As we can see in the vast creative world, art comes in many forms and styles. Whether it be photorealistic or geometric and cartoony, you will see most masters gain artistic solace from the fundamentals. ‘Fundamentals’, essentially, are the building blocks of any artwork - the core foundation that, when studied and used creatively, allows the artist to create something intricate and eye-catching. It’s generally agreed upon that these are the core art fundamentals: anatomy, perspective, composition, form/structure, and value and lighting (or colour).
When talking about anatomy, you will find that most are referring to *human anatomy* - but it applies to all life forms such as plants and other animals. This isn’t the same as something you will see in a medical textbook. It is about how the parts of the body move and how they look when doing so, holistically and also individually. Understanding proportions and how joints work is essential for artists who want to depict characters or humans (or any animal) in general. Whether you want to draw a character standing, bending down, or running, a solid grasp on anatomy will prove to be of great use. Instead of diving headfirst into the complicated names of specific muscles and joints, an efficient way to start learning anatomy is *gesture drawing*. Gesture drawing involves observing a photo of a person and aiming to do a drawing that resembles the human figure with as few strokes as possible. Oftentimes artists will set a timer when gesture drawing; for example, one minute for each figure. Being given a short amount of time forces the eye to only take in the basics, without worrying about every little detail. This is especially important when just starting out. Considering all the information, it can be overwhelming to try and learn anatomy - but it is a concept that, with practice and focused study, you will naturally improve overtime.
An essential art skill to master, especially when depicting buildings and scenery, is perspective. Artists use perspective to create the illusion of depth, or three-dimensionality, on a flat surface. It is speculated that creatives began to develop a system of perspective in fifth century B.C. in ancient Greece. Ancient Egyptians employed the use of 2-dimensional twisted perspective - this is when the person or animal is drawn in side profile, but their head is turning to face the viewer. Later, application of mathematical perspective increased in the late middle ages and then the Renaissance era, where many painters showed mastery of it.
Today, the most generally used type of perspective in art is *linear perspective*. This technique uses the relative sizes and positions of objects to create an illusion of depth. The main three components of linear perspective are: *horizon line*, the *convergence line*, and *vanishing point*. This system acts similarly to how the human eye views things in real life. From the High Renaissance era, this painting *The Delivery of the Keys to Saint Peter* by Pietro Perugino is a great early example of linear perspective in use.
The *horizon line* is at your eye level. If you drew a line across the scene at your exact eye level, that is the horizon line. It is where the surface of the earth meets the sky. Convergence lines, also referred to as orthogonal lines, are parallel lines that get closer together the further away they are, and eventually converge at a meeting point.
Finally, the vanishing point is a point on the horizon line where all parallel lines appear to meet or converge. In traditional images of linear perspective, there is one vanishing point in the middle, however there can be multiple (which is called two-point perspective) and it can be at any position on the horizon line.
Another commonly used method is *aerial perspective.* Also called atmospheric perspective, this is where areas/objects that are further away appear less saturated and detailed. In real life, our eyes take in less detail from things that are further away - this is used in aerial perspective to create a sense of depth.
In this photo, we can observe the natural occurrence of aerial perspective. The trees in the foreground are a more saturated green and shadows, lighting and individual bunches of leaves are visible. However, you can tell that everything besides the foreground is more cool-toned, and as the hills get further away, they get less detailed and appear to fade into the sky.
Linear perspective and aerial perspective are not necessarily completely different concepts; in fact, they are often used in unison to create realistic illusions of dimension. This painting by John Atkinson Grimshaw is an example.
In the painting, the path gets smaller until it fades into the vanishing point at the horizon line. Defined areas below the horizon line (like the path and bottom part of the fence) slope slightly upwards, whilst areas above (the trees, building, top part of the fence) slope downwards. This demonstrates understanding of one-point linear perspective.
At the vanishing point, the path, trees and fence all begin to fade into one another and melt into less defined edges and desaturation. This, combined with the use of linear perspective, tells us that the area is further away, and gives the scene an illusion of depth.