Page 73 - The Decorative Painter Summer 2014

SKILLBUILDER
FOCAL POINT AND CENTER OF INTEREST
Divide your project into three equal spaces vertically and horizontally. You will have four intersections where the lines cross. Pick one that will work for your project.
This intersection should be approximately where you want to place your focal point. A focal point can be es- tablished with a color, a mass, or a lack of color. This concept is called the rule of thirds. I have shown you how this applies on the lighthouse and what intersection I chose as the approximate focal point. Bear in mind, I said approximate. There are only guidelines in art, never any absolutes.
Learn to play with a little action in your work by hav- ing objects face different directions. Notice one lighthouse cabin faces the path, the other cabin doesn’t, and the stee- ple ties them together while rising into the sky. Tall objects normally suggest an uneasy feeling of tipping, but the little cabins secure it to the ground.
There should be diagonal lines of color that will lean toward this focal point. These diagonals are the pathways for the viewer’s eye to comfortably enter and leave your work. See how my pathways suggest this.
After completing the finished sketch, I block in the darker areas with FW Artists Acrylic Ink. This will give a very good perspective on the balance of the layout.
If you use a color to establish your focal point, try to place a small percentage of that color at two of the other three intersections (even with white). I call this an echo. Just as a vocal echo trails off to a lesser degree, your fo- cal point will calm the viewer’s eye if you establish two similarities of lesser degree at two other intersections. The small boats balance the buildings of the lighthouse.
That brings us to the question: Is focal point also the center of interest? Let’s say that the focal point is the tech- nical hook to catch the viewer’s eye and the center of inter- est is the emotional hook presenting the story around it.
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