The January 2012 Tutorial Discussion

[Gare]

However, Mike?

You've expressed something on this forum, and that in and of itself is worth its weight in gold.

In his later years, Albert Einstein put away the metaphysics and focused on the human condition. One of his revelations had to do with (drum roll, please): self-expression. He said in one of his writings that he felt strongly that the need for self-expression is not only a driving force in Mankind, but it often outweighs the needs for shelter and food.

It's that strong.

But self-expression has more avenues than I can count. First, let me tell you, Mike, that you shouldn't disqualify yourself as an artist, because you sort of have to define what an artist is before your practice denial!

My late father used to bash himself over the head trying to be "creative". He saw carpentry as his gold standard, and he wasn't talented at it, but damn if he didn't spend all weekend in his wood shop making semi-successful pieces of furniture for the family...who used to put it in the same closet where they kept the necktie gifts, the socks, and the Christmas fruitcake.

My dad was creative, however. He just didn't intellectually/emotionally embrace the reality that his mode of self-expression wasn't in woodworking—he was a positively awesome manager at G.E.'s television plant.

The point is that unfortunately, whenever a brilliant piece of software such as Xara is created, that has user controls that allow a non-skilled person to create pleasant designs—all of a sudden "drawing" becomes the gold standard of self-expression and of creativity. And this is very shortsighted.

What we all have in common on this forum is that we are interested in artwork: making it, viewing, occasionally criticizing it.

But isn't classical dancing just as legitimate avenue of self-expression? How about music? Drama? Hey, we have a LOT of drama on TalkGraphics!

If you have the perseverance, I can help teach you some of the skills for doing outstanding artwork. But if you fail, you shouldn't be unhappy, because drawing isn't the whole ball of wax, you know? An "Artist" merely means "someone who practices Art.", and as I've suggested, you can be artistic without ever picking up a brush or a sculptor's chisel. You can do desktop publishing layout in Xara, you can create animations, there's a lot of things you can do outside of drawing a photorealistic car.

If you live in a free country, you always have options for self-expression.

Be happy for that. In fact, do a little dance.

Who knows? You might discover that you're a gifted dancer.

My Best,

Gary

[angelize]

I have always had an eye for composition, I just never really realized it before! I wasn't lucky enough to be able to go to collage, and all my art and design skills are basically self taught. I have learned by doing and I will often turn to the internet as well as books. When I look at the examples in Gary's last post my eye is automatically drawn to the last one because it has different shapes and angles which make it more interesting and pleasing, at least to my eye. I often when doing ad layouts will use different angles and different objects to draw the viewers eye to what is important in the ad. A recent example is an ad we did for a local grocery store. The special was blueberries. The client likes cartoony style images in his ads so I drew 4 cartoon style blueberries each one a slightly different shape, none of them perfectly round and two showed the blossom end two did not. The berries were then arranged with different sizes and angles in a pleasing composition which lead the viewers eye into the ad and to the special price and the rest of the information.

[handrawn]

Which "artwork" is most interesting? Now: Why?

—Gary

I like the middle one - it has a natural flow and spacing
The first one has no discernable composition at all
The last one is going nowhere fast, if its not careful it'll fall off the cliff - maybe its 'composed' but interesting it is not, nowhere for my eye to focus...

composition.. i wuz taught it, but I learnt most of it by studying good works of art and deciding what made them good, something I still do...

[Gare]

I won't/can't defend the 3 compositions, Steve. But let me explain what I was aiming at:

1st one: deadly boring, because the 3 circles are the same size, the same color, and aligned in the vertical center of the canvas. I won't say there is no composition in this one—in the same way I cannot look at a person's act of self-expression and say, "This isn't Art". It might be awful art, but I feel it's presumptuous of a critic or an audience to deny a piece of self-expression as "Art".

2nd One: the one Steve likes best. Okay, fair enough. It's compositional improvement upon the 1st one: it used circles that have the same colour, but different sizes, and they are asymmetrically arranged. And there's an additional element—one circle overlaps the other.

3rd one: The composition is more complex than the 2nd one, and it could be debated whether it's "artistically better". That wasn't my point, sorry! I've added different colors, a gradient, and a different shape to the final piece. Actually, Steve, for the 30 seconds it took to draw the examples, I thought I had something going on with the simple abstract 3rd one. I thought I had it "reaching" up and to the right, to suggest motion. I didn't feel the 2nd one had "motion".

Perhaps we are looking for the aesthetic appeal in these examples and not the structure, in which case I should have kicked out the jams and illustrated three full-blown pictures of different levels of successful composition.

This is becoming Art School and not a thread on the January tutorial...which is okay, but I'd prefer members to discuss what they're learning and sharing, and I will butt out unless I see something going way off course, like the Titanic.

Let me leave you with this for today: Art is all about what? It's about feeling. Art without feeling is a technical drawing, IMO. Frances said she's self-taught to a certain degree, but I think more than that, she is following a natural instinct she has to express motion, order, disorder, conflict, harmony, all that good emotional stuff—by doing it with graphics.

A composition is a recipe, folks. You can taste the finished product, but you can't say, "Oh, look! A composition took my car keys, and is driving away in my rental!" It's an intangible structure, much like HTML, or other container that is a structure, a foundation, upon which artists build magic.

You're not supposed to see it, but you will notice it when it's not there.

Sort of like Santa Claus.

