Activity #4 Principles of Design

In the first painting by Picasso the gray scale is used to provide an intresting contrast of white and black. Since both of them are values of the gray scale they belong together to make that contrast. The art work gives a sense of unity and variety to the viewer.Unity is a sense of oneness, of things belonging together and making up a coherent whole while Variety is diffrence, which provides intrest. There is more weight(visual weight) towards the right side of the art work, due to the position of the horse's mouth leaning towards the right and his neck on the left side also providing an asymmetrical balance to the art work.Visual weight refers to the appearent heaviness or lightness of the forms arranged in a composition as gauged by how insistently they draw our eyes. The scale and proportion of the horse's head provide an emphasis on his mouth. The scale of his head is a large than a normal horse's own. The size of the horse's teeth, nose and tongue are in correct proportion to his mouth . Scale means size in relation to standard or "normal" size while proportion refers to size relationships between parts of a hole , or between two or more items perceived as a unit. Emhasis means that our attention is drawn more to certain points of a composition than to others.

Works Cited

Getlein, Mark. Gilbert’s Living with Art. 7th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2005.