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Making a Giant Look Immense and Powerful

What makes The Colossus look so gigantic?
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GIANT, noun: (in folklore) a being with human form but superhuman size, strength, etc.
Dictionary.com

There are very tall people among us now, and no doubt there always have been. Here are photos of just a few of them:

Zhan Shi Chai (1840s-1893), Chinese, Eddie Carmel (1936-1972), Israeli-American, Ralph Madsen (1897-1948), American, and Sultan Kosen (1982-still living), Turkish.

These unfortunate people have often ended up being exhibited as freaks in circuses, and as there are few other job openings for them or anyplace where they "fit in," they usually grudgingly accept their fate and allow themselves to be exhibited. Their abnormal size is usually a result of a tumor on their pituitary gland (which regulates growth). Rather than being super-healthy, their condition often causes them to die young. These people are startlingly tall compared to the rest of us, but of course none of them have been "giants" of the kind that we know about from legends and fairy tales. They are not the type to cause an earthquake when they walk or eat a pile of whole roast oxen for dinner.

The giants of mythology and stories and movies and so on are always huge beyond a size that humans have ever grown to, and are extremely strong and powerful and often looking for a fight with gods, or with other giants, or else they're looking for a meal. No matter if they might be supposedly "friendly," such a giant would be frightening, as even the most careful and courteous giant might inadvertently step or sit down on people or animals or houses, etc., or knock over a building. He (sometimes she) would also use up the resources of the local "little people" in a hurry.

Though it's obvious that giants of this type have never actually existed in real life, they've been invented by writers, artists, and storytellers as metaphors to fill different needs. For instance, it is likely that the giant ("Colossus") in the painting shown below is meant to represent the Spanish people resisting Napoleon's invasion.



The Colossus - 1808-10
A clearer reproduction
Artist: This painting was formerly attributed to Francisco de Goya, but some experts now believe it is by Asensio Julia (1760-1832) (Here is a much better article on Julia, but in Spanish), a pupil and friend of Goya (Spanish - 1746-1828)
Picture, from Wikimedia, is in the public domain

To me this giant looks definitely of gargantuan size and strength, in addition to appearing somber, serious, and powerful. One would think mountains would crumble as he walked by.

What are some of the things the artist has done that make this giant seem so gargantuan and powerful? It's not just the size he has made the figures in the foreground, which are tiny in relation to the giant. If we are able to see this picture more clearly and in a larger size, we'll see there are people and animals in the foreground fleeing the area, but I didn't even notice them when I first looked at this dark reproduction of the picture, and wasn't aware of them until I read about them later; they just looked like specks of debris to me. When I saw another reproduction, I could see them, but even when I didn't know they were there the giant looked extremely gigantic. In fact, it seems to me that you could remove the bottom third or so of the picture, leaving out all the comparatively tiny humans and animals, and he would still look of monstrous size.

And what if we leave the bottom of the picture intact - Why is it that we don't see the Colossus as a man of normal size and the fleeing people and animals as being very tiny?

There are several things I can think of that the artist has done to make the Colossus look so gigantic and powerful. Here is what I've been able to come up with so far:

Borrowing the immensity of the sky

- There is the fact that he blends in with the black sky, making him "as big as the sky," since in many places you can't really see where he ends and the sky begins. I think that is one of the most effective methods the artist has used to imply monstrous size. What is bigger than the sky?

Making the giant appear to be rooted in the earth

- Although he seems to be part of the sky - or the sky seems to be part of him, at the same time he seems to be "rooted" in the earth (his body from the thighs down is either in a very deep valley or at the bottom of the ocean...neither one of which seems likely...or he is supposed to be buried from feet to thighs in the earth, not immobilized, but in order to appear figuratively deeply of this place and not about to be unsettled by mere interlopers), and this secure attachment to the ground gives him a look of great stability, adding to the impression of power and invulnerability.

Comparing his height with the height of the clouds

- He rises above the clouds...that alone makes him seem huge.

Contrasting his size with that of the clouds

- There is also, of course, the contrast in size between the clouds and the giant.

Contrasting his size with that of figures in the foreground.

- Mentioned above.

Having his eyes closed to show control of a huge reservoir of emotional energy

- The giant appears to have closed eyes. To me at least the closed eyes add to the feeling of power and strength contained within his massive and stable body. The closed eyes remind me of closed vents on a steaming pressure cooker. They show that he's holding back extremely strong emotions in order to keep them under control, presumably in order to make the best use of them, though he could explode with fury and action at any second.



Making him appear reddish
- One thing that helps make him look powerful is the lighting, which presumably is caused by a setting sun, making him reddish, and therefore hot looking, which causes him to appear very "alive" and possibly angry or otherwise possessed by a powerful emotion about to erupt.

Illuminating the giant from a low angle

- The light shining on the giant is coming from a low angle, illuminating him as a just-setting sun would throw dramatic reddish light on a monstrous thundercloud to the east. Lighting him from "below" helps make him seem even taller.

Positioning his body so that he looks even bigger

- His raised arm and fist make him look bigger -- It gives him more bulk; and although his back is in blackness, much of its outline is clearly defined by the lighted clouds beyond it, so that we are aware of the thickness of the middle of his body -- If the background behind his back had also been black, he would not have looked so big and powerful. He would have look very tall, but "flimsy," not thick and strong.

Positioning him so that he appears to be rising

- Also, the raised arm, capped by a huge fist aimed upwards, along with the nearby head of the giant (which so strongly pulls our attention so near the top of the picture), makes it seem as if he's rising (and, as Arnheim [see Note 3, below] points out, what is rising is what we are alarmed by -- what is drooping or lying flat does not scream out "danger" to us; it calms us down as it is non-threatening). A rising giant (and/or the rising arm and fist of a giant) is definitely alarming.

Using a strong diagonal to show action

- The raised arm is the only really noticeable diagonal in the composition. We all know that a diagonal that is not supporting something signals "action," though that action could be "rising" or it could be "falling." The arm does look like it's rising, rather than falling, as the fist seems to "pull it up." Action, especially "rising" action, implies energy and power.


Providing a viewpoint that makes the giant look huge

- Another thing that adds to the impression of hugeness is how the giant appears from our viewpoint. Even though he is a great distance away, we are looking "up" at the giant from approximately the level of his thighs, knowing that the rest of his lower body is far below our eye level. Just imagine how it would affect us if we saw such a thing from this viewpoint in real life.

Putting him in the upper part of the picture

- There is also the fact that objects that are higher up in a picture seem heavier than they would if they were lower in the picture. The giant is the only thing in the upper part of the picture, other than the clouds (which are "floating"). His raised arm and fist plus the thickness and three-quarter view of his body give him great width in this part of the picture. If his arm had been at his side and the hugeness of his back not defined by the light-colored clouds behind it, he would have looked tall but not massive. But he does have a raised arm and fist and etc. Not only that, but as mentioned, just because these things are so high up in the picture it makes him seem even heavier, and stronger. (If a person can easily hold up that much weight - the weight of his monstrous body - we can assume he is very strong).

Putting him in the distance

-- Oddly enough, something else that makes him look huge is putting him at such a distance from the foreground. How do we know that the giant is far in the distance? One way we can tell is that the mountains are in front of him (i.e., between the giant and the viewer) -- We may not assume that those dark shapes are mountains but even then we know that the entire foreground, whatever it is, is between him and us, cutting him off at the upper thighs, thereby, to our eyes, pushing him back behind something, which of course indicates that he is in the distance.

