The Aesthetic Dimensions in Art and Society

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Chapter 13: Line

Harrold, South Dakota

Lines serve to define length, distance and shape, indicating boundaries and separate forms, textures and colors that move the eye and create the illusion of depth—like railroad tracks to the horizon. Physically, they can be many or few, take many shapes, have thickness and depth, length and texture with varying degrees of brightness.

And lines can consist of light and shadow, both specular and diffuse.

In geometry, a “point” is a location. A “line” is an extension of a point, an elongated mark, a connection between two points or the edge of an object or situation. Artist Paul Klee said, “A line is a dot out for a walk.” It can define a space by outlining and creating boundaries between visual elements, be used as a signal, suggest movement and flow within a frame and evoke emotional responses. In photographs that create patterns and geometric shapes, circles and zigzags create a sense of motion; static lines suggest calm or stillness.

Downtown, Columbus, Ohio

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519 CE) initiated a revolution in art by using architectural lines to direct the eye to a vanishing point as in The Last Supper. Artists in the East drew and painted calligraphic lines as part of their spiritual practice. For Chinese artist Wang Xizhi (303-361 CE), brushstrokes were a way to emphasize the harmony of the cosmos. And Andreas Gursky, a contemporary German photographer, became known for his large format architecture and landscape color photographs, made from a high point of view. Apparently, “line” topped the list of his aesthetic preferences.

This line of highlighted water serves to separate textures and tones. Lines of light like this can make an image pleasing to the eye, because we’re attracted to highlights, especially when they separate darker tones.

APPLICATION

Horizontal lines have a meditative quality, conveying a sense of calmness, tranquility and expansiveness. They divide an image harmoniously, structuring elements in a way that feels natural and ordered, leading the eye across an image to create a sense of flow. Italian photographer Franco Fontana is best known for his abstract color landscapes, strong in vertical and horizontal lines with discordant color.

Vertical lines suggest growth, solidity and permanence. They tend to be rigid, stable and strong, often seen in architecture, trees, telephone poles and electric towers, windmills, waterfalls and mountain peaks. Lines guiding the eye upward evoke ideas of growth, ambition and transcendence. Slim vertical lines evoke a sense of grace, whereas thick lines convey a more grounded and weighted sensibility.

The eye tends to follow lines, so artists use them as vectors, directing the viewer’s attention to elements of interest. Here, besides the railroad tracks which are lines of light, other lines include the diminishing telephone poles and wires, railroad ties and the horizon itself which leads to the sun.

Research has shown that our perception of elements within a frame happens at 13 milliseconds. This, combined with eons of artistic pictorial expression, has shown that an expressive composition results from the intentional placement of linear elements. Lines are especially emphasized by combining an unusual camera angle with deep depth of field.

Artists have characterized shadows as “organic lines.” When broken or varying in thickness, texture, shape or color they help to describe edges and create depth. Their position in the composition helps to define the primary subject and its location. And the sharpness or blurriness of  shadow edges indicate the specularity or diffuseness of the light source, including its relative brightness. Here, they contribute to the sensibility of a warm, bright summer day.

Lines can also be ephemeral, for instance, a ray of light, an airplane vapor trail or a line of fog in a valley. In this instance, sunlight streaking through windows on the dome at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, conveys a sense of divine presence. The dome itself displays a series of concentric circles in the architecture, directing the eye heavenward to a point of light.

TECHNIQUE

Amish hey shocks

Vertical Lines are powerful, leading the eye upward. The closer to the subject, the more likely they are to be bent. A view camera with swings and tilts is often used to get the lines exactly parallel. Images made with a Single Lens Reflex (SLR) camera can also correct for “barrel” and other distortions with editing software. Contemporary French photographer Hélèn Binet often works with vertical lines in architecture. Strong lines, exquisite light and shadow constitute her aesthetic preferences.

As a reminder, the point of this series which demonstrates the variety of aesthetic dimensions is to encourage you to become aware of them in your photographing (or other visual art form), toward identifying the top 3-5 preferences that constitute your unique “style.” Once known, they will guide your choices of location, subject matter and composition making your creative expression truly authentic.

Horizontal lines are restful, calm and serene. They suggest gravity, depth and breadth—converging railroad tracks, rolling hills and meadows, a line of fences, a sprawling farm, a thin stream meandering through tall grass and weeds. Thes lines are enhanced by removing distractions so there’s a clean division between elements and compositions that are clearly about one thing. Look for flowing horizontal patterns in nature—rolling hills, sand dunes or winding roads. Consider long exposures where clouds and water are moving, so they can be blurred. To extend the exposure, us a tripod and neutral density (ND) filters in front of the lens. Michael Kenna’s images will surely inspire you along these “lines.”

New York, close to Lincoln Center

Lines that intersect suggest strength, tension and durability. Their crossing can convey a sense of convergence or conflict. As directional vectors, the eye is drawn to the point of intersection before it explores the other elements in the frame. Because the above lines consist of light, they create depth and express a dynamic flow that’s balanced, equally strong left to right. Intersecting lines can also tell a story, represent collaboration or resolution, even mark moments of change or transition. They can also create a visual metaphor for journeys, relationships or conflict resolution.

Diagonal lines are dynamic. They express the energies of activity, restlessness, drama and opposition—wind-blown trees, a severely tilted barn, an uplifted rock face, contemporary architectural features, an ascending airplane. Lines of light are particularly distinctive, especially against a dark or black background.

Straight, sharp and bold lines are assertive. Curved, thin, and continuous lines soften. It’s one reason why, aesthetically speaking, straight lines are considered “masculine,” and curving lines “feminine,” particularly in architecture. And finally, lines can be imaginary. Photographers and filmmakers make use of  “sight lines,” the direction people in the frame are looking. Generally, we don’t want these lines to lead the viewer out of the frame, preferring to have a person direct their gaze either toward the camera, to another person or an important object or situation.

CONTEMPLATING “LINES” IN PERSONAL AND SOCIAL CONTEXTS

We all draw lines in life. How and where we draw them is an expression of our beliefs and values. Often, these can trigger an emotional response—people standing in line, waiting for hours in the rain or cold, segments of society being excluded, walls to keep immigrants out.

We resolve conflicts by “drawing a line in the sand.” Sitting in a line of traffic for a long period tests the patience of drivers, at times to the brink of road rage. We’re “sold a line of goods” by Robo callers who are directed to follow a “line of thinking.” In the military and certain companies, people are required to “fall in line” behind a leader. In these and other such situations, the choice is social alignment, deciding whether or not to follow someone else’s lead or thinking, conform to a request or behavior. We want to know if it’s “in line” with our beliefs and values.

How and where society draws its lines reveals its collective consciousness. In anthropology and sociology, the phenomenon of drawing lines around groups of human beings is referred to as “stratification.” It’s how we position ourselves relative to the groups we identify with in relationship to outsiders, making distinctions according to kin, tribe, caste, race, geography, economic status and intelligence to name just some of the common groupings.

Landscape photographers in the United States are severely restricted due to every bit of land being owned or enclosed by lines such as buildings, walls and fences. Our environments are filled with fences, telephone poles, electric towers and wires, wind turbines and cell phone towers. It’s why photographers favor state and national parks and travel to other countries and wilderness destinations. In rural England it’s very different. While farmland is owned, its fences have gates for the express purpose of allowing people to walk the property without needing to ask permission. And there’s strict governmental regulation about where poles and towers can be placed. The lines we draw communicate. And what they say has everything to do with how we perceive our neighbors.

Maya women separating and binding stacks of onions.

On a research trip to Guatemala, I followed a Maya guide on walking paths through hills and valleys where vegetables were being grown. One of the notable features was the lack of fences—anywhere. Individual plots were marked by rows of low stone or trees that only grow five feet tall (seen in this photograph). Walking paths through the fields were open to anyone and were often used as shortcuts to various destinations. Where there’s trust, there’s no need to build fences.

The opposite of trust is control; control is an announcement that we do not trust.

Benjamin Shield, craniosacral therapist

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My other sites:

David L. Smith Photography Portfolio.com

Ancient Maya Cultural Traits.com: Weekly blog featuring the traits that made this civilization unique

Spiritual Visionaries.com: A library of 81 free videos on YouTube featuring visionaries and events of the 1980s.