—Gary

[handrawn]

question: 'do you think I have what it takes to be a good cartoonist ?'
answer: 'how well can you write ?'

sequential art: composition means dynamics, dynamics means motion, motion means curves [that lead the eye]

but not as you say an art school , so back to the learning and sharing......

[Gare]

question: 'do you think I have what it takes to be a good cartoonist ?'
answer: 'how well can you write ?'

I love this, Steve! It is always such a joy when someone offers an answer that's much better than the question.

I'd prefer not to build a personal definition for "composition", because then there would be one for commercial art, one for advertising, one for daily cartoon strips and single panels...and if none of us can agree on a general definition, then "composition" defies definition.

How about: Composition is a quality of all art that directs the eye, that turns what could be a static visual into an experience of discovery. A well-crafted composition leads the viewer to exactly where the designer intends, makes the audience linger exactly as long as the creator intends, and deliberately makes certain areas of high importance, and others of subordinate visual interest.

Composition is sort of like the term "contrast" Contrast, in the context of art means (usually primarily) an area of difference in brightness values on a canvas. But it has several other artistic meanings.

I have to conclude that we need to provide visual examples on this forum as often as possible, because a graphic can transcend lanuages, and often get right to the gist, the kernel of an artistic truth.

Besides, we don't pay for server space on tg .
Okay, okay, let's keep uploads within reason,

—g

[jvila]

Gary,
Thank you very much for the examples, when I saw them my eyes went onto number two, after that when you explained the concepts about each one I can notice what you mean but my eye goes to the middle one hehehehehe.

I'll look for books as you recommend, let see what happends.

Thank you very much for all the answers and advices, you've written a lot more than I expected, I really value all the effort you're doing here.
Best regards

[mwenz]

Defining things makes my head ache <g>.

Yes, a pretty ill-defined series of statements. And a dichotomy you pointed out. Much of my life is filled with dichotomy though, so that's alright.

A little closer to my thoughts would be to write: I am not practiced in translating what I believe I feel, or about about how my mind interprets, a thought or an idea in a mechanical manner. One could practice an artist's version of free-writing, simply starting and seeing where it ends up. I failed miserably during early grade school in the artistic expression of finger painting, so there might not be hope. Heck, I probably asked my teacher what was the point of smearing paint on paper if it didn't resemble "something."

The thought about what artistic expression is and its many forms is well taken. Of course I am accomplished in many things, well capable in others, and perhaps excel in another. Those too are artistic expression ranging from a loose definition to a more pointed one. I was limiting the earlier comments to artistic design and element origination, not compilation or copying. My current business has plenty of avenues for artistic expression, such as this handle:



In the end it must be said all the business really does is specialize in copying dead people. That handle is a copy of one made in about 1890. The skill in replicating is artful.

Rationalization and babble aside, I am enjoying the discussion. It has served me as way of explanation of my starting point in the absorption and application of what I hope to get out of these new discussions that are happening.

Take care, Mike

[Karateed]

Hi Gare,

Ok, when I first saw the 3 dabblings, I immediately went to #3....didn't do it because of feel (as far as I know), but because of complexity. Motion....I see no motion in #1, #2 gets my attention on the intersecting circles then I move fairly quickly to the small circle so I see motion, mostly upwards...that's what happens when I look at 2, #3 for me was a more complex drawing, hence my 'technical' choice for the winning sketch....but when I look at it carefully, there is much quicker motion than #2 for me. It's probably because of the tiny, dark square...it draws my attention quite quickly....but after quickly viewing the other objects in the picture. I'm not an artist, at least not in the drawing sense, but am musically an artist.....when it comes to drawing I'm totally clueless but do know what I like when I see it.

What holds my attention on this thread are the varied explanations that give me a learning I never expected to see and when I can get more time (right now spent mostly with ukulele music - don't laugh, it's a serious relationship) I will dabble with my learnings and your explanations and will see what a neophyte is able to accomplish or at least learn....I find this all very facinating...thanks Gary.....

[Boy]

This is becoming Art School and not a thread on the January tutorial...

Thank you, Gary, for you open and passionate lectures on art. Sorry, but you have lifted this thread to Art School and you are the professor.

I have no idea if you can sustain this level of involvement over time – as this is a volunteer type of thing – but it’s much appreciated. For now, I consider it as an ongoing group tutorial where students can pop in (and out) and have very valuable experiences. Not only do you address specific techniques but also wider concepts and even philosophical aspects. In this way, the art of drawing and designing is lifted to a level that touches us on an existential level.

When you mention Einstein’s revelation that the need for self-expression is an essential human need it resonates. We are all creative and expressive beings who participate in the shaping of reality. I agree with you that there are endless ways to do so and that we shouldn’t get stuck in believing that there’s only one right way to express oneself artistically.

I was touched by your story about your father’s creative efforts in his wood shop. I immediately had a sense that this hands-on acts of creating and crafting where possibly a prerequisite for him being such an awesome (creative) manager at G.E. After all, management is often very conceptual and abstract, the actual acts of physical creation mostly being done by others (the specialists). I suspect that the whole process of imagining each piece of furniture, planning its execution and actually fabricating and crafting it must have helped him tremendously in communicating his plans to and having them be ingested and realized by the people in the plant. After all, I imagine, to him his wood shop was a mini plant so he knew what it took to take an idea all the way to fruition.

Wikipedia defines “art” as follows: “Art is the product or process of deliberately arranging items (often with symbolic significance) in a way that influences and affects one or more of the senses, emotions, and intellect”.

Doesn’t this describe much of our human activity? Of course, the word "deliberately" is key here.