-- Another thing that implies distance is the dramatic difference in lighting between the foreground and background. Where the giant is, in the distance, the evening sunlight is still trickling through, but in the foreground you can hardly see what is going on; it is as if it's already nighttime there. Such a difference in lighting indicates a difference in depth. Knowing he's at a great distance, the fact that he still looks enormous is rather stunning.


Putting him in the vertical center

- He is basically, as far as the legs and main trunk of his body is concerned, in the vertical center of the picture (though turned toward the left). Being in this position stabilizes him and makes him seem invulnerable.

Having him turn toward the left
- The fact that he is turning toward the left might show an attempt to push back at something that is coming at him from that direction. Action in a picture generally is imagined to begin at the left side and in this case the giant stops it and keeps it from going further. (Due to the fact that his base is firmly "planted" along the central vertical of the picture, the giant does not seem to have come from elsewhere, but to be defending himself from his home base, there in the center of the picture.) Having him turned toward the intrusion shows that he is quite aware of the danger and is able and prepared to do something about it ("the sleeping giant" has been awakened and he is furious).

Including fleeing people and animals

- Although these are hard to make out (at least in the copies of the painting I've seen), when you do notice them, they appear to be moving at top speed away from the giant, indicating, I would guess, one of three things:1) The giant is scaring them; 2) They know that something horrific is about to happen involving that giant and whatever he is facing; or 3) They are trying to escape whatever the giant is confronting, leaving him to take care of the problem. In any of these cases the giant, be he friend or foe, is having a terrific impact on these people and their animals.

Selecting a suitable format

- The picture is in the shape of a vertical rectangle, though not far from being a square. That is, it's "squat." This format reinforces the stocky, sturdy, powerful look of the giant.
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Although I have not seen the original painting, and I have probably not even seen a good reproduction (the picture shown here is the only one I've studied; I chose it because it was explicity said to be in the public domain), the ways in which it appears to me that this picture makes the giant look tremendously huge and powerful are still valid. My point is to reveal ways in which to make something look immense and fightfully strong and energetic. Certainly techniques such as these have been, and are, used not only in stories and drawings, paintings, photographs, etc., but also in other art "products"...from architecture to advertising...to make something - anything - appear to have similar qualities.
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NOTES:

1) The thoughts presented above on how the artist has made the giant appear to be so huge and powerful are my own, based on what I have read and understand; I am not pretending to be an expert, but I am very interested in composition and study the subject constantly.

2) I'm aware that The Colossus is now considered by some (most importantly, the Museo del Prado) to be the work of Goya's apprentice, Asensio Julia, yet it is very much in the spirit of what Goya himself would have done and some experts still believe it was painted by him. It doesn't matter here (in this post) who the artist was, as we're talking about how the composition makes the giant look gigantic, but it's interesting.

Here are some articles on this subject that you might want to read:
Wikipedia article on The Colossus (El Coloso), in English

Wikipedia article on El Coloso (The Colossus), in Spanish - This one is much longer and more interesting than the one in English.

"Does it matter who painted The Colossus - Goya or his apprentice?", Article in The Guardian (U.K.),

January 27, 2009, by Adrian Searle

Museo Nacional del Prado on the attribution of El Coloso
This is in Spanish, though Google will translate it. It's a long, very detailed, illustrated explanation of why they consider that El Coloso was not painted by Goya.


3) Rudolf Arnheim

Books by Arnheim consulted for this post:
--- The Power of the Center
--- Visual Thinking
--- Art and Visual Perception

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The Square Format - Example 2

THE SQUARE FORMAT


Cliff Dwellers - 1913
Artist: George Bellows (1882-1925)

This is the second post with an example of the square format used in a painting. The first example was a painting by Alfred Sisley titled The Rest by the Stream.
The square format of The Rest by the Stream, helps achieve a very calm, restful effect. In the painting shown above, by George Bellows, the square format helps achieve a stifling, compressed, claustrophobic, "no way out of this place" effect. (It makes me think of the trash compactor scene in Star Wars.)

WHAT IS GOING ON IN THIS SCENE

Obviously these are poor people who cannot stand the heat inside these brick buildings they live in (and I assume their apartments are small and crowded, adding even more pressure). Of course there was no air conditioning back then. They have to go outside in order to get any relief at all, though they can't go far - either onto their tiny balconies or onto the crowded street and sidewalks directly below. One gets the feeling that the people in this scene are trapped, unable to get any real relief before they'll have to go back inside. Although outside of their rooms, they are still virtually imprisoned between the high apartment walls.

Although I did not read about what was actually going on in this picture before I first saw it, I knew immediately that this was a crowded tenement scene in New York. Where else could it be? I knew of the Ashcan artists of New York and what their usual subjects were, and that George Bellows was associated with them (though I had only seen his boxing scenes). I was especially familiar with the tenement drawings of John Sloan, which I have spent a lot of time looking at and am still fascinated by. (See Sloan's drawing called Night Windows (1910), on the Phillips Collection website; also, there is an article on John Sloan on Wikipedia.)

However, I am assuming that even if I hadn't known anything about these artists or their typical subjects or about the living conditions of recent immigrants in New York City in the early years of the twentieth century, I would have had a strong inkling of what was happening here because of what the composition and the square format are "saying," and I'm pretty sure you would have come to the same conclusions.

But what if a stranger who had just arrived from another planet and had never before seen these types of buildings or human beings, nor knew what we know about the times, the place, and the local artists were to observe this picture. Might they be able to quickly figure out what this picture was about? The basic idea, I mean. It depends. If their home planet was large and dense and gravity was as important there as it is here (which would probably be the case), it seems likely to me that the stranger would at least be able to figure out the basics: these creatures have been forced outside, they can't go far, they are trapped. Also, the alien -- being some kind of intelligent creature (here alone, observing, and curious) -- might realize that the "people" were at least some kind of animal life, probably intelligent (they are not all doing the same thing, so one might guess they're self-guided), and so on -- but what I'm most interested in here are the basic forces and the forms and directions and such that reveal them.

THE SQUARE FORMAT AND GRAVITY

Although the square format has been much used since the early 20th century for abstract and semi-abstract pictures for the very purpose of eliminating the appearance of the effects of gravity (which are so much a part of "realistic" painting), Bellows obviously did not wish to disregard gravity and in fact the effects of gravity are very much taken into account by the artist, and used to help us understand what is going on. Just one example: The people, sapped of energy by the heat, seem to have spilled from their no doubt sizzling apartments downward toward the relief of a lower, comparatively cooler and airier, stratum, but now that they are there they appear to be weighted down and barely able to move (note that everyone at the bottom of the picture is sitting at or almost at ground level, or has both hands and knees on the ground, and they do not look like they're about to get up). Our intuitive understanding of how gravity works to pull and hold people down when they're weak or tired or injured or sick helps to suggest or reinforce the idea of these people's lack of energy and lack of ability to do anything about the situation.

THE SQUARE FORMAT'S CONTRIBUTION TO THE OPPRESSIVE LOOK OF THE SCENE

In this square format, all four sides seem to be pushing toward the center or at least holding it very firmly in their coordinated grip, giving a feeling of compression throughout the entire picture. Of course there is help in creating this squeezing effect from the vertical edges of the buildings which repeat the verticals of the inward-pushing sides of the square, plus there are the converging perspective lines which make it look as if we're peering into a brick box, at the far end of which is a lighter-colored building which appears to be marching forward right up the street toward the crowd of people ... who, as we know, cannot escape. (All I can say is, this picture must have been a lot of fun to think out).