 

 

 

The Aesthetic Dimensions in Art and Society

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Chapter 12: Light

“Photography” literally means writing with light. Awareness of light’s properties and behavior is a critical requirement for all artists, especially photographers. Paying attention to what light is doing contributes to an awareness of how profoundly it qualifies everything we arrange within a frame. Lit in a certain way, a cracked eggshell pulled out of a garbage pail can be rendered special and beautiful, perhaps even evoke a sense of impermanence.

What does light do? Technically, it “illuminates” through transmission and reflection. Your electronic display is transmitting light directly to your eyes right now. Your hand, however, is reflecting “ambient” light from a lamp or the sun. On the aesthetic side, light generates shadows, directs focus through vectors and contributes to the qualification of form, shape, size and texture all of which influence mood and meaning. The quality (color) of light and its relative degree of brightness can communicate a wide spectrum of emotions and create atmosphere. Its modification through reflecting devices and diffusion materials can create a sense of a subject’s hardness or softness. And there’s a quality of light that symbolically represents divine presence, truth and revelation.

George Eastman House, Rochester, New York

In 1888, when George Eastman introduced the first commercially available camera—a “Kodak” box pre-loaded with enough film for 100 exposures—the instructions simply read “keep the sun at your back.” That avoided dark shadows under people’s eyes and noses. It worked great, except when intense sunlight made everyone squint. Today, we take that into consideration. Given improvements in image-capturing technologies, subjects are more often placed in softened shadow area to avoid that discomfort. If the intent is to create photographs that will have some aesthetic appeal and captivate viewers, consideration needs to be given to the light source and its management. I made this image with a minutes-long exposure, walking around with the shutter open, “painting” the structure with bursts from an electronic flash.

APPLICATION

Photographically, light can reveal subject matter as it appears to the eye normally or enhance it by managing the four primary aspects of the source: 1) quality, 2) intensity, 3) direction, 4) modification (how it’s made more or less diffuse).

QUALITY

When photographers talk about the “quality” of light, the reference is generally to its color. Normally, in daily living, the human perceptual system tends to interpret all light, indoors and out, as “natural.” When LED “daylight” bulbs became more commonly offered online and in hardware stores, people realized that the incandescent bulbs they used in home fixtures were decidedly yellow compared to daylight bulbs, which are blue by comparison. Every light source emits  specific wavelengths or color of light, so films and digital cameras have to be “balanced” according to the shooting conditions.

Sunlight varies dramatically depending on geography, atmospheric conditions and the time of day.

The quality of light that a camera will record can be altered by changing the “white balance” feature on digital cameras, or by putting a filter over the lens. In both cases the color of the image is affected overall. Everything takes on that color. To apply only a portion of color to an image, an acetate “colored gel” can be placed in front of a light fixture, so the subject will take on its color. Yellow gel produces yellow light. Three lights with different colored gels will result in three different colors of light on the subject.

INTENSITY

Shooting in bright sunlight yields sharp, very distinct, hard-edged shadows and high contrast—excellent for deepening color saturation and creating depth.

As brightness diminishes, these qualities gray-down, softening the shadows and emphasizing highlights.

DIRECTION

Whatever the source, inside or out, light coming from the side enhances texture. The more to the side the greater the texture.

Light falling on the front of a subject illuminates its features but is considered “flat,” lacking in depth. It’s fine, just ordinary.

The opposite is true of light coming from behind the subject. Backlighting is dramatic because it creates a halo or rim around the subject, enhancing its form and creating depth. Generally, the brighter the backlight the more dramatic the image, but there’s a decision to be made: Is there enough light on the front of the subject to resolve some detail in the shadows? To ensure this, expose for the darkest shadow. Compensations can then be made in the software.

MODIFICATION

A light “modifier” is any medium that diffuses light coming from its source. Clouds soften bright sunlight and various types of diffusion devices or translucent material in front of an artificial source will accomplish the same thing.

At one extreme is “specular” light. It comes from a source that’s tiny and bright, like the sun on a clear day, or a tiny 500-watt clear quartz bulb. The more specular the source, the sharper the edges of the shadows. Jewelry stores have several of these kinds of lights mounted in the ceiling and even rotate them in cases to make the facets in precious gems sparkle.

As a source becomes more diffuse, the shadows spread out until they nearly diminish altogether.

When photographing people, specular light tends to increase contrast, sharpen shadows and emphasize skin features and textures. It can be harsh.

Diffuse light softens those same features. Sheets of foam core are often used to fill in shadows created with a specular light. And large areas can be lit with diffuse light by bouncing one or more lights off white walls or ceilings. If a wall is colored, the subject will display that tint.

PERSONAL AND SOCIAL REFLECTION

“Light” is a metaphor for awareness. That’s why a light bulb was often used in comic strips and animated movies to symbolizes a bright idea. We “shed light” on a problem, and when spiritual seekers attain realization, they speak of it as “illumination.”

Awareness clarifies our experiences so we can respond appropriately rather than impulsively. It keeps us grounded in the present and cultivates greater empathy, patience and kindness toward others. Because we make more of whatever we attend to, it’s good to be aware of how and where we’re spending our “attention capital.” What am I thinking about most often? Do those thoughts serve me, brighten or darken my day? Above all, what is the illuminating source in my life, the “voice” I can completely trust?

Socially, our collective awareness—consciousness—has profound implications for the shaping, functioning and evolution of social systems from communities to nations; ultimately, the world. Viewed through an extremely wide angle “lens,” human evolution is fundamentally the story of  its evolving consciousness, a process of increasing understanding and appreciation of who we are, where we are and why we’re here. With the first glimmer of light from a family campfire somewhere in East Africa around 160,000 years ago—the time when homo sapiens became self-aware—we began to construct and experiment with  systems of organization that would meet the needs and desires of individuals in a context that would be sustainable.

Today, through eons of experience we’re learning what does not work for a population that’s  exceeded the world’s sustainable limit. That’s important and apparently necessary, because the experience is a greatest teacher. Newscasts are showing us the breakdowns, the social consequences of citizens and leaders activating the dark side of human nature. The breakdowns and tragedies being reported can be viewed as opportunities to change direction, to move away from dysfunction and toward the light. Components of the shift are obvious, but an AI chart makes them specific.

Darkness Light
Discrimination Inclusion
Injustice Justice or Fairness
Lies Truth
Greed Generosity or Selflessness
Self-centeredness Altruism or Empathy

Hate / Fear

 Love
Prejudice Acceptance or Open-mindedness
Lawlessness Lawfulness or Order
Disorder Harmony
Disease Health or Well-being
War Peace
Nationalism Globalism
Separation Unity

Futurist Barbara Marx Hubbard often observed that “Our story is a birth.” She said humanity is currently experiencing the pangs of being born. “We’re only beginning to open our eyes, just catching a glimpse of how intelligent technology combined with our urge to join together can co-create a positive future for all. It’s a real possibility.” Her vision is fully articulated in a series of videos online at SpiritualVisionaries.com. I recommend Videos>Barbara Marx Hubbard>Navigating Evolutionary Change (52:00). Chapter 2 in that title is shorter. (14:56)

My mission is to tell the story of the birth of ourselves as a universal humanity, awakening all of us to our unique opportunity to participate through our own conscious evolution.

            Barbara Marx Hubbard

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My other sites:

David L. Smith Photography Portfolio.com

Ancient Maya Cultural Traits.com: Weekly blog featuring the traits that made this civilization unique

Spiritual Visionaries.com: A library of 81 free videos on YouTube featuring visionaries and events of the 1980s.

The Aesthetic Dimensions in Art and Society

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Chapter 11: Key

The terms “low key” and “high key” are often used in photography. They refer to photographs that are overall bright or dark. “High Key” images are predominately light or  white, like a white cat sitting on a white sofa. “Low Key” is dark and somber, a black dog in a dark tunnel.  These images stand out because the effect is rarely seen in nature or everyday living. For that reason they’re usually simple rather than complex, consisting of few elements.

Low key images tend to create eye-catching experiences because they tend to be moody and mysterious. Photographers have long understood that “there’s mystery in the shadows.” With fewer distracting elements we tend to delve deeper into the dark areas, searching for more information. The result is that low key images tend to hold our attention a little longer than those those characterized as “normal” in tonality. The style in appropriate when the communication objective or expressive intent is to create a sense of solitude, heaviness or mystery. However, low key is not good at providing information.

Australian photographer Bill Henson underexposes his color negatives with carefully positioned lights, then prints them even darker. And Yousuf Karsh, an Armenian-Canadian considered one of the greatest portrait photographers of the 20the century, was known for his black and white portraits of notable individuals. His aesthetic preference was low key lighting of people on dark backgrounds. It emphasized character in their faces, men and women alike.

