The Principles of Design

The Principles of Design
1. Design: v. the organization of formal elements of art within the art work
2. Design: n. the composition of the artwork
3. Composition: a design or arrangements of elements of art
Vitruvian Man
1.
Mind and Matter
1. Transcendental and the material
worlds
2. Square: earthly
3. Circle: Heaven
Title: Illustration of Proportions of the Human Figure
Source/Museum: Galleria dell'Accademia, Venice
Artist: Leonardo da Vinci
Medium: Pen and ink
Date: c. 1485-1490
Size: 13 ½ x 9 ¾ in.
Design as a Vehicle for Change
1. Original house is pink
1. Addition is new and
different
2. Not meant to be a
cohesive whole
3. Contrasting forces
of old and new
4. Breaking down
rules of art
Title: Gehry house
Source/Museum: Photo: Tim Street-Porter
Artist: Frank Gehry
Medium: n/a
Date: 1977-1978
Size: n/a
The Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain
The Rasin Building, also known as the
Dancing House or the Fred and Ginger
Building, designed by Frank Gehry in
Prague, Czech Republic
Walt Disney Concert Hall
Title: Gehry house
Source/Museum: Photo: Tim Street-Porter
Artist: Frank Gehry
Medium: Axonometric drawing
Date: 1977-1978
Size: n/a
Balance
1. Balance: refers to the distribution of weight in the composition
2. Actual weight: the physical weight; mass, and pounds
3. Visual weight: the apparent heaviness and lightness of the shapes and forms
Symmetrical balance: Absolute
Symmetry
1. Mausoleum for Wife of
Shah Jahan
Title: Taj Mahal
Artist: n/a
Date: c. 1632-48
Place: Agra, India, Mughal period
Shah Jahan, who commissioned the Taj Mahal -"Shah jahan on a globe" from
the Smithsonian Institution
Artistic depiction of Mumtaz Mahal
Bilateral Symmetry
Cross is symmetrical
Title: Coronation of the Virgin
Artist: Enguerrand Quarton
Date: 1453-1454
Source/Museum: Musée de L'Hospice, Villeneuve-lès-Avignon.
Giraudon/Art Resource, New York.
Medium: Panel painting
Size: 72 x 86 5/8 in.
Asymmetrical Balance
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
large are closed to the fulcrum balances out a smaller circle further away
Two small areas balance a large area that are the same distance apart
A dark area closer to the fulcrum is balanced by light area of the same size farther away
A large are of light is balanced by a small dark area
A texture area closer to the fulcrum is balanced by a smooth area farther away
Title: Some different varieties of asymmetrical balance.
Source/Museum: n/a
Artist: n/a
Medium: n/a
Date: n/a
Size: n/a
Asymmetrical
1.
2.
Not mirror images
Have same visual weight
1.
2.
Bilateral symmetry
Scales empty: symbolic
1.
Truth
2.
Last Judgment picture in
background: Christ weights
the souls for entry into
heaven
3.
Own life
4.
Content
Painting is asymmetrical
Title: Woman Holding a Balance
Source/Museum: Widener Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Image © 2003 Board of Trustees, National Gallery of Art. Photo: Bob Grove.
Artist: Johannes Vermeer
Medium: Oil on canvas
Date: c. 1664
Size: Stretcher
24 ¾ x 23 x 3 in.
size: 16 ¾ x 15 in. Painted surface: 15 ⅞ x 14 in. Framed:
Asymmetrical Balance
Title: Boston Common at Twilight
Artist: Childe Hassam
Date: 1885-1886
Source/Museum: Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Gift of Miss
Maud E. Appleton, 1931.31.952
Medium: Oil on canvas
Size: 42 x 60 in.
Asymmetrical Balance
1.
2.
3.
Nostrums: Series, vile or remedies without proof of scientific evidence
Surgeon and Queen Elizabeth
1. Suppose to cure our bills and our social ills
2. Balance of power
3. David vs. Goliath
4. Impeding movement
“You are the patient I am the real person”
Title: Emetic Fields
Artist: Ida Applebroog
Date: 1989
Source/Museum: Collection of the Whitney Museum of
American Art, New York
Medium: Oil on canvas
Size: 8 panels, 102 x 204 ½ in. overall
Title: Zeeg (Spill Series)
Artist: Nancy Graves
Date: 1983
Source/Museum: Private
collection. Courtesy Knoedler & Company, New
York. © Nancy Graves Foundation/Licensed by VAGA, New York, New York.