WHAT IS IN THE CENTER OF THE PICTURE

In Sisley's square painting, The Rest by the Stream, there is nothing but a blur of leafy branches in the middle of the picture, but this central area of indistinct "leafiness" seems to be surrounded by a "circle," which transforms it into something like a pinwheel that seems to move around and around hypnotically, helping to give the effect of movement and breeziness that spreads to the edges of the picture. This is a very refreshing effect.

The center of Bellows' inner city scene is also virtually empty - There is nothing to focus on there. But just as is the case with The Rest by the Stream, the empty space is surrounded by a "circle." In this picture it is a virtually inert circle of people (in the foreground as well as at the windows and fire escapes) along with the clotheslines at the top (a weak link that makes the bottom of the circle seem heavier). A circle has somewhat of a mesmerizing effect; it holds your attention. The people are around the edges of it but they seem to be held to it, too. It seems that nothing is allowed to escape this confining circle, only to drop to the bottom of it.

Besides employing the tondo-like circle (Arnheim calls these "internal tondos" - see in The Power of the Center, p. 130, by Rudolf Arnheim) within the already confining square format, in order to, among other things, make us see the pattern of distribution of the people including those just outside their rooms, the artist has seen to it that no one is making a move toward the edges, not even at the bottom where most of the people are concentrated; the people seem held in place -- they have escaped the worst, but this is as far as they can go. They are "held to the center" by the artist's composition (including his choice of the shape of the canvas).

The verticals of the buildings, especially the one in dark shade, very effectively keep the "circle" from spinning (as the center does ever so slowly in The Rest by the Stream by Sisley), thus oppressively helping to keep the people weighted down at the bottom. Those verticals are reinforced by the nearby presence of the verticals of the edges of the picture. Also, the convergence of the buildings as they go into the background, where they meet even more buildings so that there is obviously no escape via that route, adds strongly to the effect of claustrophic confinement.


A Day in June - 1913
Artist: George Bellows (1882-1925)

A COMPARISON

In the above picture, painted by Bellows in the same summer that he painted the Cliff Dwellers, the effect is quite different. These are not the people who live in the tenements. These people can go to a park with cooling grass and shade trees and have a pleasant picnic when it's too warm in their homes. You will have noticed right away that the picture is not square - it is a horizontal rectangle. The horizontal rectangle allows the people the possibility of moving beyond where they are and accommodates well a feeling of peace and ease and conviviality. This rectangle is made even more peaceful and unstressful looking by its division into two shallower rectangles, the upper one a dark green mass that looks very deep and inviting.  Also, there are views beyond of the blue sky with clouds (including at both upper edges, so that the dark mass of trees doesn't seem to continue on forever as do the buildings in the inner-city picture), and people appear to be moving beyond the confines of the frame as well as into the dark, cool interior. In other words, there is a feeling of "escape from stress" present everywhere. It makes Cliff Dwellers look like a pizza oven in comparison.

ALSO READ: The Square Format - Part 1 (The Rest by the Stream by Alfred Sisley)

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The Square Format - Example 1

THE SQUARE FORMAT


The Rest by the Stream - 1872
Artist: Alfred Sisley (1839-1899)

In this picture the square format helps achieve a peaceful, stable effect, much like a tondo (which is in the shape of a circle) does and for the same reasons (see Rudolf Arnheim's The Power of the Center, Chapter VI: Tondo and Square). The tondo shape, however, does not give a feeling of being grounded, which a square format is very capable of doing, and does here.

Although once you have seen this picture for the first time you may then look around the scene for details in other areas, your eyes are first and foremost drawn to the middle, where close and distant foliage mingle. For me, at least, that center area seems like a pinwheel that turns slowly and hypnotically, sometimes to the right, sometimes to the left, and it's hard to glance away from it.

The intense focus on the center (in spite of there being nothing there but indistinct leafy branches) has as much to do with the square format as with the large shapes in the composition that lead you there. A horizontal format or a vertical format would suggest something is happening or about to happen, or relationships are being revealed, or etc., causing you to look all around the picture to get some clues as to what's going on. But a square scene seems to just sit there quietly, its outer four edges implying a central point that they're all equally distant from and related to so that you simply can't help but look toward that calm and steady central point when you begin to search for the subject.

The square shape, with four straight edges of equal length and at right angles to each other, imply the balancing center of picture is in the actual "geometric" center of the square. This central focal point makes the picture (or at least whatever is at the very center of it) seem very balanced, solid and stable, as if it's not going anywhere nor is it concerned with anything that is outside of the edges of the picture. (Certainly an artist could make the subject look as if it's concerned with something beyond the edges, but in general the square format is used for a self-contained picture and it is very suitable for it.) The scene is made to look even more stable in this particular picture because of the depth the artist has given the scene, giving it the look of being inside a square "box" (cube) that is solidly resting on the earth's surface.

The role of the Cartesian Grid

The feeling of stability is further reinforced by the tree trunks that repeat the verticals of the sides of the picture, as well as the lower edge of the brightly lit grass behind the tall trunks and the bit of horizontality seen in the distant footbridge and suggested on the roof of the house at left which repeat the horizontals of the top and bottom of the square frame. These large and small bits of vertical and horizontal "lines" that can be seen imply a stable structure beneath the rolling ground and other curving shapes that fill the canvas. They suggest that the Cartesian grid is being utilized in this painting. The Cartesian grid considers the earth to be fundamentally flat (though of course, those who use the Cartesian grid know the earth is spherical; it is just that for many practical purposes it is flat enough within the areas we make use of that it is most practical for us to consider it flat and even to flatten it if it's not, e.g. in the case of floors, roads, sidewalks, and building foundations). The Cartesian grid (or Cartesian Coordinate System) is made up of verticals and horizontals that are perpendicular to each other. These horizontals and verticals are seen to be stable (inactive but solid and secure). When the structure of the Cartesian grid is evident in the composition, you are able to notice when things are not in line with it (i.e., not strictly vertical, or not strictly horizontal), thus enabling you to detect movement, direction, slopes, curves, etc. To find out more about what the Cartesian grid has to do with art, you might want to read an earlier post: Art, Gravity, Life, and the Cartesian Grid.

The Cartesian Grid combined with the Centric System

In this particular picture being discussed here (The Rest by the Stream by Alfred Sisley - see above) the Centric System and the Cartesian grid system are both effectively utilized to bring about the feeling of calm restfulness the painting's title promises.


Combined Centric and Grid Systems

The above diagram, which so perfectly applies to this square painting by Sisley, and more on this subject can be found in an earlier post, entitled Centric Systems. In that post it is noted that the Introduction to The Power of the Center, by Rudolf Arnheim, begins with this sentence: "This book derives from a single idea, namely that our view of the world is based on the interaction of two spatial systems." Those two spatial systems are the Centric System and the Cartesian grid system.

The similarity to a mandala

"Mandala is a Sanskrit word that means 'circle'. In the Hindu and buddhist religious traditions, their sacred art often takes a mandala form. The basic form of most Hindu and Buddhist mandalas is a square with four gates containing a circle with a center point." (This quote is from a Wikipedia Article on the mandala.) The article goes on to say that "mandalas may be employed for focusing attention of aspirants and adepts, as a spiritual teaching tool, for establishing a sacred space, and as an aid to meditation and trance induction."

