Subject-Specific Vocabulary

Every day you come into the art studio, you are expected to use subject-specific vocabulary. The more you use it, the more you will understand it and will be able to speak "art" fluently. So where do you begin?

Elements of Art

The Visual Components of Color, Form, Line, Shape, Space, Texture, and Value.

Principles of Design

The principles of design are the rules a designer must follow to create an effective and attractive composition. The fundamental principles of design are Emphasis, Balance, Proportion, Unity, Pattern and Rhythm/Movement.

Think of it this way..

The elements of art are the artist's tools. With these tools, an artist can create balance, contrast, emphasis, etc. For example, you might use bright colors to attract the viewer's attention to a specific area of a painting, which is called emphasis. In this example, color is the element, emphasis is the principle.

Once you've started incorporating this vocabulary into the way you look at and talk about art, you will find it easier to express yourself and describe an artwork or your ideas.

Next, you can begin including more complex terminology into your thinking, including descriptive words on process, aesthetics, and art theory.

Art Language is colorful

Use art vocabulary whenever possible, in the Visual Journal, in Critiques, and when writing the Curatorial Rationale and Exhibition Texts.

( art language, art terminology, subject specific language, it's all the same thing, it's language that talks about ART)

Subject specific language in art can be used when...

• Describing processes (site specific, lithography)

• Techniques (scumbling in oil painting, encaustic, sgraffito carving in ceramics)

• In Visual Analysis (triangular composition, complementary colors, contrapposto)

• Words describing visual qualities, as in 'contrasting dark tones', 'diagonal lines', 'bold brushstrokes'

• When referring to Art History (constructivism, baroque, pre-renaissance)