II. Mass 01 The difference between composition

The difference between composition and mass is that a composition is a mere outline of pen or pencil, each object taking its proper place in the square of a canvas, while mass is the filling in between these outlines either of varied color or in lights or darks, their gradations but so many guides to the spectator's eye marking not only its perspective, form and atmosphere, but, if skilfully done, telling the story of your subject at a glance. painting for sale
To do this the student must find the lightest light and darkest dark in the subject before him and, having found it, adhere to it to the end of his work. For as the sun dominates the sky and earth so do its rays dominate parts of the whole, making more luminous than the rest only one object upon which its light falls.To make this more explicit it is only necessary to look at an egg upon a white table-cloth. Here is a natural object devoid of local color except in reflected lights, and yet you will find that where the round of the egg reflects the light the highest light is found, while in the edge of the shadow, where the egg turns into the round—between that high light and the reflected light from the table-cloth, I mean—is found its darkest dark. But only one portion of that shadow, a point as large as the point of a pin, is the darkest dark. Everything else is gradation, from the highest light to the lowest light, the lowest light being almost a shadow; and from its darkest dark to its lightest dark the lightest dark again being almost a light. cheap oil paintings

In landscape art these problems are greatly simplified. The sun is always the strongest light, and whatever comes against it, church tower, rock, palace, or ship under full sail, is the darkest object. In addition to this there is always some one point where the outdoor painter can find a lesser supplementary light and near it a lesser supplementary dark. Moreover, throughout the rest of the composition these same lights and darks are echoed and re-echoed in constantly decreasing gradations. frames for oil paintings