High key images consist of mostly light, often pure white tones. They tend to be bright with a minimum of shadows. The look is crisp, clean and uplifting. In the extreme, the style can be abrupt, even shocking to the eye. On the positive side, the brightness can create a sense of purity, softness (depending on the subject) and optimism. However, the immediate surprise can wear off quickly and three-dimensionality suffers. So high key images work well when the expressive intent is to shock or create a sense of optimism. As with low key, it’s not a good choice if the communication objective is to provide information.

 Richard Avedon, master of black and white portrait and fashion photography often used all white backgrounds for his subjects so there would be no distracting elements. His intent was to capture an individual’s personality, so in his shooting sessions he would ask his subjects probing, sometimes uncomfortable psychological questions.

British photographer Michael Kenna often photographs landscapes in black and white. He accomplishes high key effects by photographing in snow and creating light gradations of blurred seascapes with time exposures. In “Recent Work,” click on “Biwa Lake Look Out” and “Hillside Fence, Study 9″—exquisite examples of high key.

 TECHNIQUE

Lighting For Low Key

Low key images require a dark or black subject, similar toned backgrounds or a dark space with minimal lighting—generally a single diffused source. Keep the camera’s ISO around 100-400, with the aperture wide for narrow depth-of-field and underexpose the background by about 2-3 stops darker than the subject. Sometimes “feathering” the light off the subject (using just the edge of a light) keeps the tones low, especially on faces. In the editing software, you can always boost the black areas.

 

Lighting For High Key

To produce a high key effect in a photograph, it’s not enough to have a white or light toned subject. It also needs to be situated on or within a predominantly white background that is or can be rendered at least as bright, ideally more so, than the subject. This accounts for high key photography being mostly done in a studio. The final component needed for high key photography is control of the exposure. A light meter or camera sensor will render a white vase sitting on white paper as gray. So the exposure has to be adjusted away from “normal,” in the direction of overexposure. This lightens the black and shadow areas. The largest part of this shell was dark, but the exposure shifted those tones to gray.

PERSONAL AND SOCIAL REFLECTION

The high key technique in photography contains some important parallels with respect to everyday living. Perhaps the simplest perspective was expressed in the song that the movie, Monty Python and the Holy Grail advised: “Always look on the bright side of life!” We characterize some people that way, “She brightens my day,” or on the contrary, “He brings me down.” In everyday living we experience light and dark personality expressions within ourselves and others. Both are equally valid experiences.

While this image boarders on low key, the man’s smile and bright personality was decidedly upbeat, high key. Linda and I were in Nassau, passing by, when he stuck his head out the door like this and made a friendly comment. It touched me, so I asked if I could take his picture.

The key for advancement in the University of Planet Earth is to favor environments and people that bring out the light that we all are. How and where do we find them? Increased illumination or lightening occurs wherever we experience the energies of love, resonance, empowerment, connection and joy. After an encounter with a person or group, we wonder to ourselves, “Did I resonate? Was I uplifted, encouraged or inspired? Am I feeling better about myself and the world? Or the opposite?” Low-key experiences can lead to disappointment, a lack of trust, anger, confusion or depression. Of course, there’s a full spectrum of environments and expressions between these extremes, and many the gray areas.

Individually and socially, with some resolve and mental discipline, we can move more in the direction of selecting positive, empowering and uplifting perceptions, behaviors and experiences—the psychological equivalent of white subject matter in photography. High key imagery often affects a shift toward heightened aesthetic appreciation by displaying a brighter than normal representation of a subject. Just so, a more positive—brighter—perception of others and the world can lift the spirit.

In life, frequent or prolonged exposure to the light of higher consciousness (more complex, abstract and inclusive thinking), increased awareness and spirituality is achieved either through grace or the choices we make—spiritual reading, self-inquiry, prayer, meditation and being with people whose light shines brightly. Through these and other uplifting experiences, the dark and gray values in life gradually become lifted into a higher tonal range.

 

In the midst of darkness, light persists

Mahatma Gandhi, Indian lawyer and political ethicist

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My other sites:

David L. Smith Photography Portfolio.com

Ancient Maya Cultural Traits.com: Weekly blog featuring the traits that made this civilization unique

Spiritual Visionaries.com: A library of 81 free videos on YouTube featuring visionaries and events of the 1980s.

The Aesthetic Dimensions in Art and Society

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Chapter 10: Gradation

Aesthetically speaking, “gradation” refers to a gradual or graded change of tone over a surface. Artists refer to it as a grading of “values.” In color photography, gradation can be a transition from one hue to another or to a different level of saturation or brightness. In black and white, it’s the transition from light to dark or vice versa, or from one texture to another. The width or “spread” of the transition can be wide, narrow or in between.

There can be multiple areas showing gradations within the same image. Here, there’s light to dark sand at the top of this image, black sand to lighter sand from the bottom up and the pure white of the sun reflecting in the pool of water where the grays of the sky waves ripple into full highlights.

APPLICATION

1939 Ford Coupe

Unlike “contrast” which consists of abrupt changes, stark difference between dark and light tones,  gradation conveys a smooth and slower, more pensive experience for the eye. It feels soft and flowing, diffuse and delicate. In some instances it can feel ethereal or luminescent. It’s especially pleasing when it enhances the roundness of a subject or object. Gradation is often created in the studio when the communication objective is to express soft sensibilities and curvature. It’s one of my top five aesthetic preferences.

TECHNIQUE

Outdoors in sunlight, gradation occurs naturally wherever there are curves, rounded or flat surfaces where the sun rakes across a subject from the side. The extent of grading varies according to the degree of the subject’s roundness, the camera’s angle relative to the brightest element in the frame and the position of the sun.

British photographer Michael Kenna often photographs in the mornings and evenings when the skies are just turning dark. To create further gradation, he makes very long exposures so clouds, water and reflections are blurred with graded edges. If the sky is too bright for a time exposure, he puts one or more “neutral density” (ND) filters in front of the lens. That way, exposures can be as long as several minutes.

Inside or in the studio, lighting for gradation is a matter of positioning the camera or the subject in relation to the light so the brightness falls off gradually. The light illuminating the white paper under the vase was “flagged off” to create another graded surface.

Minor White was teaching at RIT (Rochester Institute of Technology) when I was there. I didn’t take his course, but I watched him examine students’ work. He often wrote about “spirit” guiding his work. Many of his photographs demonstrate an attraction to gradation.

And Jonathan Knowles is an advertising photographer. Scroll through his meticulous images to see how he uses gradation in color.

To widen gradation, situate a light well above, below or to the side of a subject so the shadow side is left dark. To shorten it, add a bit of fill light in the shadow areas using a reflective surface, for instance a sheet of foam core or another light placed at a distance and “feathered” (using just the edge of a light) to control the amount of desirable detail in the shadows.

REFLECTIONS ON PERSONAL AND SOCIAL GRADATION

“Gradation” in art is easy, gradual and soft. In life, it equates with the personal quality of equanimity, responses to change that are gradual and graceful, calm and quiet as opposed to stark and abrupt. Graded experience doesn’t excite or shout. It relates to the way we approach things that take time and consideration—personal growth disciplines, new relationships, creative expressions, skill development, job searches and financial planning. Are we in a hurry? Not enough hours in a day? “Gotta get this done!” Peace of mind requires a relaxed mind, confidence that “It’ll work out when it’s supposed to.” A graded approach to life is more about allowing rather than controlling.

Allow the world to be as it is, and your mind will find peace.

Eckhart Tolle, German spiritual teacher, self-help author

Socially, gradation is more evolutionary than high contrast revolution. It’s more thoughtful and flowing. Less reactionary. We see it in dialogues rather than debates, questioning rather than pronouncing, inviting rather than excluding, listening rather than speaking and accepting rather than confronting.

Most important issues aren’t totally black and white; there are gray areas. Although we’re sometimes frustrated that positive change in the area of social development takes a long time, our faith in the future is grounded in the belief that eventually common sense, decency, intelligence, wisdom and truth will overcome ignorance, greed and anger. As in our personal lives, the challenge—and lesson—of social development is patience. Gradual change may take longer, but because it’s thought out and tested, it’s more likely to lead to a good result and sustain.

Every time we invest attention in an idea, a written word, a spectacle; every time we purchase a product; every time we act on a belief, the texture of the future is changed… The world in which our children and their children will live is built, minute by minute, through the choices we endorse with our psychic energy.

