Hi, I'm artist Lillian Gray and in today's lesson,
we are going sky high up into space. No, I'm joking, not that kind of space.
We're talking about the seven elements of art space. Space within an artwork.
Space is one of the seven elements of art along with line, value, texture, colour, shape,
and form. Space is the area in which an artwork is organized. Space is always a part of an artwork
but sometimes in multiple ways. When people refer to space in an artwork, they could be referring
to various aspects of the artwork, such as the actual place the artwork is exhibited or created,
or the negative and positive space of the artwork. So enjoy this video as I explain the various
aspects of space in art.
Site-specific art is artwork created to exist in a certain place.
Typically the artist takes the location into account while planning and creating the artwork.
For this type of art, it's impossible to isolate the work from its surrounding environment. These
can include sculpture, graffiti, installations, and land art. One of my favourite site-specific
artworks is a 300-meter mural that street art legend Keith Harring painted on the Berlin wall.
The Berlin wall was a guarded, concrete barrier that physically and ideologically divided Germany
into two. Keith Harring painted his distinctive figures in the form of a human chain,
interlocking their hands and feet to represent the unity of people against the Berlin wall.
He did so using the colours of the German flag. The creation and process
of this artwork brought a lot of attention to that specific place and space in history.
This is similar to Banksy that created a series of artworks in Palestine's Gaza strip.
In 2011 there was an uproar when the artworks were literally cut out of the stone walls and
removed from the Palestine area to be exhibited in galleries. Banksy fans argued that the works
were created for the Palestinian people. Out of context, it does not have the same humour
and significance. There are two types of space: positive space and negative space. The actual
object is the positive space and the area around the object is the negative space.
Sometimes artists intentionally try to blur the boundaries between positive and negative space.
Dutch artist MC Escher often plays with positive and negative space in his art,
creating interesting optical illusions. He also often toys with our perception of depth to create
interesting visual puzzles. The surrealist painter Salvador Dali also loved to play with
positive and negative space in his artwork. This is a beautiful painting of his true love Gala.
Understanding positive and negative space is also very important when artists do printmaking.
Printmaking are techniques such as linocut, where artists have to cut away the negative
space to get a positive print. In sculpture and other three-dimensional artworks, we call it
open or closed spaces. Open spaces are empty and closed spaces contain physical structure.
Then there is also white space. In design and art, we often talk about white space,
but white space isn't always white. It is a design term. This is the empty space in a composition, to
create breathing space or focus in an artwork. The area you do not fill in your artwork or design can
be a key element in your art. We also use space in 2D artworks such as paintings and drawings.
As artists, we're often taking a 3D object and portraying it in a 2D space,
So we need to create an illusion of depth. Many two-dimensional artworks create the illusion of
three-dimensional space by using some very specific techniques. Artists often combine
these techniques in various ways to create depth in their artwork. These techniques include size,
where we scale objects with a smaller object being further away from the eye.
Here we can see Japanese artist Hokusai's artwork on how he uses size to create depth,
with the smaller boats being in the background and the bigger boats in the foreground.
Another technique artists use to create depth, is overlapping. This is when we put one object
behind another to show that the one is further away and the other one closer to the eye. Collage
artist Marcela Monreal creates amazing depth by overlapping various layers of his portraits.
Another technique artists often use is placement,
where we place objects on the plane. When we move further towards the horizontal line,
we create an idea of depth. Another technique artists use is detail. By giving the object that's
closest to the eye more detail than others that are further away, it creates a sense of depth.
Here hyperrealist artist Jason De Graaf uses this technique by blurring objects in the background
and painting the objects in the foreground with extreme detail. Artists can also use colour and
value to create a sense of depth, by giving the objects closest to the eye much darker
value and then gently decreasing the value as it proceeds to the back. here we can
see South African artist Pierneef using this technique to create depth and a sense of space.
Artists often create the illusion of space through perspective drawings
In art we get one-point perspective, two-point perspective, and three-point perspective,
where we create linear perspective with vanishing points and horizontal lines.
The Renaissance art movement is known for its dramatic shift in the use of space and depth,
with early work using shallow depth and later works incorporating lots of depth. Leonardo da
Vinci is known for using perspective drawings to create an illusion of depth in his work.
One of the most famous being the Last Supper, where Christ's head is the vanishing point.
When creating depth as an artist, you also need to consider your layers. This includes your
background, foreground, and middle ground. But usually, you need a lot more layers to create
an expansive sense of space. When creating lush environments like this animation by
in an artwork. Cluttered space can create a feeling of being trapped, overwhelmed.
Symmetrical space creates a feeling of balance, shallow space that has very little depth
and flat space. Next time you visit a gallery and you are looking at a painting, photograph
or sculpture, how would you describe the way artists approach space? What qualities do you see?
Now let's improve your own art. How can you create a better sense of depth in your artwork? Which
techniques can you combine? Which techniques do you need to practice to get better at it?
I hope you guys are blown away and you now know how to create depth or the illusion of depth
in your artworks. This is Lillian Gray, give us a thumbs up and stay tuned for the next
elements of art video. Visit our website and buy our amazing worksheets to understand the
seven elements of art. This is a great tool to save teachers time and for students to really
learn how to apply the seven elements. The link to buy these worksheets is in the description below.