Note how the mandala seen below combines the Centric System and the Cartesian grid system in the same way they are combined in the Sisley painting.

Tibetan Sand Mandala
Uploaded by Mary Mueller [CC-BY-2.0], to Wikimedia Commons

The cubical "enclosure"

The feeling of a snug cubic "enclosure" surrounding this scene also adds to the serenity and satisfaction we feel when viewing it. It is like viewing a scene in a glass sphere except that in the case of the cube we feel as if we could actually enter the scene, whereas the sphere rejects us -- we can only look at it from the outside. (You can read about the scene within a sphere under the last picture in an earlier post, titled Round Artworks).

There are other factors, also, which contribute to the
"restfulness" of this picture, but they do not have to do with its "squareness."

The Square Format - Example 2

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Visiting Spirits - Where Are They Coming From?

When it comes to the entrance of spirits onto a scene, the main rule is this (as we all know): The exceptionally good ("holy") and powerful spirits come from above and the exceptionally bad (as in "they are coming from Hell") and powerful ones come from below -- while ghosts of ordinary dead people enter at ground level (unless they're raised from their grave six feet below the surface - but then they end up at ground level or just barely above).

Another "rule" seems to be that these visitors usually enter the scene to the left (i.e., the viewer's left) of the person or persons they've come to interact with. Of course there are exceptions, but it does seem that most of them enter from the left, especially if it's their idea (or the idea of their superior, who has given them orders) to make this contact with one or more living humans (and sometimes animals); on the other hand, it seems that in most cases if someone summons a spirit then the summoner is shown to the left of the spirit.

An Angel Appears to Balaam - 1866
Artist: Gustave Doré (1832–1883)
From Wikimedia, this picture is in the public domain

The angel, who at this point can only be seen by the donkey, has obviously entered the scene from the left (i.e., the viewer's left), and obviously from above, as we can see that she has wings of a size that would be awkward for regular use at ground level but very useful for flying purposes, plus of course it is common knowledge that angels live in Heaven (which is "above").

Gottvater mit Propheten und Sibyllen - 1497-1500
Artist: Pietro Perugino (1446-1524)

When God himself decides to communicate with people on earth, things are a little different. In pictures he very often seems to reveal himself from directly above - or very close to it - and doesn't come anywhere near ground level. He is often in something resembling a bubble, or large halo (aureola) when he is in this location. In addition to announcing his "holiness," these appear to seal him off from everything outside them. This appearance by God does not have to do with approaching humans at their level. This is not a "visit" so much as "vision," or some kind of a revelation, and is a one-way communication, apparently without any expectation of, nor desire for, immediate personal response from the human(s) below. The fact that he is near the top of the picture also makes it clear that this is a picture that is meant to imply a hierarchy wherein the person "on top" has power over those below even though they may not come into direct contact with them.*

* Please see other posts on this blog that have to do with gravity and how it influences our interpretation of what is going on in a picture. Not only does our understanding of gravity "tell us" that what is up higher has more weight (in a picture - not in real life) and thus (at least if it is not very close to or actually touching an edge of the picture) has power over what is below it, but also we are aware that something that is higher up can "observe" and perhaps understand better (and for that reason, too, have an advantage over) those who are below -- while those below, of course, for the same reasons are at a disadvantage.

 

Picture from a German church

From Wikimedia - Photo of this painting taken by Andreas Praefcke

I don't know the story behind the deathbed scene above, but this picture seems to me to be extremely easy to read, with its zigzag composition that includes all the characters, who are arranged in a way that tells us much more quickly than words what is going on here -- Without knowing anything about this, not even the title, it appears obvious to me that: the man is dying and receiving the last sacraments from a priest who is no doubt at that very moment pleading with Mary to intervene and ask that this man's soul be accepted in Heaven. Mary is placed between God (who is above, and not personally participating in the deathbed event) and earthly life, and she is (looking at and) begging God to have mercy on this man and either to let him live...because, as it also very obvious, the man has a wife and baby who will be left behind if he dies...or to let him into Heaven. Meanwhile the devil, rising from blackness below, and unseen by all, is surveying the whole scene and apparently waiting to take the man's soul down with him to Hell. The scene is pertinent to this essay because of the visitations of Mary (from above left) and the Devil (from below right) as well as the appearance of God to Mary, who has summoned him in order to make a request.

As mentioned earlier, whether the living person is purposely approaching or summoning the spirit, or the spirit is approaching the living human of his or her own volition, sometimes seems to make a difference with regard to which side of the picture they seem to have entered from. I have noticed that it is usually the one who has the idea of communicating who is at the (our) left. In the above picture the summoner is the priest on behalf of the man. The devil has taken it upon himself to enter the scene -- he was not summoned by anyone.

Magician raising a ghost

Illustration from Robert Cross Smith's The Astrologer of the Nineteenth Century (1825)
The image is based on an 1806 illustration by Ebenezer Sibly.

In the above picture, the idea of communicating was that of the magician, not the ghost, yet the ghost is shown to our left. But if you look at the illustration this picture was based on, below, you will see that the artist, Ebenezer Sibly, shows the magician and his friend on the left and the ghost on the right.

Edw[ar]d Kelly, a Magician. in the Act of invoking the Spirit of a Deceased Person
Engraved by Ames of Bristol (1806), original drawing by Ebenezer Sibly

Ghost of humans who, upon death, did not graduate to Heaven nor plunge directly into the depths of Hell (they seem to still be entirely preoccupied with earthly affairs and want to be handy so they can interfere in them easily), may approach people from any direction (except from skies above or from below, with the exception of rising from their own grave or from a lower floor or basement), but generally they approach at ground level or at times floating, upright, just a tad above the ground (no doubt due to their weightlessness - It's hard to keep your feet on the ground when you're a ghost, apparently).

Cap'n Goldsack, Pirate Ghost
Artist: Howard Pyle (1853 - 1911)

Although the pirate ghost in the above picture appears to be approaching the viewer "from above," that is because he has been placed near the top of the picture; he is not actually descending from above (from the sky), but, rather, seems to be approaching at ground level (with no sign of having flown or floated in) and appears to be stumbling down into an indentation in the ground.  His position at the top of the picture, in fact, (helped by the darkness of the head) gives him the "weight" that makes him appear to be stumbling heavily downward.

The Witch of Endor Raising The Spirit of Samuel.

c. 1800

Artist: Willliam Blake (1757 - 1827)

"The Witch of Endor, sometimes called the Medium of Endor, was a woman who called up the ghost of the recently deceased prophet Samuel, at the demand of King Saul of the Kingdom of Israel in the First Book of Samuel, chapter 28:3–25."

I am not sure which of these figures is the witch, but I'm assuming it's the person on the (our) right side of the picture, dressed in blue. "Her" arm is raised as if to "pull up" the spirit (yet the spirit seems to only have eyes for the fellow in orange, who must be King Saul, though I don't know). All I know about this story is what is quoted in the above paragraph, but the story the picture tells is what concerns me. We should be able to get the general idea of what's going on without knowing the story ahead of time.

The witch seems to have pulled up Samuel directly out of his grave. The relationship between the three, if we are to go by their positions in the picture seems to be that it is the man on the left who is the one who summoned the spirit, using the witch to do so, and that would fit the short description quoted in the last paragraph. In other words, the entity whose idea it was to make contact is to the left (i.e., our left) of the ghost (which tells us why the ghost is facing in that direction).

