve all of them by finding the search box in the right-hand column of this blog, and searching for artist tips.

Big Cat - Original Watercolor Painting

This big catamaran looks like it means business. It's moored with other sailboats in a marina in Coconut Grove, Miami, Florida.

If you'd like to purchase this 11" x 15" original watercolor painting for $200 including shipping within the United States, you can do it securely on my website www.jimoberst.com (click on the image). There are additional paintings for sale there, and my smaller paintings are available on my other website www.weeklywatercolor.com.  Add a unique original painting to your collection! Join my fine art e-newsletter mailing list Here.

Artist Tip #12 - Principles of Design (Part 2)

In Artist Tip #11, we listed the seven Principles of Design:

• Contrast
• Gradation
• Repetition with Variation
• Harmony
• Balance
• Dominance
• Unity

and discussed the first two.  In this tip, we'll move on to the third design principle...

Repetition with Variation tells us to introduce variation into any repeating object in our painting.  Examples include trees in a forest, fence posts, clouds, rocks, etc.  Our natural, human tendency is to paint repeated objects uniformly, but unfortunately, repetition without variation is dull and boring.  So unless we're designing wallpaper, we need to overcome our natural tendency and include variation, even when the objects before us appear very uniform.

It's best to vary as many elements as we can - size, direction, color, spacing, edge texture, etc.  We should try to vary lines as well as shapes.  For this reason, it is seldom a good idea to use a ruler for lines on our paintings.  To represent a group of items, often three are sufficient.  We can think mama, papa, baby to help us vary the sizes of the shapes we paint.

 In the painting Lazy Afternoon, we can see how variation can be applied to lines:

The lines that represent the stems of grass and grain vary in size, direction, width, and type (straight or curved).  This creates interest in a painting that would be rather boring if all of the grass and grain stems were of similar size, width, and direction.

Making Headway illustrates a number of shapes repeated with purposeful variation:

Note first the three sailboats, each of a different size, and with different spacing between them.  The sailboats are also a good example of applying the mama, papa, baby principle.  Varying the repeated spaces between shapes is just as important as varying the shapes themselves.  The clouds, also , have variation in size and shape.  Finally, look at the foam breaking on the beach.  The variation and randomization of its shape has been  exaggerated compared to actual foam on a beach to make the painting more interesting to look at.

A third example of repetition with variation can be seen in River Town:

Rural landscapes often include a line of fence posts, and in reality they may be quite uniform.  But to make our paintings more entertaining, it's important to vary the posts - their height, thickness, direction, and the space between them.  If we don't think about doing this purposely, our natural tendency will lead us to make the posts uniform, and our paintings a bit boring.

You will find it instructive to take a second look at these painting examples and try to identify where the first two design principles - contrast and gradation - have been applied.

We've now discussed the first three principles of design, which help us to make our paintings more interesting and less boring.  In our next tip, we'll start to discuss the remaining principles that balance these first three, and help us pull our painting together into a unified whole.

Twilight Sail - Original Watercolor Painting

The sailboats' grace is in harmony with the peaceful sunset.

If you'd like to purchase this 11" x 15" original watercolor painting for $200 including shipping within the United States, you can do it securely on my website www.jimoberst.com (click on the image). There are additional paintings for sale there, and my smaller paintings are available on my other website www.weeklywatercolor.com.  Add a unique original painting to your collection! Join my fine art e-newsletter mailing list Here.