Medium: Bronze with polychrome patina
Size: 14 5/8 x 10 in.
Radial Balance
1.
2.
Radial Balance: everything
radiates from the center
outwards
Rose window representing the
last judgment
Title: Rose window, south transept, Chartres Cathedral
Source/Museum:Chartres, France. © Art Resource, New York
Artist: n/a
Medium: n/a
Date: c. 1215
Size: n/a
Radial Balance
1. Radial balance as spiritual and
religious meanings
2. Artist is Navajo and Euro-American
1. Imbuing found objects with
cultural meanings
1. Animals become spirits
Title: Animal Spirit Channeling Device for the Contemporary Shaman
Source/Museum: Photo by the Artist. Courtesy of the artist.
Artist: John Feodorov
Medium: Mixed media
Date: 1997
Size: 15 x 12 x 3 in.
Emphasis and Focal Point
1.
2.
3.
Emphasis draws the viewers
attention to the focal point
Complementary colors
1. Red and Green
2. Contrast between the
ordinary and the
imported lobster
3. Balance of Light and
Color
4. Exercise in good taste
Court of Louis XVI (French)
1. Academie Royale
1. Only four women
painters
Title: Still Life with Lobster
Artist: Anna Vallayer-Coster
Date: 1781
Source/Museum: Toledo
Museum of Art, Toledo, Ohio. Purchased with
funds from the Libbey Endowment, Gift of Edward Drummond Libby.
Medium: Oil on canvas
Size: 27 ¾ x 35 ¼ in.
Emphasis of Staged Scenes
1.
2.
3.
4.
Emphasis: to draw viewer’s attentions to on
part of painting
Focal point: where all the emphasis meets
Light and color used to provide emphasis
Divine light, emphasis on Christ himself not
Joseph
Title: Joseph the Carpenter
Source/Museum: Musée du Louvre, Paris. Scala/Art Resource,
New York.
Title: Judith and Maidservant with
the Head of Holofernes
Artist: Georges de La Tour
Medium: Oil on canvas
Artist: Artemisia Gentileschi
Date: c. 1645
Size: 18 ½ x 25 ½ in.
Date: c. 1625
Emphasis of Staged Scenes
1.
Innocence and Sheltered childhood
1. Parsifal: grew up to be a knight charged with
retrieving the spear of destiny
2. Chauvinism: prejudice of the Third Reich’s quest
for power
3. Mythology of the Spear of Destiny contained at
the Treasure House in Vienna, later invaded by
Adolf Hitler in his quest for world domination
Title: Parsifal I
Artist: Anselm Kiefer
Date: 1973
Source/Museum: Tate Gallery, London. Purchased
1982.TO340.
Medium: Oil on paper laid on canvas support
Size: 127 ⅞ x 86 ½ in.
Afocal
Source/Museum: Albright-Knox Art Gallery,
Artist: Larry Poons
Buffalo, New York. Gift of
Seymour H. Knox, 1964. © Larry Poons/Licensed by VAGA, New York, New
York.
Date: 1963
Medium: Acrylic on canvas
Title: Orange Crush
afocal: the eye does
not rest, no focal point
Title: Les Reines de France
Artist: Anselm Kiefer
Date: 1995
Source/Museum: Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York.
97.4558.a-.c.
Medium: Emulsion,
acrylic, sunflower seeds, photographs, woodcut, gold
leaf, and cardboard on canvas
Size: 3 panels, 220 ½ x 290 ½ in. overall
Afocal
1. Without a focal point
2. Scene of the Spanish Court of King
Phillip the IV and Queen Mariana
3. Figuring out the focal point
4. Intension of the artist is to elevate
painting into the realm of nobility
and higher status
Title: Las Meninas (The Maids of Honor)
Artist: Diego Velázquez
Date: 1656
Source/Museum: Museo del Prado, Madrid. © Giraudon/Art
Resource, New York.
Medium: Oil on canvas
Size: 10 ft. ¾ in. x 9 ft. ¾ in.