Brutus and the Ghost of Caesar - 1802
Copperplate engraving by Edward Scriven

(1775-1841) from a painting by Richard Westall (1765 - 1836). London, 1802

Brutus, visited by the ghost of Julius Caesar, whom he has helped to kill, is obviously feeling very worried here. The ghost is probably no taller than Brutus would be if he were standing, but still he seems quite threatening not only because of his gesture and his evil look, but because he (particularly his head - the center of his thoughts, which lead to actions) occupies quite a large area near the top of the picture and "above" Brutus who has been sitting in a casual fashion, not ready to run anywhere. Also, Brutus has been surprised from behind by the ghost and being penned in by the table (and apparently a wall or a drape to his left) is not prepared for a quick exit whether he can get his feet under him or not.

Nissaka Man Receiving Baby from his Wife's Ghost - 19th Century
Artist: Utagawa Kuniyoshi

Above: The description under this picture says that this man's murdered wife (the ghost) has just handed her baby to her husband, and that the woman's spirit lives in the rock that her blood flows from.

I don't know whether the man went to the rock to implore his dead wife to give him the baby, or if he was just there to visit her spirit as one normally visits a grave of a departed loved one and it was her idea to hand over the baby, or if perhaps he has just killed her himself, though I doubt the latter as it does say her spirit "lives" in the rock as if has been living there for some time.

She is looking toward her husband but there is some reason she has turned her back on him after handing him the infant. Perhaps he killed her some time earlier, and giving him the baby was her revenge - though if he had killed her, certainly he wouldn't want to visit the place where she was murdered as he'd probably be very worried about what her ghost might do to him.

The fact that she is "above" him in the picture, in the same area that Ceasar inhabits in the picture above, may tell us that she is the one whose idea it was to appear to her husband...that it was not his idea. I really don't know. I am not (at this time) able to "read" this picture clearly. Possibly if I had been raised in the Japanese culture it would be obvious.

The Approach of Doom - 1788
Artist: William Blake

When I first saw this picture I thought it was unfinished. Then I realized, or supposed, that it was not, that we finish it in our own minds, not with any "thing" that could be seen, but with a huge feeling of dread of the unknown.

Whatever it is, this "doom" that is approaching is coming from the left and it is filling the air over and under and around the people, nibbling away at them - dissolving them. They are backed up at the right as if they had gone in that direction to escape, but now have nowhere else to go as they have reached a dead end. Their legs are straight and their arms are entwined so they can be as close together and as far away from the dreadful thing as possible, and they are looking the only way there is to look, directly into whatever it is, which they can't see clearly but know means their certain death.

No monster could look as frightening as this cloud of "nothingness" that is enveloping them and that there is no escape from. The white tentacle-like shape at upper left that seems to be leaping toward the huddled group makes us realize that this is no innocent fog but something that contains a hellish element that seems to be throwing its light onto them, seeking them out in order to find and destroy them, very likely by dissolving them so that they become part of the cloud.

You may think I'm reading too much into this because I know the name of the picture ("The Approach of Doom"), but try to imagine this picture with a less morbid name, such as "A Lovely Summer Night's Walk in the Cooling Fog." You would probably then look at the picture and say to yourself: "I don't think so."

My hope is that this little essay will help the reader to realize that the placement of objects in pictures, in relation to each other and in relation to the perimeter of the picture, is very important to the viewer's understanding of what the picture is about.

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How to Make a Fat Man Look Even Fatter

(And Like a Fool As Well)

A vertical format can make a subject look more slender and tall than it actually is.

Philip II of Spain - 1551
Artist: Tiziano Vecelli or Tiziano Vecellio (c. 1488/1490-1576), better known as Titian
From Wikimedia, this picture is in the public domain

But a vertical format can also accentuate fatness.

Porträt eines dicken Herrn, des sogen - 17th century

("eines dicken Herrn" seems to translate to "a fat lord")
("des sogen" seems to translate to "so-called")
Artist: Bernardo Strozzi (c. 1581-1644), Italian Baroque painter
From Wikimedia, this picture is in the public domain

This man, the artist seems to be saying, is not just fat - he's too fat (and not just fat but clueless - Strozzi did not like this guy).

A very large person can be made to look comfortable and quite acceptable and even admirable in his or her world -- the "world" of the painting. But Strozzi has made this large man look like he doesn't fit at all into the scene he has painted him into (even though the subject looks quite conceited, apparently completely unaware of how ridiculous he appears).

Other paintings by Strozzi show that those people he cared to flatter or whom he had something else to say about were not painted in the same way at all. For example:


David with the Head of Goliath - c. 1636
Artist: Bernardo Strozzi
From Wikimedia, this picture is in the public domain

David (as well as Goliath's head) blends in with the background (and foreground - let us just say with the "ground"), whereas the "fat lord" stands out as a dark figure against a very light background so that we can very clearly see his entire bulging contour. As we can see from the painting of David and Goliath, Strozzi did not paint all subjects alike - How he painted them had to do with what he wanted to get across about the subject, so obviously the artist made the "fat lord" look as fat as possible quite intentionally.

How the artist made the fat lord look bigger:

- First of all, he chose the shape of the overall picture: a narrow vertical rectangle. A narrow vertical format can help to lengthen and slenderize a bulky vertical subject but other factors have to be manipulated as well or the same vertical rectangle can make the subject look even bulkier than it is - because of the contrast between tall/slim and bulky/wide. This is especially true if the sides come quite close to the subject, indicating that it barely fits or even that it's expanding toward the edges of the composition. This is the case here.

- And of course the rectangular shape (rather than an oval or round shape) of the perimeter of the picture -- along with the straight vertical columns -- strongly suggests the "Cartesian grid" understructure of the painting, making it impossible for us not to notice the bulging shape of the man as contrasted with the straight vertical and horizontal lines of the grid.

- As mentioned above, there is the contrast of the very dark subject against the very light "ground," making his large and bulging profile extremely obvious, and in fact more immediately noticeable than anything else in the picture.

- The dark shadow the man's stomach casts on the column blends in with the adjacent stomach to make it seem even larger than it is. "Where the overlapping units together form a particularly simple shape, they tend to be seen as one and the same thing." (Rudolf Arnheim in Art and Visual Perception, page 121)

- The man is, for some reason, pulling up his hem. Not only does this show us that he has huge legs, but it also plumps up the fabric and adds more bulk to the profile on the side of the picture opposite the stomach.

- The slenderness of the sword, which reaches down to his feet, contrasts with the bulk of the body, making the body look all the larger. The sword is so narrow that it looks like it might snap under the weight.

- The sword also accentuates the protrusion of the stomach since it is directly in line with the stomach's profile beginning at its outermost extension and acts as an arrow that points out the outer edge of the frontal bulk. (Another function of the sword is to "pin down" the lord's balloon-shaped stomach, as it seems to be rising.)

- The "heavily planted" feet seem to be pushed downward by a great weight.

- The artist takes advantage of the fact that we perceive objects that are higher in the picture as being heavier than they would look in a lower position "[I]n a painting the higher an object is in pictorial space, the heavier it looks." (Rudolf Arnheim in The Power of the Center, page 24) Thus the stomach looks particularly heavy.

