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The elements of art and their importance

The elements of art are sort of like atoms in that both serve as building blocks. You know that atoms combine and form other things. Sometimes they will casually make a simple molecule, as when hydrogen and oxygen form water. If hydrogen and oxygen take a more aggressive career path and bring carbon along as a co-worker, together they might form something more complex like a molecule of sucrose.

A similar activity happens when the elements of art are combined. Instead of Hydrogen, Oxygen. Carbon etc, in art you have got line, shape, form, space, texture, value and colour. Artists manipulate these elements, mix them in with principles of design and compose a piece of art. Not every work has every one of these elements contained with them but at least two. For example a sculptor by default has to have both form and space in a sculpture because these elements are in three dimension. They also can be made to appear in two dimensional works through the use of perspective and shading.

Art would be sunk without line, sometimes known as a moving point. While line isn’t something found in nature, it is absolutely essential as a concept of depicting objects and symbols and defining shape. Form is also an element of art. As it’s most basic, a form is a three dimensional geometric figure as opposed to shape which is two dimensional or flat. In a broader sense, form in art means the whole of a piece’s visible elements and the way those elements are united. In this context, form allows us to mentally capture the work and understand it. Texture is another element like form and space that can be real, created or implied.

The elements of art are important for several reasons. First and most importantly, a person cannot create art without utilizing at least a few of them. Secondly, knowing what the elements of art are, it enables us to describe what an artist has done, analyse what is going on in a particular piece and communicate our thoughts and findings using a common language.

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