Title: Philip IV, King of Spain
Artist: Diego Velázquez
Date: 1652-1653
Source/Museum: Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. Erich
Lessing/Art Resource, New York.
Medium: Oil on canvas
Size: 17 ½ x 14 ¾ in.
Title: Portrait of Queen Mariana
Artist: Diego Velázquez
Date: c. 1656
Source/Museum: Meadows Museum, Southern Methodist
University, Dallas. Alger H. Meadows Collection. 78.01.
Medium: Oil on canvas
Size: 18 3/8 x 17 1/8 in.
Title: Las Meninas, detail
Artist: Diego Velázquez
Date: 1656
Source/Museum: Museo del Prado, Madrid. © Erich Lessing/Art
Resource, New York.
Medium: Oil on canvas
Size: n/a
1. Scale: the size relation of an
object when viewed in relation
to its surroundings or natural
form
2. Proportion measures the
differences in scale parts of
whole and its surroundings
3. The supporters of the hero
carrying the pediment
1. Male and female 12 inches
high
2. Different ethnicities
Title: Public Figures
Artist: Do-Ho-Suh
Date: 1998-1999
Source/Museum: Installation
view at Metrotech Center Commons,
Brooklyn, New York. Courtesy the artist and Lehmann Maupin Gallery, New
York.
Medium: Fiberglass/resin, steel pipes, pipe fittings
Size: 10 x 7 x 9 ft.
Symbolic Meaning of Scale
1. The artificial topping of the
culture which is art
1. Maraschino cherry
Title: Spoonbridge and Cherry
Artist: Claes Oldenburg
Date: 1988
Source/Museum: Minneapolis
Sculpture Garden, Walker Art Center,
Minneapolis. Photo courtesy of Walker Art Center.
Medium: Stainless
steel and aluminum painted with polyurethane enamel
Size: 29 ft. 6 in. x 51 ft. 6 in. x 13 ft. 6 in.
Title: The Daughters of Edward Darley Boit
Artist: John Singer Sargent
Date: 1882
Source/Museum: Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Gift of Mary Louisa Boit, Julia
Overing Boit, Jane Hubbard Boit, and Florence D. Boit in memory of their father, Edward
Darley Boit. 19.124.
Medium: Oil on canvas
Size: 87 3/8 x 87 5/8 in.
Symbolic Meaning of Proportion
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Scale to depict depth: illusion
Proportion: relationship between parts of and object and the whole or its surroundings
Fuji: everlasting, Japan
Juxtaposing the life of a Nation with fleeting time and individuality of life
Everyone the Japanese culture knows how big Mount Fuji is
Title: The Great Wave off Kanagawa, from the series Thirty-Six Views of
Mount Fuji
Artist: Hokusai
Date: 1823-1829
Source/Museum: Giraudon/Art Resource, New York.
Medium: Color woodcut
Size: 10 x 15 in.
Scale and its Impact
1. Artist as an activist
2. Speaking about hidden truths about AIDS
1. Artist had aids and died at age 38 in 1996
2. Symbolic Meaning of the empty bed
1. Emptiness
2. Loss
3. Loneliness
4. Death
3. Scale meant to shock the public
Title: Untitled
Artist: Felix Gonzalez-Torres
Date: 1991
Source/Museum: Courtesy of Andrea
Rosen Gallery, New York, and
Museum of Modern Art, New York. © The Felix Gonzalez-Torres Foundation.
Medium: Billboard
Size: Overall dimensions vary with installation
Beauty as a function of Proportion
1. Canon; a set of rules that outlined the perfect
proportions of the human body (text is now lost)
2.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/parthenon/program_t.html
Title: Doryphoros
Artist: Polykleitos
Date: 450 BCE
Source/Museum: Roman copy after lost bronze original.
National Museum, Naples. Art Resource, New York.
Medium: Marble
Size: Height 84 in.
Goddess Athena: wisdom
Golden section
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/parthenon/program_t.html
Title: Parthenon
Artist: n/a
Date: 447-438 BCE
Source/Museum: Athens, Greece. D.A. Harissiadis, Athens. ©
Photographic Archive, Benaki Museum.
Medium: Pentelic marble
Size: 111 x 237 ft. at base
Source/Museum: Musée Picasso,
Artist: Pablo Picasso
Paris. Cliche des Musées NationauxParis. © R.M.N. © 2003 Estate of Pablo Picasso/Artists Rights Society (ARS),
New York.
