The document discusses the principle of contrast in art. It defines contrast as the arrangement of opposite elements that create visual interest. Elements that can be contrasted include color, texture, size, and shape. Contrast is important because it attracts the eye, aids organization, and creates a focus. Examples are given of artworks that effectively use contrast through opposing colors, tones, textures, and subject matter. These include paintings by Amorsolo, Caravaggio, Anuszkiewicz, Sheeler, Warhol, Rudnitsky, and Hatoum. The document also includes plates demonstrating contrasting colors.

1. P R I N C I P L E S O F A RT
CONTRAST

2. CONTRAST
• the arrangement of opposite elements in a piece so as to
create visual interest, excitement and drama.

3. ELEMENTS THAT CAN BE CONTRASTED
Color and Tones Text (Typography)
Proportion and Size Texture
Direction or Movement Shape and Form
Concept

4. IMPORTANCE OF CONTRAST
1. Contrast is attractive to the
eye.
2. Contrast aids organization of
information.
3. Contrast creates a focus

5. EXAMPLE OF COLOR CONTRAST
A huge part of creating
depth in an image, and interest in
a piece, is by using multiple
contrasting elements – or different
elements set side by side. This is
often done with color, form, size
or texture.
Color is the primary tool that
Amorsolo uses to create contrast and
depth in his piece. He uses light as a
subject – the way the figures are all
shaded in darker tones with the
exception of a bright central pair and a
young fruit picker, highlighted by light
tones.“Fruit Pickers Harvesting Under the
Mango Tree,” by Fernando Amorsolo in
1939

6. CONTRAST PAINTING STYLE:
TENEBRISM
Tenebrism, from the
Italian, tenebroso (murky), also
called dramatic illumination, is
a style of painting using very
pronounced chiaroscuro, where
there are violent contrasts of
light and dark, and where
darkness becomes a dominating
feature of the image. The
technique was developed to add
drama to an image through a
spotlight effect, and was popular
during the Baroque period of
painting.
“Supper at Emmaus" by Caravaggio

7. EXAMPLE CONTRAST
Richard Anuszkiewicz: Plus
Reversed 1960
An example of op art,
this painting has such a
strong contrast in colors that it
plays with visual perception
and makes it seem as if the
shapes are moving. There is
also a contrast in shapes, in
that positive shapes becomes
negative shapes, and vice
versa.

8. EXAMPLE OF CONTRAST
Charles Sheeler Golden Gate, 1955
Oil on canvas H. 25 1/8 in. (63.8 cm),
W. 34 7/8 in. (88.5 cm)
Metropolitan Museum of Art, George A.
Hearn Fund, 1955 (55.99)
This is a dramatic and beautiful
portrayal of a dramatic and beautiful
bridge, the Golden Gate Bridge in San
Fransisco, California. The bridge has a
distinct orange hue, and against the
blue sky, creates a strong visual
contrast. Sheeler has optimized this
contrast by simplifying and almost
abstracting the form of the bridge into
shapes, and enhancing the intensity of
the color of the bridge and the sky. The
angle of view reveals its size and
magnificence.

9. EXAMPLE OF CONTRAST
Andy Warhol Electric Chair 1971
screenprint on paper 35.5 x 48 inches
From the label text for Andy Warhol, Electric Chair
(1971), from the exhibition Art in Our Time: 1950 to the Present,
Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, September 5, 1999 to September 2,
2001: "In 1962, Andy Warhol started a series of silkscreened
paintings of death and disasters that included photographs of
suicides, plane and car crashes, and tragedy-stricken celebrities
such as Marilyn Monroe and Jacqueline Kennedy. All the images
were taken from the print media. He depicted an electric chair in
several groups of silk-screens throughout the 1960s, the first in
1963--the same year that New York's Sing Sing State Penetentiary
performed its last two executions by electric chair (capital
punishment was banned in the United States from 1963-1997). For
his 1968 retrospective at the Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Warhol
produced yet another series, of which these works are a part. In
these prints, however, he made some variations: he cropped the
image to bring the electric chair to the foreground, and screened it in
a variety of colors other than black, occasionally printing off-register
double images. By the artist's account, the replication of the image
was intended to "empty" it of meaning."
This print contains a distinct visual
contrast in the colors that are used. It also
presents a contrast in subject matter, in the sense
that the colors used do not fit our interpretation of
expectation of an electric chair. The result is that it
causes us to look at and consider the electric
chair in a new way.

10. EXAMPLES OF CONTRAST IN ARTWORK:
CONTRAST IN SUBJECT MATTER
Emmanuel Rudnitsky (Man Ray) Gift 1921
Cast iron, tacks6 x 3 1/2 x 5 in. (15.24 x 8.89 x 12.7
cm)
Publisher Emmanuel Galleria II Fauno, Turin
(replicated in a 1970 edition of 11)
Minneapolis Institute of Arts The William Hood
Dunwoody Fund
Image Copyright:© Man Ray Trust / Artists Rights
Society (ARS), NY / ADAGP, Paris
The title of this artwork, "The
GIft", belies its content and presents a
contrast between our idea of what a
gift is and what this object represents.
An iron, normally used to press
clothing, is lined with tacks that would
prevent normal use of the object. Man
Ray offers us a visual pun and a
Surrealist viewpoint of life.

11. EXAMPLES OF CONTRAST IN ARTWORK:
CONTRAST IN SUBJECT MATTER
Mona Hatoum Nature morte aux grenades
Mona Hatoum often presents a
contrast between subject matter and materials
in her work. Like Warhol's Electric Chair, this
work forces us to look at an object (hand
grenade) in an entirely new way, because of the
bright colors and unexpected materials. The
"grenades" are displayed on what appears to be
an operating table, suggesting an up close and
and detailed examination--of the hand grenade--
and presumably its purpose, use, and history in
the contemporary world.

12. PLATES 11-12 FOR CONTRAST
Plate 11 Chart of Contrast in Different Elements
(HB pencil, Tech pen, Acrylic Paint and Brush)
Plate 12 Contrast in Colors
(HB pencil, Acrylic Paint and Brush)

13. PLATE 12 : CONTRAST IN COLORS
• Create 6 pairs of colors indicating contrast
using complementary pairings, black and
white, 1 pair of warm and cool colors and
one contrast color pair of your choice.
• The measurement of each rectangle is 3 x 2
inch each, divide each rectangle into to two
and paint.
• Label each rectangle

15. REFERENCES
https://sites.google.com/site/principlesofdesignsite/home/contrast
https://www.sitepoint.com/principles-of-design-contrast/
https://www.sophia.org/tutorials/design-in-art-balance-and-contrast
http://www.visual-arts-cork.com/painting/chiaroscuro.htm