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The Language of Art and Architecture

I. Formal Elements

A. Line

1. Line – A line is a moving point, having length and no width.

2. Actual lines – Actual lines physically exist and can be broad, thin, straight,

jagged…

3. Implied lines – Implied lines do not physically exist, but appear to be real.

4. Directions – A line’s direction describes spatial relationships.

5. Line quality – Line quality can express a range of emotions, fragility,

roughness, anger, whimsy, vigor...

6. Gesture – Gesture lines - rapid, sketchy marks mimicking the movement

of human eyes when examining a subject.

7. Outline – Outline - follows the edges of a silhouette of a 3-d form with

uniform line thickness.

8. Shape –

9. Contour lines – Contour lines mark the edges of a 3-d object with varying

line thickness and with some internal detail.

10. Cross contours – Cross-contours - repeated lines around an object and

express its 3-dimensionality.

11. Hatching – Lines can produce tones, or values, as in parallel lines of

hatching.

12. Crosshatching – Many thin, parallel lines create the illusion of a light gray

tone, parallel lines layered on top of each other create darker gray tones.

B. Light and Value

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The Language of Art and Architecture

1. Light - basis for vision, necessary for art, energy stimulates the eyes and

brain.

2. Ambient light – the light all around us.

3. Vales – one step on a graduation from light and dark.

4. Tone – another word for value.

5. Achromatic value scale – extremes - white and black, gray tones in

between.

6. Chromatic –

7. Shading or Modeling – manipulating gradations in values creating the

appearance of natural light

8. Chiaroscuro – Renaissance Italians used the term chiaroscuro to describe

light-dark gradations.

C. Color - visible in refracted light, a spectrum of color, like a rainbow.

1. Refracted –

2. Spectrum –

3. Reflected –

4. Hue – pure color, the color’s name

5. Value – lightness and darkness within a hue.

6. Shade – Black added to a hue

7. Tint – White added to a hue

8. Intensity (Chromo/Saturation) – brightness or dullness of a hue.

9. Neutral –
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The Language of Art and Architecture

10. Local colors – normally found in the objects around us, yellow hay, and

gray-and-white clouds

11. Additive color system – applies to light-emitting media.

12. Subtractive color system – Artists mix pigments* to control the light that

is reflected from them.

13. Pigments – Pigments are powdered substances ground into oil, acrylic

polymer, or other binders to create paints

14. Primary colors – red, yellow, and blue.

15. Secondary colors – orange, green, violet

16. Tertiary color – blue-green

17. Analogous colors – similar in appearance, next to each other on the color

wheel.

18. Complementary color – opposites on the color wheel.

19. Color wheel –

20. Relative – Color perception is relative, we see colors differently

depending on their surroundings

D. Texture and Pattern

1. Texture - a surface characteristic that is tactile or visual.

2. Tactile texture - consists of physical surface variations that can be

perceived by touch.

3. Simulated textures - mimic reality

4. Abstracted texture - is based on existing texture but has been simplified

and regularized.
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The Language of Art and Architecture

5. Invented textures - are products of human imagination.

6. Mosaic - a picture created out of small colored glass or stone pieces,

which are affixed to a surface.

7. Pattern - a configuration with a repeated visual form.

8. Natural patterns - occur in leaves, flowers, clouds, crystal formations,

wave.

9. Geometric patterns - have regular elements spaced at regular intervals.

The black and yellow patterns are abstracted from human or animal features and

have a geometric quality.

10. Pattern - architecture: creates visual interest or functions as decoration.

Helps organize idea into visual diagrams that make relationships clear.

E. Shape and Volume

1. Shape - 2-d visual entity.

2. Regular shapes - are geometric

3. Irregular shapes - are organic or biomorphic

4. Volume - is 3-dimensional.

5. Mass - Volume may have more or less physical bulk.

F. Space

1. Planar space - the height and width of the picture surface.

2. Perspective, creating the illusion of depth on a flat picture plane.

3. Atmospheric perspective -refers to the light, bleached-out, fuzzy handling

of distant forms to make them seem far away.

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The Language of Art and Architecture

4. Linear perspective - the theory that parallel lines appear to converge as

they recede.

5. Horizon line - corresponds to the viewer’s eye.

6. One-point perspective - the frontal plane of a volume is closest to the

viewer; all other planes appear to recede to a single vanishing point.

7. Two-point perspective - a single edge of a volume is closest to the viewer,

all planes appear to recede to one of two vanishing points.

8. Three-point perspective - only a single point of a volume is closest to the

viewer, all planes seem to recede to one of three vanishing points, creates the

illusion of forms that receded to the left, to the right, and downward.

9. Isometric perspective - used in architectural drafting, renders planes on a

diagonal that does not recede in space. The side planes are drawn at a thirty-

degree angle to the left and right.

10. Oblique perspective - a three-dimensional object is rendered with the front

and back parallel, gives a sense of space going back from the lower right to the

upper left.

11. Multipoint perspective - various sections conform to different perspective

systems.

12. Space in sculpture and architecture - consists of the footprint occupied by

the structure and also the voids and solids within each piece and immediately

surrounding it.

13. Space in installation or performance art - can be particularly significant

because part of the meaning comes from the environment.

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G. Time and Motion - are related, motion cannot exist without time. motion marks

the passage of time.

1. Time - is the period that viewers study and absorb an artwork.

2. Motion - is implied by: rhythmic repetition of abstracted forms

3. African masquerades - are art forms that incorporate art objects, singing,

dancing, and community celebrations and rituals.