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, psychologist

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My other sites:

David L. Smith Photography Portfolio.com

Ancient Maya Cultural Traits.com: Weekly blog featuring the traits that made this civilization unique

Spiritual Visionaries.com: A library of 81 free videos on YouTube featuring visionaries and events of the 1980s.

 

The Aesthetic Dimensions in Art and Society

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Chapter 9: Geometry

Artistically, form and geometry are interconnected but distinct creative dimensions with unique expressive roles. The previous chapter on “form” was about creating a three-dimensional sensibility on a  two-dimensional substrate, usually an electronic screen or paper; the object was to create the sensibility of depth. “Geometry” in the context of creative expression, deals with precise shapes and structures including circles, ovals, squares, triangles and lines that convey a feeling of visual harmony and order. It’s one of my top five preferences because it “speaks” to the order inherent in Nature and the cosmos.

Geometry and numbers are sacred because they codify the hidden order behind creation.

Stephen Skinner, author, Sacred Geometry: Deciphering the Code

In the early two decades of the twentieth century, single-image “modernist” photographers moved away from the soft focus, painting-like quality of “pictorialism,” preferring sharp focus and clean lines with an emphasis on shape and form including viewpoints that better lenses made possible. This was the specialty of the 1930’s “Group f64” California photographers that included Ed Weston, Ruth Bernhard, and Paul Caponigro. Among others in that association, I selected these because they were particularly adept at lighting for gradation, another one of my preferences.  

APPLICATION

If the purpose of an image is to inform or to communicate quickly, an emphasis on geometric shape is ideal because it immediately suggests the subject’s size and importance relative to its environment and other visual elements. Take a look at the work of Julius Shulman, a highly esteemed American architectural photographer, framed his stunning black and white images with a view camera, at times using infrared film to create a dark sky against the strong lines and contours of famous buildings. Some of today’s SLRs provide an infrared option.

On the other hand, if the purpose is to express a mood or  feeling, an emphasis on geometry is again warranted, this time emphasizing simplicity to make the subject fascinating or unusual. That can be done using only one light, perhaps a bare bulb in a dark room; a mirror can be positioned to reflect sunlight coming through a window; penlights and flashlights are great for photographing small objects in the dark.  Fan Ho, a master Chinese photographer, often set up his camera in spaces with strong geometric lines and then waited for the “right” moment to click the shutter. Master of street photography, Henri Cartier-Bresson, famously referred to it as “the decisive moment.”

 

TECHNIQUE

Artists want to perceive beyond looking. And they want to see what others take for granted. To accomplish this, they engage in a practice of not naming subjects and disregarding their function. Instead, they choose to see elements consisting of shapes, surfaces, textures and lines that display highlights, shadows and graded areas. Beauty lies in the combination and treatment (point of view and lighting) of these qualities.

Shapes that contribute to geometric expression include—

  • Leading lines move the viewer’s eye within the frame
  • Triangles create a sense of stability
  • Diagonals contribute to motion
  • Patterns attract through repetition
  • Perspectives create a sense of depth
  • Silhouettes make people look dramatic through backlighting
  • Simplicity reduces the number of visual elements to geometric forms
  • High Contrast lighting emphasizes lines and shapes

REFLECTION

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines “geometry” as “the study of shapes,” specifying that they make things fit for a particular use or purpose. This is curious when applied personally because it raises the question, “Am I fit, in good enough shape, to accomplish what I’m here to be and do—physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually? It’s a good question for contemplation, not only to gain some perspective but also to consider our fitness relative to the future. Geometric shapes exhibit stability and balance. Can we say the same of ourselves? Geometry deals with angles. What of our point of view? How do we see the world right now? It’s a critically important question, because we create and sustain what we see.

Socially, we can ask similar questions. What is the shape of the nation? Is the social body physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually fit, resilient, ready to face the changes that are coming? Are we collectively able to create forms and systems that can respond appropriately to change? Are we prioritizing properly? Is the way we talk and act reflecting our true values? Are we thinking and planning ahead or spending our time and creative capital metaphorically “putting out fires?” Are we keeping our “eye on the ball,” not letting ourselves become distracted by the voices of negativity, sensationalism, conformity and hate? While these questions may be unanswerable beyond opinion or speculation, I think they deserves some thought.

Real learning does not come solely through assimilating knowledge; it involves coming to hold one’s conceptual frameworks sufficiently lightly to allow in experiences that don’t fit well with the existing frameworks.

Willis Harman, engineer, futurist, author associated with the human potential movement

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Aesthetic Dimensions in Art and Society

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Chapter 8: Form

The shape of an object within a pictorial frame is two-dimensional. To emphasize its three-dimensions, artists use a variety of techniques to emphasize “form.” This can be “soft,” increasing a sense of presence, as if the viewer could feel the subject’s surface. Or “rigid,” angular or brittle, not inviting the sense of touch. While images in color represent forms beautifully, I’m illustrating in black and white because color tends to distract from the grays and gradations that make the sensibility of form and volume more apparent, especially on rounded and textured forms.

The jug and cocktail glass illustrate how forms evoke a certain feel. The former is soft and solid, the latter hard and delicate. Through lighting and composition, forms can lead the eye around the frame. Notice that the jug’s short depth of field grabs the eye and holds it on its thick mouth, where the glass repeats the sensibility of roundness in several places with long depth of field. There’s also a difference in volume suggested by the thickness of the jug compared to the thinness of the glass. I compare them here just to show how the different expressions of form create a sense of weight.

CREATIVE APPLICATION

Photographers use lighting, point of view (POV) and depth of field to accentuate the illusion of three dimensional subjects on paper, giving them a fuller, closer to reality, more tactile visual experience.

Lighting

Forms are enhanced when the light—diffuse or specular—comes from the side, raking or grading across a surface. It helps define a subject’s contours.

Outdoors, the angled light of “golden hour” (sunrise and sunset) enhances form with long shadows and high contrast.

Inside, low key lighting emphasizes form by creating gradations with highlights that attract the eye. The sensibility is soft and solemn. Edward Weston was a master of lighting and the use of a large format view camera. His photographs are sculptural, using deep shadows and careful lighting to reveal sensual, abstracted forms, particularly in natural objects and the human body. Check out and enlarge the titles “Shell 1927,” Pepper 1930,” “Cabbage Leaf, and “Church Door, Hornitos, 1940.” Notice how the lighting enhances these forms. Analyzing further, observe the direction and characteristics of the light source in these images. Is it specular or diffuse?

High-key lighting stresses the lines in a form through high contrast. It’s almost as if the lines were drawn. The mode is bright and energetic. Photographer Laura Letinsky plays with form, space and the aftermath of consumption in her high key images. Her themes include domesticity, ephemeralization and visual perception. And check out Platon. This renowned portrait photographer photographs world leaders and famous people against a white background, using high key “front” lighting. His images are stark and bold.

Point of View (POV)

Forms are enhanced when a subject is viewed from an angle that emphasizes its third dimension. Shooting from a low angle tends to make subjects (especially people) appear bigger, more powerful.

High angles, looking down, tend to flatten forms and diminish a subject. Wider aperture settings separate the dynamic center (foreground) from the background by reducing the depth of field. Photographic historians consider André Kertész to be one of the most important fine art photographers of the twentieth century. He famously said his objective was “to give meaning to everything.” With respect to point of view, he worked angles to emphasized form. My favorite photographs of his are “Budapest,” “Carrefour Blois,” “Chartres,” “Melancholic Tulip,” “Satiric Dancer” and “Chez Mondrian.” Enlarge to better appreciate.

Depth of Field

Form is enhanced when there are objects in front of or behind the primary subject. The relationship of one element to another contributes to a sense of depth in a two-dimensional medium, particularly when they overlap.

Form is always enhanced with rounded subjects. Shallow or narrow depth of field compels us to focus our attention on the foreground elements, the point of critical focus. Russian photographer Elena Shumilova uses shallow depth of field to blur colorful backgrounds and foregrounds to create a soft, dreamlike effect. Her collection features several images in each of the four seasons. Beautiful work!

Different levels of tonality, particularly on rounded forms that are sharp from foreground to background, contribute to a sense of depth. Take a look at images made by Alma Lavenson, an American photographer and member of Group f64 West Coast photographers in the 1930’s oriented toward sharp, detailed, and highly focused images. They rejected the soft-focus, painterly style of pictorialism. The name refers to the smallest aperture (f/64) on large-format cameras, which allowed for maximum depth of field and crisp detail throughout the image. Other members of Group f64 included Ansel Adams, Edward Weston and Imogen Cunningham.