- The vertical shape (a column) that is closest to the man's body and to the front plane of the picture not only contrasts with the rotund shape of the man's body, making it stand out all the more, it (the column) also helps to "lift" the stomach up, making it seem all the more prominent (and even "active!") - as if it were being shown off. ("Look at my magnificent stomach!")

The reason the column appears to lift up the stomach is that it (the column) is seen to be rising like a rocket just starting to lift off the ground - and in doing so "pulling" the nearby stomach upwards with it. The reason the column appears to be rising is that although there is a very definite base attached to its bottom, essentially "blocking" any perceived downward thrust, in contrast there is no change in shape (like a bulge) or anything else (such as a capital at the top) that appears to slow down the "ascent" of the column at the top the picture, and so the column appears to continue rising upward and out of the scene. -- When something immediately adjacent to something else looks like it is reaching upward, as this column is, there is a tendency to perceive that almost-attached "something else" as being lifted along with it. (See The Power of the Center, by Rudolf Arnheim, pp. 21-23)

- The fat lord's maximum girth is above the horizontal center of the picture, attracting our attention to it more strongly than would be the case if it were lower in the picture where heavier objects, pulled down as they are in real life by gravity, are usually found.

- The man's hands seem to cradle a large globular mass (his stomach), thereby emphasizing its size and shape. And speaking of the cradling hands, notice the difference in their apparent size, with hand in the foreground looking much larger than the one in the background - yes, there is probably more of the hand that we can't see from that position but what is important is what we can see; also the hand in the background is darker by far than the very prominent and brightly lit larger foreground hand...This difference in hand size and brightness emphasizes the distance between the one and the other.


Hold cursor over pictures to read directionsClick on above pictures to see left divided into upper and lower halves, right divided into quarters
- The large pear-shaped face (which we can see clearly as it is lit from the side and is of a light color modeled by dark shadows) is similar to the shape of the main bulk of the man's body. The light/dark modeling makes the face and neck area look 3-dimensionally bulgy, suggesting that the adjacent similar (though much larger) shape is also 3-dimensionally bulgy.

- The fat lord's feet (it looks like only one foot is shown, but we assume the other is there beside it!) are shown sideways and they seem very long - Whether or not it's just that he has very long shoes, or whether part of what we see is the "flag" or whatever it is lying on the floor doesn't make any difference. It is the dark shape we see and where the foot ends and the shoe ends or where the material behind his foot ends makes no difference as it is all one dark mass that we see as "the feet." Even if we saw only a bare foot and knew where it ended, this sideways view of it is the largest image we could have of it; obviously the artist gave us this profile view of the feet to make them seem very large and virtually planted to the floor in order to emphasize the man's great weight pushing downward ... Look at that heavy-looking, downward aimed wedge-shaped calf directing all the weight of the body above into the shoe; the leg seems not to end at the bottom of the shoe, but, rather, the shoe that we see looks like it opens up at the bottom so that the wedge extends into a deep pit.

- Another way he has been made to look large and heavy is by seemingly rubbing up against the column, as if there wasn't room for him to stand without bumping into something.

How the artist made this man look foolish:

It has been implied by the artist that the man, who looks very conceited, and proud of his figure, is delusional and foolish. Here are some of the ways the artist shows that the man is not what he thinks he is:

- His facial expression shows that haughty and satisfied look just mentioned, in spite of the ludicrous figure he presents.

- He is holding a very odd pose in a very odd place, just barely fitting on that pedestal and facing in the direction of the column. Obviously there's nowhere to go in that direction; he has run into a blockade.

- Note the viewpoint, from a little below. The artist has put this man quite truly on a pedestal and has us (ironically) looking "up" to him. Actually it appears as if the fat man had put himself on that pedestal, having had to step up there in order to take that pose.

- The man is (awkwardly) turned to show his profile, as if showing off his huge stomach quite proudly. (I don't think the subject knew anything about this picture, do you?)

- Perhaps what looks like a crumpled flag under his feet and just behind his lower legs might be there to show that he is capable of crushing things easily. Or it could be the remains of a flimsy chair he had been sitting on. With the other "clues" we've been given, we tend to think that the reason that "crumpled fabric" is there probably has to do with this man's weight and/or size.

- Why is the man pulling up his hem and showing his huge leg?
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     The artist must have really enjoyed creating this picture (and probably his other pictures as well).  He knew what he wanted to "say" about this man (i.e., that this delusional fat man is a pompous fool), and in order to get that across he had to do a lot of thinking (or "problem solving") to figure out how to accomplish this goal.  Sounds like fun to me.

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Verticality - Heaven is Up and Hell is Down

A vertical format strengthens the theme of the great desirability as well as difficulty of reaching Heaven and the ease of descending to Hell instead.

Why? Because Heaven is "up" and Hell is "down," and a vertical format, which so unmistakably shows who's on top and who's below (metaphorically speaking) is the best format in which to show a hierarchy, in this case the hierarchy that has Heaven at the top and Hell at the bottom.

But why is Heaven up and Hell down? It's gravity that gives us an up and a down, and it's the effects of gravity that make going "up" difficult and therefore admirable and "down" easy and therefore unworthy. Down is the direction in which gravity constantly pulls us toward the center of the earth. Up is the opposite direction ... toward the sky. Gravity holds us in place on the ground or...if we dare to try to defy gravity and move upward by some means...is ever capable of pulling us back to earth, in a most deadly fashion if we dare to attempt to go further than we safely can. For most of the time humans have noticed this they have not had airplanes nor were they able to go so far "up" that they escaped the pull of gravity, so when they imagined gods - beings superior to us - they imagined them like the clouds and stars and the sun and moon, apparently unaffected by this powerful force that we mere humans experience here on earth.

Lucifer - The Fallen Angel by James Donahue
For an angel who is no longer welcome in Heaven alas there is suddenly a very definite "down."
Source: Wikimedia

As for Hell, it is the opposite of Heaven and it is a place into which we "fall." Naturally it's "down." But it is not at ground level. It's even further down than that. We do not start out in Hell, after all, and so If we fall into it, it must be further down than the level at which we start out, even if we do not attempt to ascend to Heaven.

The Ladder of Divine Ascent - 1612
(The Heavenly Ladder of St. John Climacus)
Source: Wikimedia

According to an article in Wikipedia, St. John Climacus was "a 7th century Christian monk at the monastery on Mount Sinai." St. John's literary output included "The Heavy Ladder of Divine Ascent" in which he described the thirty "steps" one must take in order to reach Heaven.

One can see that it's a difficult climb to reach Heaven as there are many temptations by devilish types along the way which can lead one, no matter how high they have climbed to fall down further even than to the ground from which they began. It looks to me like a monster from below the ground has his mouth open ready to swallow up those who fall. In any case, obviously Heaven is Up (and a hard climb) and Hell is Down (and an easy fall), and a vertical format is very suitable to get this idea across.

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Verticality in Artworks - 2nd Post

I'm going to write about this subject in several posts, to keep them small and easy to absorb.

When I say "verticality" I'm referring not just to the outside shape of the canvas of paper or whatever the picture is on, but also to dominant lines and directions within the picture.
Recently I've written some posts about horizontality in art in which you can read about (and see demonstrated) many different effects you can achieve through the use of horizontality. As you can imagine, to achieve opposite effects you might be able to use verticality instead (though it's not always quite that simple).

For example, if your goal is to emphasize a relationship between equals you might want to use a horizontal format, with whatever you want to portray as "equal" on the same horizontal level, but if you want to show who's (or what's) in charge, you might want to use a vertical format, with the one who clearly has the advantage in the situation above the one who is at a disadvantage, for example in the following picture.



