COMPOSITION: Cropping

Jill

Rio

Last night we made a series of studies exploring different ways of "cropping" a single object. Students then chose the best one to develop into a finished drawing. One of the issues raised last night was the use of verticals and horizontals vs. diagonals. Vertical and horizontal compositions, like Jill's at the top, establish stability. Think about architecture. Diagonals as in Rio's drawing, are more dynamic. Placing an object on a diagonal introduces triangular negative areas into the rectangular frame. Cropping, in general, may enclose and/or divide the space resulting in more interesting and active negative areas.