CONTEMPLATING “FORM” IN ANOTHER CONTEXT

A painting or photograph emphasizes form, the quality of presence, when the subject matter is represented in three dimensions. The number “three” in dimensions of reality, applies to human beings and everything we experience in the world. As persons we are multidimensional. For instance, we have three modes of being—physical, mental and spiritual; body, mind, and spirit.

Parsing it further, according to Lajos Egri in The Art of Dramatic Writing, there are three dimensions that contribute to the revelation of character—physiology, which considers how a person’s body helps or hinders them in the pursuit of a goal, psychology that reveals a person’s thinking, and sociology, the socioeconomic and cultural aspects relating to status. According to Egri, these traits should provide a fiction writer with the information needed to develop a well-rounded, “multi-dimensional” character. The same in photography—well-rounded forms express a subject’s dimensions.

Larry Brooks, an author, speaker and coach in the art of storytelling, provides a model for introspection—how we see ourselves and others, and how others see us—by describing three “realms” of character. His first dimension, the “exterior landscape” of character, consists of “surface traits, quirks, and habits,” the personality we present to the world. His second dimension, the “interior landscape,” consists of “backstory and inner demons”—where we come from, our scars, memories, dashed dreams and resentments including our fears, habits and weaknesses, the things we prefer to hide from others. And yet he says, this is precisely what readers want and need to know because it helps them understand and empathize with the lead character.

Empathy is the great empowerer of stories. The more of it the reader feels, the more they’ll invest themselves in the reading experience.

Larry Brooks, bestselling author of six thrillers

Brooks’ third dimension of character is “action, behavior, and world view.” We take a stand, take risks, make decisions, dive in and execute. We go for what we want or need, follow our urges, seek answers to questions and create what we can imagine. And in the process of reaching for goals, we reveal what we’re made of—character in the sense of moral substance, or lack of it.

What we do and how we behave are a consequence of consciousness—who we think we are and how we perceive the world. Combined, how we think reveals our point of view—and vice versa. A gun, for instance, can variously be conceived as a threat, an object of art, or a deterrent to crime. And a border wall can be perceived as a solution to a problem, a challenge to be surmounted, an unnecessary expense or a symbol contrary to national values.

According to Larry Brooks, the art of developing a strong, empathetic character in a story is a matter of integrating inner, outer and expressive characteristics. I would suggest that the art of developing the fullness of personhood in real life involves the integration and effective management of our physical, mental and spiritual aspects—perceived as ever-evolving potentialities. As the British would say, “Personal growth is good form.”

Joy is the feeling that comes from the fulfillment of one’s potential.

William Schutz, social psychologist

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Aesthetic Dimensions in Art and Society

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Chapter 7: Depth of Field

“Depth of field” (DOF) is the optical property of a photographic lens that determines the degree of sharpness between objects close to the camera and those farther away. When both distances, near and far, are sharp the DOF is said to be “long” or “deep.” When only the point of critical focus in the foreground is sharp with the background out of focus, the DOF is “narrow” or “shallow.”

There are mathematical considerations that affect the DOF, but in practice, the features that concern the photographer are a) the lens’s aperture or f-stop, b) the focal length of the lens and c) the camera-to-subject distance. Each is an independent variable, but they combine to produce the DOF. When photographing purposefully, it’s always a consideration.

APPLICATION AND TECHNIQUE
Aperture

Long depth of field, where objects both near and far are sharp, spreads the viewer’s attention over the entire image. It encourages the eye to explore all the details within the frame. When a lens is “stopped down,” admitting little light, the f-stop numbers hover around f16, f22, f32. The higher the number, the longer the depth of field. In this range, when “critically focusing” on a near subject, the background will also be sharp.

Narrow or short depth of field compels the eye to stay focused on the dynamic center, the point of critical focus in the foreground. The more open the lens aperture, the more light gets through to the recording medium—film or camera card. These aperture numbers hover around f2.8, f 3.5, f4. The lower the number, the narrower the DOF. In this range, when critically focusing on a subject near the camera, the background will be out of focus.

Focal Length

Fountain Square, Cincinnati, Ohio

The focal length of a lens determines the area of coverage that a camera “sees.” Here, a “wide angle” lens includes the sky, plaza and fountain.

A “medium” or “normal” focal length lens shows some sky, but the buildings in the background are prominent.

“The Genius of Water” atop the Tyler Davidson Fountain

A “telephoto” lens lets the photographer get a closer view without physically moving close to the subject. Here, the optics excludes everything except the figure at the top of the fountain and what’s behind it. The camera’s aperture was fairly wide open, rendering the building slightly out of focus.

A very wide angle lens, even with the aperture wide open, will likely render both the foreground and background as sharp. Conversely, the aperture of a telephoto lens has to be “stopped down” considerably in order to keep the background sharp. This is one of the reasons why professionals carry many lenses—or a zoom lens where the focal length can be varied from wide to telephoto.

Camera-to-Subject Distance

As a camera is brought closer to the primary subject, the foreground and background in the frame tend to go out of focus, necessitating a smaller aperture to keep them sharp.

As the camera-to-subject distance is increased, objects both near and far will be more in focus. A camera moving closer to a subject is equivalent to a person moving closer. It’s why movie directors prefer cinematographers to use single focal length (“prime”) lenses rather than a zoom lens. They want the viewer to feel like they are in the subject’s personal space.

PERSONAL AND SOCIAL REFLECTION

Our eyes continuously shift from wide to medium to closeup perspectives in an instant. Cameras have a single and objective “eye.” And they only record in two dimensions. We see in three dimensions and our perception is subjective—we make sense of what’s in front of us, real or imagined. This observation is so obvious, it hides the significance of perception as a process of thoughts that make meaning, which in turn drive action.

If we consider a “field” as a domain of thought, of consciousness, the question arises: What is my personal depth of field? How deep does my thinking go? Most of the time, when we’re not focused on everyday concerns, where do we place our focus? Daily, like a zoom lens, we shift between close-in, self-oriented and short-term matters, and broader, more other-directed and long-term thinking.

As an organism starts to develop it begins to resonate to a certain field, and the more the organism follows that particular path the more it becomes habituated and goes on developing within that field to its final form.

Judy Cannato, American Catholic author, retreat facilitator, and spiritual director

Becoming habituated to a particular field of thought is like viewing the world solely through a “normal” lens. But in everyday living, our depth of thought shifts continuously. Looked at analogously, a camera’s aperture controls the amount of light that reaches the recording medium. How much light of awareness am I letting in by exposing myself to diverse perspectives, higher (more complex) consciousness, creative and inspirational sources? What is currently the depth of my thought-field? What’s mostly on my mind?

Consider also the focal length of a lens that determines the extent of subject coverage. Am I taking advantage of opportunities to change lenses (perspective), to empathize, walk in other people’s shoes, expand my field of thinking by observing people and circumstances close up, broadly, and farther away in order to supplement my “normal,” routinized ways of thinking? And with regard to camera-to-subject distance, am I venturing out, exploring other fields of thought, ideas and values? Of course, there are no right or wrong, better or worse, responses to these questions, but they recommend wider and deeper perceptions when considering where we are in the unfolding process of trying to live our lives more authentically and productively.

New perceptions and insights fill us. The five senses no longer limit our experiences. We are learning to distinguish love from fear within ourselves and to choose love no matter what happens inside us or what happens outside. This is authentic power. We are seeing for the first time that the love and fear in the world are the love and fear in us. Therefore, only by changing ourselves can we change the world. All this is only the beginning.

Gary Zukav, author Universal Human

On the subject of “consciousness,” my friend Glenn Geffcken authors a blog, The Deeper Side of Things. I highly recommend it.

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My other sites:

Substack: Poetry and insights relating to creation and Creator

David L. Smith Photography Portfolio.com

Ancient Maya Cultural Traits.com: Weekly blog featuring the traits that made this civilization unique

 

The Aesthetic Dimensions in Art and Society

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Chapter 6: Contrast

In photography, “contrast” is the ratio between the darkest dark and the lightest light within a frame. It’s said to be “soft” when there’s very little difference between the lights and darks,  “medium” in what we regard as normal, and “high” when an image has both maximum blacks and brightest whites.” Contrast is never one thing: it’s the difference between two things.

