Successful use of color in painting requires a thorough understanding of both color theory and color mixing and application. I wrote about the theory in a previous post. This post will provide you with everything you need to know about color mixing and application. I’ll cover: Basic Color Mixing Terms Color is a complicated area, … Read more
This is a comprehensive guide on the idea of movement in art and how we can convey it in our artworks. I’ll cover: What Does “Movement” Mean in Art? Our paints cannot physically move, but we can paint in a way that gives the illusion or suggestion of movement. This typically involves arranging shapes in … Read more
Pablo Picasso’s The Bull is a series of eleven lithographs created in 1945. It depicts the bull at various stages of abstraction, starting with a fairly realistic depiction and ending with nothing but a few lines. The first lithograph in the series appears light and spontaneous, as if it were quickly sketched with a brush and … Read more
Line is perhaps the most fundamental of all the visual elements. It broadly refers to a mark which spans between two points. But there are many different types and uses of line. In this post, I cover: Line Types Lines can be: Straight or curved Thick or thin Rigid or organic Horizontal or vertical Broken … Read more
The fundamentals of art are the building blocks of an artwork. They are color, composition, value, form, brushwork, and perspective. The fundamentals are, for the most part, universal across different mediums and styles. Learning them will help you become a well-rounded and versatile artist. Color I like to break color into two parts: color theory and … Read more
Symbolism was a late 19th century movement whose artists communicated ideas through symbols instead of bluntly depicting reality. It was created as a reaction to art movements that depicted the natural world realistically, such as Impressionism, Realism, and Naturalism. In this post, I cover: Beginnings of Symbolism Symbolism first appeared as a literary movement that … Read more
John Singer Sargent was a remarkable and prolific artist, having created over 900 oil paintings and 2,000 watercolor paintings (many of which you can see on Sargent’s gallery page). You will notice that I use his work to illustrate many of the posts on Draw Paint Academy. In this post, I take a closer look … Read more
Emphasis is a principle of art that refers to the use of visual elements to draw attention to a certain area, usually a focal point, in an artwork. There are many ways you could go about using emphasis in your art. Usually, it involves contrasting different elements against each other. For example, a bright, red … Read more
Photoshop is a remarkable tool that can complement the work of traditional artists. I don’t claim to be a Photoshop expert, but I use it on an almost daily basis to help me explore compositions, identify colors, and alter reference photos, and so on. In this post, I will run through some of the ways … Read more
Harmony is a principle of art that refers to how well all the visual elements work together. Elements that are in harmony should have some kind of logical progression or relationship. It should just look like it works. If there is an element that is not in harmony with the rest of the artwork, it … Read more
In this post, I take a closer look at the remarkably intricate Ophelia by British artist and founding member of the Pre-Raphaelites, Sir John Everett Millais. I cover: Key Facts, Ideas, and Subject The figure in the painting is Ophelia, a character from Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Act IV, Scene VII. She is depicted lying in the stream … Read more
Waterfalls are a fantastic subject to paint, particularly as a study of edges, color, and movement. But they can be challenging, with all the twists, turns, breaks, reflections, and turbulence as the water crashes down through the rocks. In this post, I will provide you with some guidelines for painting waterfalls, using master paintings and … Read more