World off art 8th edtion by henry m sayre chapter 04

WORLD OF ART
EIGHTH EDITION

CHAPTER

4

Shape and Space

World of Art, Eighth Edition
Henry M. Sayre

Copyright © 2016, 2013, 2010
by Pearson Education, Inc. or its affiliates.
All rights reserved.


Learning Objectives
1. Differentiate between shape and mass.
2. Describe how three-dimensional space
is represented on a flat surface using
perspective.
3. Explain why modern artists have
challenged the means of representing
three dimensions on two-dimensional
surfaces.


Introduction
1 of 2

• Shape is a two-dimensional area.
 Julie Mehretu's Berliner Plätze features
layers of place, space, and time that
emerge from the flat shape of the
canvas.

• Perspective is a system that allows
the picture plane to function as a
convincing window into its subject.


Julie Mehretu, Berliner Plätze.
2008–09. Ink and acrylic on canvas, 10 × 14'. Commissioned by Deutsche Bank AG in
consultation with the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation for the Deutsche Guggenheim,
Berlin.
© Julie Mehretu, courtesy of Marian Goodman Gallery. [Fig. 4-1]


Introduction
2 of 2

• The Deutsche Bank and Guggenheim
Museum commissioned a group of
works known as Grey Area, meant to
display ambiguous spaces.
• Space has become an increasingly
contested issue, especially in an age
where the Internet and cyberspace
dominate our daily lives.

Shape and Mass
1 of 2

• Ellsworth Kelly's Three Panels: Orange,
Dark Gray, Green applies the shapes to
the gallery wall as though it were the
canvas.
 The wall became the ground in the
figure–ground relation.
 Shapes between figures are known as
negative shapes, and the figures
themselves are positive shapes.


Ellsworth Kelly, Three Panels: Orange, Dark Gray, Green.
1986. Oil on canvas, overall 9' 8" × 34' 4-1/2 in. Museum of Modern Art, New York.
Gift of Douglas S. Cramer Foundation, 776 © 2015 Ellsworth Kelly. [Fig. 4-2]


Rubin vase [Fig. 4-3]


Shape and Mass
2 of 2

• A mass is a solid that occupies threedimensional volume.
 It can be measured with height, width,
and depth.
 For example, a circle is a shape but a

sphere has mass.

• Martin Puryear's Self appears to
possess weight and density, but is
lightweight and made from wood.


Martin Puryear, Self.
1978. Polychromed red cedar and mahogany, 5' 9" × 4' × 25". Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha.
Museum purchase in memory of Elinor Ashton, 1980.63. © Martin Puryear. [Fig. 3-4]


Martin Puryear, Untitled IV.
2002. Soft-ground and spitbite etching with drypoint and Chine-collé Gampi, 8-5/8 × 67/8". Paulson Bott Press, San Francisco.
© Martin Puryear. [Fig. 4-5]


The Creative Process
1 of 2

• From Two to Three Dimensions:
Umberto Boccioni's Development of a
Bottle in Space
 Marinetti's Futurist movement called
for the beauty of speed.
 Umberto Boccioni asserted that no
object exists in space by itself, and is
rather coexistent with its surroundings.

The Creative Process
2 of 2

• From Two to Three Dimensions:
Umberto Boccioni's Development of a
Bottle in Space
 A drawing of a glass bottle resting on a
table renders the bottle and glass in
volumetric spirals.
 The three-dimensional bronze version
lures viewers from all sides.
• Further versions explored form and color.


Umberto Boccioni, Table + Bottle + House.
1912. Pencil on paper, 13-1/8 × 9-3/8". Civico Gabinetto dei Desegni, Castello Sforzesco, Milan.
© Comune di Milano. All rights reserved. [Fig. 4-6]


Umberto Boccioni, Development of a Bottle in Space.
1913. Bronze, 15-1/2 ×23-3/4 × 15-1/2". Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
Bequest of Lydia Winston Malbin, 1990.38.© 2015. Image copyright Metropolitan
Museum of Art/Art Resource/Scala, Florence. [Fig. 4-7]


Negative Space
1 of 2

• Standing vertical masses in Barbara
Hepworth's Two Figures have negative

spaces carved into them.
 The left-hand figure especially seems to
represent anatomical features.

• The Feast-making spoon represents the
generosity of the hospitable wunkirle
woman in the Dan people of Liberia, its
belly "pregnant with rice."


Barbara Hepworth, Two Figures.
1947–48. Elmwood and white paint, 38 × 17". Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum,
University of Minnesota.
Gift of John Rood Sculpture Collection. © Bowness. [Fig. 4-8]


Feast-making spoon (Wunkirmian). Liberia/IvoryCoast.
Wood, Height 18-1⁄8". Private collection.
Photo © Heini Schneebeli/Bridgeman Images. [Fig. 4-9]


Negative Space
2 of 2

• In architecture, buildings surround and
frame empty space.
• The 125-foot tall nave of the Reims
Cathedral in France elicits a sense of
awe, particularly with the way that light
fills the space.

• Olafur Eliasson's installation Suney
featured a gallery bisected with a
yellow sheet of Mylar.


Nave, Reims Cathedral, France.
Begun 1211; nave ca. 1220. View to the west.
© Art Archive/Alamy. [Fig. 4-10]


Olafur Eliasson, Suney.
1995. Installation view, Künstlerhaus Stuttgart, Germany.
Courtesy of the artist, Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York, and Neugerriemschneider,
Berlin. [Fig. 4-11]


Representing Three-Dimensional
Space in Two Dimensions
• Stebe DiBenedetto creates the illusion
of deep space in Deliverance.
 Overlapping images, such as the
helicopter atop a landing pad, imply that
one object is in front of the other in
space.
• A shadow provides another visual cue.

 Finer lines on the landing pad draw the
viewer inward.

Linear Perspective
1 of 4

• One-point linear perspective relies
on a single point, or vanishing point,
on the viewer's horizon to represent
parallel receding lines.
• When the vanishing point is directly
across from the vantage point (where
viewer is positioned), the recession is
frontal; if it is to one side or the other,
it is diagonal.


Steve DiBenedetto, Deliverance.
2003. Colored pencil and acrylic paint on paper, 30-1/8 × 22".
© Steve DiBenedetto, courtesy of David Nolan Gallery, New York, Collection of Morris
Orden, New York. [Fig. 4-12]


One-point linear perspective.
Left: frontal recession, street level. Right: diagonal recession, elevated position. [Fig. 413]