                         

The low contrast image on the left  looks “muddy” because there is very little difference between the blacks and whites. A medium or “normal” contrast image has some deep blacks and bright whites, with a full range of grays in between. Generally, fine art photographers tend to print for the darkest blacks and the brightest whites which the substrate (usually photographic paper) can accommodate. This maintains some detail in the shadows and highlights. At the other end of the continuum, in this extreme high contrast image there are barely any grays. The whites are as bright as possible and the blacks are totally dark. While this effect can be accomplished in image editing software, I produced this effect in the darkroom. I began by making a duplicate of the negative on Kodalith film, an emulsion that only renders pure black and white.

In the digital world, cameras have a built-in histogram that displays brightness levels. These can be adjusted for each of the primary colors and the extremes of dark and light. Whatever the medium, Dmax (maximum density) and Dmin (minimum density) are devoid of detail. Being able to control contrast is both technically and aesthetically important because it determines the amount of detail that will be visible in the shadows and highlights. I highly recommend the “RAW” format for cameras because it  renders better quality by capturing a high level of image detail, which allows for greater flexibility and more options in editing software.

Creative Application

Aesthetically speaking, low contrast evokes a calm, flat or soft sensibility. There’s detail in the blacks and whites. These images are not seen very often because they’re not generally appealing. Extremely high contrast images are bold, evoking a sense of starkness and clarity. When I was apprenticing, I sometimes heard photographers use the word “snap” as an indication of the desirable contrast range. That’s where there are pure whites and pure blacks in the frame and a full range of gray tones in between—as illustrated in this grey scale.

This is a section of a “Kodak grey card.” Reflecting 18% of the light. Professionals used it with an exposure meter to determine the luminance under various conditions to get a reading of “middle grey,” camera settings that would yield the full scale of tones.

Ansel Adams equated the tonal scale of photographic prints with that of a piano octave. His ability to accomplish the full range of tones on photographic paper earned him a reputation as a master craftsman. For that reason alone, his original prints are far superior to the reproductions in books, posters and calendars. When he showed prints to our class at RIT in the early ‘60s, I was inspired to make black and white photography my principle creative medium.

Technique

Contrast is determined in the first place by lighting. Outdoors, cloudless sunlight creates high contrast—bright areas with dark shadows. Using editing software, photographers get better results by increasing the contrast of low contrast originals, rather than vice versa.

This is why wedding photographers prefer to shoot groups in the shade or under a diffuse cover on a bright sunny day—and use flash, not only to freeze the action, but also to establish highlights in the eyes. Working inside with lights, the standard practice or “starting point” for portraits is to use three lights—a “key” or main light that illuminates one side of the subject, a less intense or feathered “fill” light that provides some detail in the dark shadows created by the key light and a “backlight” positioned behind the subject to convey a sense of depth by creating a rim around the subject. To maximize contrast, eliminate the fill light altogether. To decrease contrast, bring the fill light closer to the subject. Having the key and fill at the same distance from the subject creates a very flat look.

Being the brightest light relative to others being used, the key is usually positioned where the primary source would be— whether actual or imagined. This man was photographed at night for a book cover. I reasoned that, because the train was stationary, the light would be coming from the railroad station. So I placed a single 1000W quartz light to simulate a night light on a platform. The tiny bulb maximized its specularity, thereby enhancing the sharpness of his skin and the texture of his hat. It also put a highlight in his eye.  So the hat wouldn’t cover his eyes I had him look up rather than down, where passengers would normally be. The contrast was extremely high, so using editing software, a bit of detail was added to the shadows, mostly to give the image some depth. Relative to composition, the white shirtsleeve serves as a vector that directs the eye to the conductor’s face.

Reflections on Social Contrast

Historically, in the United States there were times of low social contrast, where there was little interest in public affairs and even less political engagement. The public’s enthusiasm was flat; the contrast range became contracted and a general malaise set in. Feeling disenfranchised and helpless, citizens largely disengaged and deferred to the preferences of their representatives. This  image represents this situation. The subject matter can be recognized, but the expression is soft lacks vitality, socially and aesthetically.

On the other extreme, when enthusiasm turns to fixated passion to the extent that neither political entity can abide the perspectives of the other, the contrast becomes stark, relationships become contentious and the whole system tends toward dysfunctionality. Pictorially, extreme political contrast identifies citizens as either a black or white pixels. You can’t be gray. Extreme contrast is militant. It says, choose your position and defend it! There’s no detail, few grey areas, no substantive perspectives or open-mindedness in either direction. (The black and white image, rather than color, stands as a metaphor extreme differences).

Episodes of Madam Secretary and Blue Bloods on television provided demonstrations of how extremely high political contrast can be reduced to a functional level. In both instances, the characters representing the extremes, fully expressed their perspectives with well-reasoned arguments making sure their positions were clearly understood. (In formal debate, the first order of business is always for the participants to define their terms). With the point of disagreement clear, the characters came together and negotiated terms—in detail—that would satisfy both. They compromised and reached a workable, win-win arrangement.

An argument is reasoned when it’s based on logical discourse that flows from evidence, statistical analysis or proven facts, as opposed to opinions expressed emotionally without supporting evidence. For instance, an argument that begins, “The American people want… or know…” is the hallmark of an unsubstantiated emotional appeal. Nations are constituted of diverse people having too many perspectives and preferences to be lumped into a single philosophical category, despite what surveys or poles might seem to indicate.

At the end of a Blue Bloods episode, Frank Reagan, the NYC Police Commissioner played by Tom Selleck, rebuilt a contentious relationship that had developed between him and his daughter, Erin Reagan, the Assistant District Attorney played by Bridget Moynahan, by citing a particularly nasty hockey game where the players on both sides shook hands after the game. Respect was regained in that situation by acknowledging that, although the game was difficult and people got hurt, the higher ideal of sportsmanship was maintained.

Social contrast, like pictorial contrast, has to be managed. In the first place, that can only happen when both extremes loosen their grip on how to accomplish a common goal. That requires the participants to have open minds. Once the goal is clearly articulated and agreed upon, the means toward achieving it have to be presented in a reasoned argument on both sides. And that requires full concentration, understanding, respectful questioning and listening with an open mind. This is the period of “illumination.” Finally, and critically important, the participants must consider the maintenance of their relationship as equally important to winning the argument. Shaking hands, having a meal together, meeting each other’s families, frequent personal interaction—these ensure that the next game will be played well.

“Thank you” to the writers, producers and cast of Madam Secretary and Blue Bloods. They are prime examples of television that’s socially responsible, showing the full range of human experience, and how the extremes can be peacefully managed.

The critical contrast between seeing and looking-at cannot be overestimated. Seeing touches the heart. Looking-at is cold hearted. The difference may be a matter of life and death.

Fredrick Franck, artist

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My other sites:

Substack: Poetry and insights relating to creation and Creator

David L. Smith Photography Portfolio.com

Ancient Maya Cultural Traits.com: Weekly blog featuring the traits that made this civilization unique

The Aesthetic Dimensions in Art and Society

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Chapter 5: Elements of Composition

In pictorial art, composition relates to how visual elements are organized within a frame. Through the centuries, both Eastern and Western artists developed guidelines to help them maintain a viewer’s attention. Aspiring artists and many in the public appreciate that the organization of elements within a frame influences the viewer’s experience of an image.

How does it work? How does composition contribute toward capturing and holding someone’s attention? Each of the aesthetic dimensions being treated in this series are contributing factors, but specifically related to composition are the principles of unity, balance, focus and placement. Because these rules have been confirmed as appealing to the eye across cultures, adhering to them is advisable. At the same time, they can and are often broken. My advice to students, “If you want to break the rules, do it for good reason and beautifully.”

Visual Elements and Information Theory

An eye for composition develops more quickly by regarding subject matter as visual elements, the parts of an image that together make up the whole. By enclosing space within a frame of any sort, the message to viewers is “Look here. I want you to see this.”

Imagine a dot like this ( . ) anywhere on a white background that’s framed. That’s one “bit” of information. It simply “says” it’s a black dot and it exists. It conveys no meaning because meaning derives from context and relationship. When we add another dot in that frame a relationship is established and it generates the question: “What does it mean?” The artist had something in mind, and the viewer’s challenge is to make sense of it—if they care to. Add a third dot and the potential for meaning increases dramatically. The relationship becomes more complex. Because the elements are within a frame, the viewer assumes they must be significant in some way. And that’s the context, urging the viewer to identify the subject, understand the relationship and why it’s being presented. What’s going on here?