Date: 1931
Medium: Oil on canvas
Title: Woman with Stiletto (Death of Marat)
Title: La Memoria de Nuestra Tierra
Artist: Judith F. Baca
Date: 1996
Source/Museum: USC Student Topping Center. © 1997 Judith
F. Baca. Courtesy of the artist.
Medium: Preliminary drawing, acrylic on canvas
Size: 9 x 23 ft.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Oppression of the Chicano Community at USC campus
Chavez Ravine: houses and communities demolished to make way for Dodger Stadium
Kiva: traditional southwest symbol of community and ceremonial center
River of life and modernity with the highway
Aztec god in protest of the defamation of its people
River of blood.
Title: La Memoria de Nuestra Tierra
Artist: Judith F. Baca
Date: 1996
Source/Museum: USC Student Topping Center. © 1997 Judith
F. Baca. Courtesy of the artist.
Medium: Acrylic on canvas
Size: 9 x 23 ft.
Repetition and Rhythm of shape and color
Title: Barber Shop
Artist: Jacob Lawrence
Date: 1946
Source/Museum: The Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo, Ohio. Purchased with funds from
the Libbey Endowment, Gift of Edward Drummond Libbey. Artwork © 2003 Gwendolyn Knight
Lawrence, courtesy of the Jacob and Gwendolyn Lawrence Foundation.
Medium: Gouache on paper
Size: 21 1/8 x 29 3/8 in. (53.6 x 74.6 cm)
Repetition and Rhythm of form and content
Title: Gates of Hell with Adam and Eve
Artist: Auguste Rodin
Date: 1880-1917
Source/Museum: Stanford University Museum of Art. Photo:
Frank Wing.
Medium: Bronze
Size: 25 x 158 x 33 in.
Repetition and Rhythm of form and content
(same figure)
Title: Three Shades
Artist: Auguste Rodin
Date: 1881
Source/Museum: Stanford University Museum of Art. Photo:
Frank Wing.
Medium: Bronze
Size: 36 x 36 ½ x 21 3/8 in.
Horror of Images through Repetition and Rhythm
Repetition of Horrific Event
Title: Untitled
Source/Museum: Courtesy the artist
Artist: Laylah Ali
Medium: Gouache on paper
Date: 2000
Size: 13 x 19 in.
Unity and Variety
Title: The Seven Valleys and the Five Valleys
Artist: James Lavadour
Date: 1988
Source/Museum: Collection of Ida Cole. Courtesy of the artist
and PDX, Portland, Oregon.
Medium: Oil on canvas
Size: 54 x 96 in.
Title: Untitled
Artist: Jean-Michel Basquiat
Date: 1984
Source/Museum: © 2003 Estate of Jean-Michel Basquiat/Artists
Rights Society (ARS), New York/ADAGP, Paris
Medium: Acrylic, silkscreen, and oilstick on canvas
Size: 88 x 77 in.
Postmodernism
1. Unity within the disorder
state
2. Postmodern lets all
things artful and deemed
unacceptable in
1. Moderns and historic
art exclude all that
which does not fall
into the norm of fine
art
2. Postmodern is the
first truly democratic
art movement
Title: Las Vegas, Nevada
Source/Museum: SuperStock, Inc.
Artist: n/a
Medium: n/a
Date: n/a
Size: n/a
1. Banal domestic subject
2. 9ft tall
3. Rabbit and talking tea cup
1. Separation of two forms
Title: Just in Time
Artist: Elizabeth Murray
Date: 1981
Source/Museum: Philadelphia Museum of Art. Purchased: The Eadward and
Althea Budd Fund, the Adele Haas Turner and Beatrice Pastorius Fund, and funds
contributed by Marion Stroud and Lorine E. Vogt. 1981-1994-1a,b.
Medium: Oil on canvas in two sections
Size: 106 x 97 in.
Title: The Railroad Bridge, Argenteuil
Artist: Claude Monet
Date: 1874
Source/Museum: The John G. Johnson Collection, Philadelphia
Museum of Art. J#1050.
Medium: Oil on canvas
Size: 21 4/5 x 29 2/5 in. (54.5 x 73.5 cm.)