Terms for my Figure Drawing Class

These are a bunch of terms for my figure drawing class. Some of them I didn’t feel really did a good job explaining something to someone who doesn’t know anything about figure drawing already so I did some more research and flushed out a few definitions.

Abstraction - My classroom definition is “the creation and organization of shapes, forms, and colors which have no counterpart nature.” Which doesn’t sound like a definition of the term that I am aware. I think that abstraction would involve distorting a real world object to make it more interesting or to highlight some element of it without removing the details that allow people to recognize the object. Google says that the Oxford dictionary says that it means, “freedom from representational qualities in art” which sounds a lot better than either of the things we just talked about.

Anterior View - Front view.

Arabesque - composition or form containing flowing patters that are fancifully intertwined. Dynamicsymmetryart.com states that it is “a line of continuity that collects, organizes, and relates different elements in a composition.” Which I was taking as meaning the flow of the work, where your eye is guided by the shapes in the scene until I read the definition of Base Line. Now I think the definition refers to the Base Line and all the objects attached to the Base Line.

Base Line - the imagined line on which an object sets.

Chiaroscuro - the tonal value created when an object blocks light creating a dramatic contrasting arrangement and play of light and dark. Which I’ve always called something being silhouetted against a light source.

Configuration - form of a figure determined by its pose or arrangement.

Continuous Line Drawing - a drawing created by a line that is unbroken from beginning to end.

Continuous Tone - blended gradations of value having no obvious vector or notable directional difference.

Contour - the lines around the perimeter of a figure. *

Blind Contour - the practice of not looking at your paper while you draw. *

* My instructor listed both Contour and Blind Contour in the same definition stating that it “is plastic in that it emphasizes or describes the three dimensionality of an object.” It didn’t make much sense to me but maybe it will to other people reading this.

Contrapasto - My instructor has put “the contrast or opposition of masses, movements, rhythms, etc.” Which I didn’t understand so I looked it up and found that the name means “suffer the opposite” according to Babylon’s Free Dictionary and the Encyclopedia Britannica describes if as “a sculptural scheme, originated by the ancient Greeks, in which the standing human figure is poised such that the weight rests on one leg (called the engaged leg), freeing the other leg, which is bent at the knee. With the weight shift, the hips, shoulders, and head tilt, suggesting relaxation with the subtle internal organic movement that denotes life.” This is something I like to call flamingo standing.

Expressive - displaying emotion in a visual manner.

Extensors - muscles that straighten and extend various parts of the body.

Figurative - a visual symbol that is recognizable as a person, object, or otherwise intangible thing.

Flexors - muscles that bend various parts of the body.

Foreshortened - form that is viewed in such a way that normal proportions visually appear shortened or compressed. This has to do with how things are larger when they are closer and smaller when they are further away.

Gesture - a quick, all encompassing overview of forms in their wholeness. Basicly a stick figure that artists draw to initially establish where everything will be before they get to work on detailing the piece.

Illusionistic Space - pictorial representation of a three-dimensional space on a two-dimensional surface.

Line - a mark made by a tool as it moves across a surface or ground.

Line Gesture - refers to the marks made inside of your figures contour lines.

Line Phrase - a single uninterrupted movement of a line from beginning to end that may be used to imply weight and/or shadow.

Mass Gesture - broad marks that create mass, volume, weight and density rather than lines.

Modeling - use of value to create the illusion of a three-dimensional space.

Negative Space - the space surrounding a positive shape or solid.

Objective - factual representation as perceived without distortion by feelings or interpretation.

Oblique Angle or View - the observation of the figure from a view other than the front, back or profile.

Organizational Line Drawing - the framework of a drawing. Measured marks made before the drawing starts that allow the artist to properly space out the piece.

Outline - a flat description of an object.

Pencil Sighting also called Sight Measuring - using a drawing instrument or marked stick as a comparative measuring device.

Pentimento or Pentimenti - visible corrections made during the early stages of a drawing.

Planer Analysis - my instructor says “drawing approach in which shape functions as plane, a component of volume.” I’ve come to see it mean drawing a line around areas where the shading of a figure changes instead of just shading them.

Posterior View - back view.

Proportion - comparative relationship between parts of the body and the whole. He says it also “relays a sense of movement.” I don’t see how that’s possible. Distance and depth of course but not movement unless you’re drawing motion blur into it.

Scribble Line Gesture - like a line gesture but uses a tighter network of lines.

Subjective - my teacher says “opinions and artistic expression derived from within the individual rather than from objective examination.” I think it means how an artwork makes you feel personally.

Sustained Line Gesture - my instructor has defined this as, “begin with the spirit or feeling of scribble or line gesture concerning quick notation of the entire subject, then proceed with an analysis and examination of the subject. Corrections establish scale and proportion.” Which confused the snot out of me so I looked it up online and Yahoo!answers member Writerbynature describes it as a more detailed version of a line gesture drawing. So instead of taking one minute to draw it takes five.

Vector - is an obvious elemental division of mass and area, light and dark.