Being human, we tend to anthropomorphize, so the three stones above could be interpreted as parents and child. Which would be the father? Actually, any of them could be, but our preconceived notions assign “him” to the larger stone because men are generally larger than women and children. The composition itself, how the stones are arranged, “speaks” as well. Notice the larger stones are touching. And why is the small one not touching the others? What might the color and differences in texture convey? What does it say that one stone has more texture than the other?

As more elements are added to an image the relationships become complex and the meaning more apparent. Each additional element—line, squiggle, circle, form or subject matter—regardless of size, shape, texture or color is another bit of information.

And the background is another. The more information there is within a frame, the more readily a viewer can discern its meaning, even perhaps the artist’s intention, mood or preferences. So what’s the story here?

Creative application

Communication Objective

To more consciously create an image that’s expressive, the consideration of composition should relate to some purpose or communication objective. What do I want viewers to see, think or feel?  Or what do I want to say? Broadly, there are two reasons why we arrange elements within a frame—to express something or provide information. Sometimes both. In practice, if the intention is to express, reduce the number of visual elements—simplicity. If it’s to communicate, increase them—complexity. Does this notion of simple/complex apply to sound as well? What about food? Architecture? Lifestyle?

Unity

In the visual sense, unity relates to appropriateness. Are the elements within the frame justified relative to the expression or communication objective? There shouldn’t be a dot, line, surface, form or anything else that doesn’t contribute to the whole statement. For instance, the impact of this photograph would be less unified if there was a kite flying in the sky.

Aesthetic unification usually requires getting in close, zooming in or changing the angle to exclude everything that doesn’t relate to the principal subject. Unity strengthens the expression and communication objective. When an image is unified, it makes a clear statement, even if it abstract.

Balance

An image is balanced within a frame when the elements are similarly “weighted” on both sides of the frame, or top to bottom. Art students are taught to think of the frame as having a fulcrum at the bottom center of the frame. Ideally, the elements don’t tip the scale on one side or the other. A balanced composition feels good; an image that’s top or bottom heavy or right or left feels “off.” It pulls the attention toward the bold or heavily weighted subject matter, making it challenging for the eye to move freely within the  frame. Of course, if the communication objective is to express a feeling of instability or attract attention through imbalance, the elements can be purposefully unbalanced. Above, the clouds and poles diminishing in size and number on the left, balance the tall, darker one on the right.

Focus

An image is compositionally focused when the subject matter is prominently placed within the frame. It’s the “dynamic center,” the point where we want the eye to go to first and return after wandering. Focus is important because it conveys the expression or accomplishes the communication objective. As the central feature and point of critical focus, it “says” what the image is about. This is generally accomplished by going in close, excluding as many secondary elements as possible. Maximizing compositional focus is why closeups are so powerful.  A lack of focus is confusing. For instance, a seascape that puts the horizon in the middle of the frame top-to-bottom could be a statement about either the sky or the ocean. Which is it?

Placement

It’s been said that the greatest compliment a viewer can pay an artist is the length of time they attend to their work. The arrangement of elements within a frame largely determines how long the viewer will stay with an image, and how their eye will move around it. In this series, all the aesthetic dimensions being considered influence that arrangement. Organization of visual elements is a skill, gained by studying the works of master image makers and analyzing our own creations to see what works and what doesn’t.

In Western cultures we read left-to-right and top-to-bottom, so the eye is best directed within a frame by having a face situated on the right of the frame looking left into the space. That way the eye enters the frame on the left, connects with the subject’s eyes, pauses and returns to the left, the direction the person or animal is looking. Were the subject placed on the left of the frame looking right, the viewer’s eye would go to the subject’s eyes and continue out of the frame on the right, shortening their attention. The rule is to keep the viewer’s attention engaged in the frame as long as possible. To do this, the elements need to be arranged so that no line, sightline or vector leads the eye out of the frame.

Eye leading and circular composition

Famous painters throughout history used “compositional flow” or “eye leading” to maintain the viewer’s gaze. Longer attention encouraged deeper engagement. Artists accomplished this by creating actual and imaginary grids to create balance and movement, the golden mean to create harmony, vectors to create visual pathways, framing devices like trees and architectural elements and circular composition to continuously guide the viewer’s eye from one element to another. Photographers working in this way often use view cameras, because composing on a 4×5 or 8×10 glass plate allows for the meticulous arrangement of elements.

The Rule of Thirds

Rule of Thirds Grid

To situate subject matter within the frame in the most pleasing way, and to better control eye movement within it, artists devised a scheme where they divided an imaginary frame into thirds to create a grid. The “rule of thirds” advises us to not place the principle subject matter dead center in the frame, instead, to place it where the lines of the grid intersect.

Sacred Geometry

An Amish construction based on the principles of sacred geometry

An example of architectural resonance

Anciently, artists discovered ways of ordering elements within a frame that evoke a numinous feeling, a sense of spiritual wholeness or grandeur. They found that certain geometric forms, those with specific mathematical properties, somehow set up a resonance within us. This aesthetic dimension is amazing and vast. I recommend a visit to a well-illustrated page in Ancient Wisdom.

Golden mean overlay

A geometric form that’s especially applicable for photographers is the “Golden Ratio,” illustrated by the spiral. It’s based on a 5:8 proportion. I use it to format images and place primary subject matter on the imaginary “sweet spot.” I highly recommend Sacred Geometry by Robert Lawlor. Its many illustrations allowed me to translate the philosophy of sacred geometry into tools for everyday use. Most libraries have the book. If you use Lightroom software you can overlay a variety of grids like this. In “Develop” mode press the “R” key to bring up the grids. To change them, press the letter “O.”

Reflections On Personal and Social Order

When objects—books, chairs, cars, buildings, neighborhoods—are ordered, they establish and display a regular pattern or sequential arrangement that looks and feels complete, managed. When all our “ducks” are in a row, they’re in a satisfying and assessable alignment. Order and disorder communicate, so we have to be careful in making judgments based on the composition of other people’s environments. For instance, a neighbor can have toys and tools scattered all over their yard, left out in the rain with weeds growing over them. And then there’s another neighbor whose toys and tools are neatly stowed in a garage or shed, leaving the grass open and well-trimmed. We may be tempted to think the former suggests an uneducated, uncaring person. Even reading these descriptions, it’s likely you formed an opinion. But the disorderly neighbor could have a Ph.D. in microbiology and sing in the church choir, and the orderly neighbor could be a radicalized individual building a well-organized collection of handguns in his basement preparing for a terrorist attack.

A principle in the anthropology of visual communication holds that “everybody notices everything.” Another is “What we see we evaluate relative to our history, experience and worldview.” And “We tend to see what we want to see.” Yet another, we find what we’re looking for.” Judgments relating to order help us place ourselves and others within a social context. On the other hand, if we let them, our judgments can create chaos, build walls of separation and encourage stereotyping. The order-disorder continuum alone, is therefore not a good criteria for making judgments about people.

Expanding the context from personal to social order, Margaret Wheatley, noted systems theorist and management consultant offered eight social principles relating to the subject of order and organizations—how we compose our lives. The following are quotes from her book, A Simpler Way.

  1. We live in a world in which life wants to happen.
  2. Organizations and societies are living systems.
  3. We live in a universe that is alive, creative and experimenting all the time to discover what’s possible.
  4. It is the natural tendency for life to organize, to seek greater complexity and diversity.
  5. Life uses messes to get to well-ordered solutions.
  6. Life is intent on finding what works, not what’s right.
  7. Life creates more possibilities as it engages with opportunities.
  8. Life organizes around identity.

Expanding the subject even further, to the nature of reality, theoretical physicist David Bohm  developed the concept of “implicate” and “explicate” orders. Using the analogy of a rolled-up carpet, he proposed that we should think of the objective or Absolute Reality as a “pattern” that already exists, complete and fully formed within the roll. The pattern is already there but hidden. We can’t see it until, in time, the carpet unrolls and the  pattern becomes visible—the reality we experience. Dr. Bohm was one of the first scientists, extrapolating from quantum theory, who theorized that reality and consciousness constitute a coherent whole that’s in a process of unfolding.

Chaos is infinitely complex order.