Single Combat of Prince Mstislav Udadloi with Rededia - 1812
Andrei Ivanov, Russian painter - 1775-1848
Source: CGFA

In the above picture it's easy to see who is in control. (The angel above is "floating" and obviously not affected by gravity which is what (perceptually) determines who has the advantage; what is important is the relationship to the ground of whatever appears that it would be affected by gravity.) Of the two men in the fight (it was actually considered a "duel") we can probably safely assume that the eventual "winner" (Prince Mstislav) is the man in a vertical position (slightly inclined toward the other man in the competition in a threatening way) and who also is "above" the obvious loser who is apparently about to become permanently horizontal. The verticality of the outer shape of the picture helps to emphasize the dominating-dominated relationship shown by the vertical hierarchy within it.



The Card Players - 1890-92
Paul Cezanne, French painter
Source: The Athenaeum

In the above picture none of the card players is seen as having an advantage. They are all at the same level horizontally. Although the man in the blue smock against the wall is "above" the card players he is smaller and obviously at a distance behind them, has his arms folded as if holding himself back, and seems busy smoking his pipe, so he obviously is neither in charge of nor threatening to the card players. Often a servant or a bystander is shown standing behind a main character in a picture but they are not seen as in the space "above" that main character ... they are obviously at a distance and are played down in other ways also ... such as with subdued colors, lack of contrast with the background, etc.

There are other posts on this blog that have to do with horizontality and verticality. Look at the right side of the page for keywords to get to a page with all the posts that have been tagged by me with one or both of these keywords. There are also other posts that you might be interested in that may not be on that page -- Most anything to do with the Cartesian grid, for instance. There is a search box for this blog on the right side of the page, also, though I admit it's hard to find because the list of keywords is so long.
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"When adversaries meet on a horizontal base they are equally matched by their spatial position; in a vertical composition, however, having the upper hand spatially constitutes an advantage, whereas being in the lower position means having to overcome the pull of gravity as well as the opponent's onslaught." (Rudolf Arnheim in The Power of the Center, page 96)

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Horizontality and Composition

Some people may wonder why I'm writing so much about how we respond to "flat" landscapes (or cityscapes, or most any view other than of a single compact object) when it may seem to them to have little to do with art, but of course it does have much to do with art.
An artist has to know (if only unconsciously) what effects horizontality/verticality/mixed heights have on a viewer. As is the case with any other aspect of a composition he or she must know what to include or not include, and what to emphasize and what to deemphasize in order allow the basic shapes to help get across what it is he or she wishes to "say" about a subject and not inadvertently give the "wrong" message or make it confusing.
Just for a few examples of what you might be trying to get across: possibly you want to emphasize the subjugation of nature by man for his own ends, showing a landscape that seems to not allow for anything accidental, unplanned, or different from what man "needs" - or to make life "easy" - no matter that it might flourish in that environment ... Nothing that is not "necessary" is allowed to protrude/impose itself and although horizontality itself may not be required to achieve the effect you're after in this case (or in others), it could be something you would make use of.
Or you might want to show the triumph of nature (not necessarily plant life ... this could include other manifestations of individuality and accidental effects that interfere with the intention of man to impose his will on what comes naturally) over man's efforts to manipulate it and hold it back/down, in which case you might show a variety of directions and heights, not emphasizing the horizontal at all, or else show definite horizontality peppered by contrasting, very vigorous verticals of various heights (think "weeds"). Or you might want to show a happy mixture of the two ideas - man and nature getting along just fine.
Or perhaps you'd want to give the impression of  "hopelessness" via a barren-looking very flat landscape or show "individual uniqueness and spontaneity is respected and accommodated here" via a landscape in which there is a variety of plant life: bushes, trees, vines, seemingly growing naturally, appearing to not have been planted intentionally by people, where it appears that people have arranged their lives around what's in nature rather than the other way around...As I say, it need not be "plants" and could even consist entirely of man-made structures that appear to not have been constructed to fit a strict plan but instead to have arisen "spontaneously." Or a combination of plants and structures. It could include whatever is seen in the air, too.
These are only a very few examples of the endless possibilities.
You can see how horizontality can help you achieve what you want in some cases, or hinder it if you're not careful in others. (If you do not think about what impression your picture will make because of such things then it may confuse people or you may inadvertently be sabotaging your intention.)
The bottom line is that what is out there (in "real life" or on canvas or paper), no matter whether it's recognizable as things we see in the everyday world or not, has one or more (usually more) "messages" for us, and in art we must know what these are (otherwise why would we bother to produce art ... We can try to copy what we see as if we're a camera or we can just dab or scribble away and try for something "pretty" or "interesting" but if there is nothing in particular we want to communicate, why do it? And what is "artful" about it?).
The messages our pictures convey are not usually communicated only by the alleged "subject matter." They are communicated by the way the entire picture is composed -- through lines, colors, textures, shapes, patterns, rhythm, size relationships, directions, etc. We "understand" what the "whole picture" means because of how all of these things work together. We understand not only because of what we have learned from reading and listening, and from looking at pictures, and from watching videos and movies, from thinking about these things, and even from personal experiences with whatever the subject matter might be, but also from our what you might call "generic" or "non-specific to any particular subject" familiarity with the physical world we live in (i.e., the earth and the tiny part of the universe we're able to experience from here) and how it basically "works." (Our understanding of how gravity works is an example, and this is very important ... There are several posts on this blog that have to do with gravity, though there are presently only two that have gravity as a keyword that I've noted on the list at the right side of the page -- You can take a look at that list for gravity - Click on the word and posts that have quite a bit in them about gravity will come up on one page ... but, also, any post that has to do with the Cartesian grid is also about gravity as the Cartesian grid exists because of gravity.)
Click on the words "horizontal format" in this same list at the right side of each page to see the posts that are most closely related to this one you are reading now.

Stormy Weather

Artist: Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot (1796-1875)

Picture Source: Wikimedia
What do you think Corot might have been trying to communicate about man and nature in this picture, and how did he make use of horizontality to help him do so?
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JUST REMEMBER THAT A FLAT LINE SUGGESTS THAT "THERE'S NO LIFE HERE ... THERE'S NO THREAT ... IN FACT IT'S PRETTY DEAD HERE ... WE CAN TAKE OVER NOW."

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Composition - Relating to the Outside Edges

Lessons from Edvard Munch's The Murderer in the Lane.

The outside edges of a painting play a major role in determining what your picture is about.

We can't just start painting without considering how the edges affect the subject we are trying to portray. What is inside the picture must be related to the outside perimeter of whatever we're painting or drawing on from the very beginning ... as well as to the center of the picture (but of course we only know where that center is when we know where the edges are).

Usually, when we are not just practicing we paint (or draw, etc.) in order to present a subject in such a way that other viewers might see it as we do and respond to it as we wish them to.

I think that all artists have these object in mind, though some who may be earnestly trying to get their message across may not realize how they are sabotaging their own efforts by ignoring the edges of their pictures, not taking them into account at all except as places where they must stop painting because they've run out of room.

Before we even choose the size and shape of the surface upon which we'll be painting, we must have in mind exactly what we're trying to say with our picture. What is it that has impressed us with regard to the subject that we want to impress upon others? Once we have that in mind, we can think about how we will accomplish this.