David Bohm, physicist

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My other sites:

Substack: Poetry and insights relating to creation and Creator

David L. Smith Photography Portfolio.com

Ancient Maya Cultural Traits.com: Weekly blog featuring the traits that made this civilization unique

 

The Aesthetic Dimensions in Art and Society

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Chapter 3: Color as Subject

Objectively speaking, the world is colorless. So is the sun. Our brains construct the sensation of color from various radiating wavelengths of photons, depending on how they’re absorbed in and reflected from various surfaces. Visible light occupies just a tiny sliver of the electromagnetic spectrum, constituted of wavelengths that stimulate our brains to interpret them as colors. We see a leaf as green because it absorbs all but the green wavelengths, which it reflects.

Light has three properties that affect the sensation of color: “hue,” which specifies a wavelength and the names we assign to its variations (red, yellow, blue). “Saturation” refers to a color’s richness (muted or intense). “Brightness” refers to its intensity.

I  want you to understand that there are no colors in the real world. There are no textures in the real world. There are no fragrances in the real world. There is no beauty. There is no ugliness. Nothing of the sort. Out there is a chaos of energy soup and energy fields. Literally. We take all that and somewhere inside ourselves we create a world. Somewhere inside ourselves, it all happens. The journey of our life.

Sir John Eccles, Australian neurophysiologist and philosopher

 

QUALITY

Photographers are concerned with the “quality” (color) of light because cameras don’t see it the way we do. They need to be shown or “balanced” for different wavelengths, and they do it by referencing “white.” A photo taken with the camera set at “tungsten” or artificial light, which is proper for indoor shooting, will turn out distinctly yellow when shooting outdoors with the same setting. Camera instruction manuals describe the “white balance” procedure, so the focus here is on the aesthetic considerations of color, particularly its sensibilities (harmony/discord) and the social/psychological characteristics that concern image makers. Light sources and controls were covered in a previous posting in this series: Chapter 3: Light and Lighting.

Sunlight varies considerably depending on the time of day, seasons and atmospheric conditions. Bulbs in artificial lights come in two distinct color “balances”—”daylight” (5500 to 5600° Kelvin), which approximates sunlight falling on a white card at noon on a clear day—sometimes used indoors to simulate daylight conditions. And “tungsten” (3200° Kelvin), which is commonly used in studio settings. Working under either of these conditions, our eyes adjust and these bulbs appear to emit normal white light. But side by side, a tungsten bulb would obviously emit orange light compared to a daylight bulb, which would be distinctly blue. Color films have long been available in both sensitivities.

CREATIVE APPLICATION

Any image, black and white and color, can be perceived as being “simple,” having few visual elements, or “complex” having many. Generally, image simplicity tends to be more expressive and evocative, whereas complexity provides more information. A related feature specific to color is the phenomenon of harmony and discord. An image displays “color harmony” when the hues within the frame are close to each other on the electromagnetic spectrum. They can vary widely in saturation and brightness, but overall the image will consist of blues, reds, greens or yellows. With even a cursory glance at such an image, a viewer will readily see it as predominately “orange,” “green” or “blue.”

Color Harmony

Application

Color harmony is used when the expression or communication objective is to attract attention or evoke a mood. It accomplishes this by being unusual. In our everyday experience of the world, indoors and out, there are so many objects of different colors it’s relatively rare to find subject matter with harmonious hues. Of course, in the studio it can be created. Whenever photographer’s see it, it catches their attention. It’s a pleasing sensation.

Out in the world with a camera, it’s sometimes a matter of shooting close and framing the shot to exclude hues different from the primary subject matter. In the studio, it’s a matter of choosing a background, foreground and other elements that are the same relative color as the primary subject, irrespective of saturation and brightness. This aesthetic dimension is effective when the intent is to create impact or generate an emotion. 

The most important aesthetic principle (for the Japanese) is harmony—harmony of forms, colors, and materials, harmony of expression, harmony of order, harmony of place and time; harmony of heaven, earth, and man; harmony of harmonies.

Hasumi Toshimitsu, author Zen in Japanese Art

Color Discord

Application

Aesthetic discord is the opposite of harmony. It’s where there are several different hues in the same image. Because it’s the visual norm, it’s much less challenging than harmony to find and produce. Used deliberately, it works best when the intent is to convey information rather than express or elicit an emotion. It accomplishes this by making each color a distinct and separate visual element. Complex images—those having many elements and colors within a frame carry more information potential. If desirable, discordant colors can also evoke a sense of clutter, frenzy or confusion. Jeffrey Becom, who focuses on the architecture of various cultures, provides stunning and beautiful examples of color discordance. Clearly one of his primary aesthetic preferences is bold and contrasting colors.

Color is evocative. One of the items in my creative toolkit is a chart of the psychological properties of different colors. It helps me make decisions about costumes, backgrounds, lighting and props. And in video post-production sessions, it helps to select fonts and graphics that pick up product colors to make things harmonious.

Whatever we’re creating, even if it’s words on a page or putting together a gift for someone, colors “speak.” They can create an affect, leave an impression and symbolize an emotion. Because they’re components of the visible portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, the hues have both higher (darker) and lower (lighter) vibrations. With regard to evocation, the key question is: What do I want people to feel?

RED is masculine, aggressive, stimulating and lively. It can signal passion, courage and strength. Depending upon the context, deep red can be aggressive and defiant. “Fire engine red” is my favorite color for creating excitement.

BLUE is intellectual, the color of mind. Its lower (lighter) vibration evokes trust, serenity, reflection and calm. Strong blues stimulate clear thought and soft blues are conducive to consideration and reflection. It’s why I chose the calm blue of a lake for the masthead of this blog. Dark blues can express coolness or aloofness.

YELLOW is emotional, the color of optimism, friendliness and creativity. Bright yellow is open, encouraging and inviting. On the dark side, bordering on brown, it can promote feelings of fear, depression and anxiety. When a product, message or scene needs to convey a sense of confidence or trust, bright yellow is a good choice.

GREEN is the color of balance and harmony. It conveys the sensibilities of peace, awareness and freshness—like an expanse of verdant grass. We have a natural affinity for green because it signals life, the presence of water and the potential for food. Dark greens, however, can express stagnation or sameness.

VIOLET on the lighter side is spiritual, the color of awareness, vision and truth, even luxury. On the dark side it can be cloying and annoying, the vibrance being so strong it borders on decadence or suppression.

ORANGE is playful. It reminds us of food, fruit in particular, so it contributes to feelings of comfort, abundance and security. On the bright side, it photographs well in ads that contain food. Think of seafood commercials. Along with red and yellow it’s one of the “fun” colors used to enhance motivation. Deep dark tones of orange can convey the opposite—deprivation.

BROWN is serious, referencing both the earth and decay. It can convey stability and warmth. Browns excel in autumnal images and ads that feature furniture, leather goods and high fashion.  Its dark (higher) vibration can express heaviness, even depression. It doesn’t photograph well in ads containing food.

THE SOCIAL SIGNIFICANCE OF COLOR

There isn’t an object or experience I can think of that isn’t influenced or enriched by color. It’s a primary influence in the food we eat, the automobiles and appliances we purchase, the vacations we take, the creative activities we perform. We use it symbolically to distinguish differing political views, moods, traffic signals and road signs. Businesses—Target stores (Red) and UPS (Brown) trucks—can be identified solely by their color. And colors carry different meanings across cultures. White symbolizes purity in Western weddings but mourning in many Eastern traditions. Red signifies luck and prosperity in China, while in the West it can imply danger, love or passion.

It plays a defining role in identity, from national flags and political movements to sports teams and religious vestments, such as Catholic cardinals wearing red, the color of hierarchy . LGBTQ+ communities use the rainbow flag as a symbol of diversity and pride. There are “red states” and “blue states,” expressing political views.

Perhaps the most socially significant color is that of skin tone. It has led to systemic racism and wars with geographic, political and economic consequences worldwide.

I see a time of Seven Generations when all the colors of mankind will gather under the Sacred Tree of Life and the whole earth will become One Circle again.

Chief Crazy Horse, Lakota war leader of the Oglala band

What we wear communicates status, mood and affiliation. Bright, bold colors may signal confidence or rebellion; subdued tones may suggest conformity or solemnity. Uniform colors in workplaces (e.g., blue scrubs in hospitals and uniforms in law enforcement) denote roles and responsibilities. Bottom line: Color communicates!

Color is a power which directly influences the soul.

Wassily Kandinsky, Russian painter and art theorist

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My other sites:

Substack: Poetry and insights relating to creation and Creator

David L. Smith Photography Portfolio.com

Ancient Maya Cultural Traits.com: Weekly blog featuring the traits that made this civilization unique