There are many things to think about when composing a picture, but one of the most important and probably the first to be considered is where the main subject will be placed and how large or small it will be, etc. in relation to the center and to the edges of the picture (as well as to everything else that's going to be in the picture). If you just paint whatever is "out there" that you are looking at (or what you're thinking about) until you get to the edges of your canvas, the intent of the picture will probably be unclear, to say the least. In fact my personal opinion is that it's not "art" unless you have planned for it (whether consciously or intuitively) to say what you want it to say.

If you have nothing to say, except perhaps that the subject of your painting is beautiful or interesting (though you can't think of exactly why and otherwise it has no particular meaning to you), you might as well just take snapshots or make sketches. You can always use the photos or studies later, after you've thought about what you want to say about this subject.

Why must we worry about the edges? Why can't we just put our main subject in the middle of the picture and paint outward from there until we reach the edges of the canvas? Because, as Rudolf Arnheim points out in his book The Power of the Center, "the nature of an object can be defined only in relation to the context in which it is considered." That context includes the surface you're painting or drawing on, right out to its outer limits.

"[T]he character, function, and weight of each object changes with the particular context in which we see it," writes Arnheim. Further, he says: "A frame of a particular size and shape defines the location of the things within its space and determines the distances between them." He is not talking here about the kind of frame you put a picture in and attach to a wall, but about the outside edges of the picture, or the "boundaries" of the picture, and how everything in the painting relates to those edges.

I'll give an example. If your subject was a very distressed murderer leaving the scene of the crime in great haste, would you put him in the middle of the picture? Perhaps. It depends on what else you do in the picture (with colors, values, rhythm, shapes, etc.) and what else you want to say about him. But take a look at the picture painted in 1919 by Edvard Munch (1863-1944), called The Murderer on the Lane.

Here you can see how large the painting is, as this page shows a recent photo of the original painting in a gallery with people looking at it -- Scroll down to the bottom picture on the page to see it.

In the painting we see just the head of someone hurrying down a dirt lane lined with frightening-looking trees, away from a dead body. His or her simple, almost cartoon-like face shows concentration and anxiety.

Assuming the head you see (a man's? a woman's?) at the bottom of the picture is that of the murderer (not a horrified passerby), you may wonder why (let's call this person "he") isn't somewhere near the middle of the picture rather than just barely seen at the bottom edge - After all, isn't the murderer the subject? I don't think Munch would put a murderer in the most "stable" part of the picture (the center), or anywhere near it. Whatever is in the center would look like it's not going anywhere soon, if at all; it would be as if planted there with no intention of movng away. The killer is crazy -- quite unstable -- and he's leaving the murder scene (and leaving it rather empty, except for that dead body), hurtling himself toward me (the viewer), in fact, and so near the bottom edge (with most of him out of sight) that his advance toward me seems unstoppable; he is "falling" right out of the picture, pulled by gravity, so to speak...as we associate the pull of gravity with the bottom of a picture (and the effect is even stronger if a significant amount of ground shows, as it does here).

In fact, if the murderer was in the center and also much larger in relation to the size of the painting, he might look like he was paralyzed, hardly able to move, the more so the bigger he was in relation to the outside of the picture. If his head filled the whole canvas so that it reached the edges it might look as if he were going to explode...but that is not the same as looking as if he were intent on getting the heck out of that place (and in fact there would be no space left in the picture in which the scene he was leaving could be depicted).

If he were situated very near or even touching the top edge of the picture rather than at the bottom he would probably not seem threatening to us at all. That edge would "hold him" up and away from us (like a helium balloon stuck to the ceiling), especially if it were toward the right side of the picture (the left side is where action usually begins, and it unfolds -- or appears that it will unfold -- toward the right, suggesting that whatever is happening will be completed by the time it reaches the far right side...unless it seems to be crashing down toward the foreground, perhaps, as in this painting).

Of course there are other things you can do with a picture to indicate the state of mind of someone, or the trajectory of his path, the likely escape route, or etc., but these are some of the ways in which the edges work ... you can modify or cancel the effects with other things you do, but let us see how the edges can work for us; it is useful to know these things if only to make sure we are not inadvertently saying something we don't want to say by where we're placing things in a picture.

In this painting the artist has made the murderer's head small in relation to the whole picture, and left plenty of room behind him so that we can see what he is fleeing from, and he has placed his head right at the bottom edge, almost out of the picture.

One reason that having the subject at the bottom edge of the picture is very effective is because, as mentioned, he seems to be uncontrollably leaving the scene. It's also effective because it's such an odd place to find the subject that it makes it very conspicuous...especially since it's only a head, with no body in sight. It's scary, and riveting.

The very dominant, large thick tree just to the left of the center of the picture is in a place and of a size such that it balances (visual weight-wise) the murderer's head that's just to the right of (and below) the center. (And the tree also looks something like a person, with a face on the thick branch at the right -- a witness to the murder, watching the murderer as he rushes away -- maybe it even represents the murderer in the act, with its branches upraised like arms perhaps wielding the knife.) There are other tree witnesses further up the lane. These trees not only play roles in the drama as witnesses, but they are lifting themselves and their branches up to the very top edge of the picture (and beyond), balancing the murderer who is running out of the picture at the bottom edge, so that the picture is not bottom-heavy, and so we look upward to the rest of the picture as there is so much in it that we need to see besides the murderer's head.

The picture shows the lane behind the murderer, where the dastardly deed was done (with the dead body still there to prove it), and although we see that the lane is not on a hill, there is still a "hill-like" effect that we feel since it starts at the horizon and comes toward the foreground (and continues beyond it out of the picture in our minds) ... Although we realize this is flat land being portrayed, we can't help but get a feeling that things are starting "high" (because the end of the path is up high in the picture) and coming "down" (to the bottom of the canvas) toward us. Also, we have a view of the murderer from slightly above his head, looking down on him, which increases the feeling that he is going downhill. What is in the foreground near the bottom edges of the picture is strongly affected by gravity in our "unconscious" minds if not in reality. An artist like Munch knows these things if only intuitively. And so the lane delivers (dumps?) the murderer into our laps.

The relatively calm (but not silent) area at the left side of the picture balances all the action on the right.

Note that the horizon (where all looks peaceful and humdrum) as well as the four edges of the picture (and the vertical trees - and there's even a square in the sky that appears to be the moon...what else could it be) are based on the Cartesian grid - These horizontal and vertical lines -- as I say, including those of the outside edges of the picture -- stabilize the picture and serve as contrast with and intensifiers of all that is bizarre and unnerving in the painting; they also determine for us what is up and what is down...We must know this in order to "feel" the gravitational pull at the bottom [this is something that we perceive below the level of consciousness] that is ridding the scene of the murderer.

All of the eerie, nervous lines and the sickening colors and so on in the picture that cause anxiety in us are more effective because of this contrast, i.e. chaos and anxiety contrasted with seeming permanence and stability of vertical and (especially) calm, non-threatening horizontal lines.

I have hardly begun to touch on the ways considering the edges (and center) of the picture can make our pictures more effective, but it's a beginning, and certainly enough for one post.

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NOTES:

1) The Power of the Center: A Study of Composition in the Visual Arts is a book by Rudolf Arnheim published by the University of California Press.

2) The Murderer in the Lane is also called The Murderer on the Lane and Murderer in the Avenue.

LINK:

The Artchive - Commentary on and Pictures by Edvard Munch. There is very interesting commentary here on Munch.

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