Visual Arts Glossary

Here are some important terms in the Visual Arts. We explore many of these in K-4 while others are used more at the middle and high school level.  For more information, check out the Massachusetts Department of Education's Visual Arts Frameworks here


Key Terms in Visual Arts

abstraction

art that is non-representational, or that converts forms observed in reality to patterns that are read by the viewer as independent relationships.

assemblage
the use of three-dimensional found objects combined to make art; see collage.

collage
a technique first used by Cubists such as Picasso and Braque to build two-dimensional images from fragments of printed paper and cloth incorporated into painting.

colors, primary, secondary, complementary; chroma, hue, value, gradation
one conventional way of arranging color to show relationships is as a circle or wheel that presents the primary colors (those from which all other colors are derived — red, yellow, blue), and their combinations (the secondary colors orange, green, violet). Colors that fall opposite one another are complementary (red/green, yellow/violet, blue/orange). Chroma and hue refer to the degree of saturation, or vividness of a color, ranging from pure primary color to colors muted by mixture with their complements, black, or white. Value refers to the lightness or darkness of a color, or to gradations of black, greys, and white.

composition
in visual arts, the combination and arrangement of shape, form, color, line, texture, and space so that they seem satisfactory to the artist.

contour drawing
the line that defines the outline of a form; by varying the thickness and character of line, an artist can suggest volume and weight.

elements and principles of visual arts
elements are generally considered to be line, color, shape or form, texture, space, and value; principles are generally considered to be unity, variety, harmony, balance, rhythm, and emphasis.

foreground, middle ground, background
layers of implied space or planes in the picture space of a two-dimensional work. The foreground is closest to the viewer, then the middle ground, and, most distant, the background.

media and techniques
the materials and procedures used in making art, such as drawing/painting materials, sculptural materials such as clay, wood, or stone; and procedures such as modeling, carving, or construction; printmaking materials and techniques such as relief printing, etching, or lithography; electronic media and techniques such as filmmaking or computer-generated imagery.

perspective

a method of representing the illusion of volume in three-dimensional objects and depth of space on a two- dimensional surface. Techniques include:

atmospheric perspective: The use of gradations of color, overlapping, and relative degrees of detail to suggest an impression of depth in space

linear perspective: The use of real or suggested lines that converge on a vanishing point or points on the horizon or at eye level, and link receding planes as they do so, to suggest depth in space.

isometric perspective or projection: The use of lines to represent an object in which the lines parallel to edges are drawn in their true length and do not converge; sometimes used in architectural or mechanical drawing to convey the actual dimensions of an object.

pattern
a decorative arrangement of shapes that repeats in a predictable way.

printmaking
techniques of art that are designed to create reproducible images: etching, engraving, woodblock and other relief printing, lithography, serigraphy (silkscreen).

proportion
the ratio between the respective parts of a work and its whole. A canon of proportion is a mathematical formula establishing ideal proportions of the human body, as seen in ancient Egyptian and Greek sculpture and reinterpreted in the Renaissance by Leonardo da Vinci.

representational art
art that seeks to portray things seen in the visible world; sometimes called figurative art.

schematic layouts
sketches or diagrams of works made for projecting the appearance of a final work.

sculpture
any work carried out in three dimensions, as opposed to drawing, painting, flat collage, and printmaking, which are usually two-dimensional. Relief sculpture refers to compositions in which parts project from a flat surface.

style

a manner of expression characteristic of an individual, national, or cultural group, genre, or historic period. Several key terms spanning all arts disciplines, and most often applied to Western art forms, include:

Folk: forms of arts that are linked to the social life and traditions of specific communities. Participation is not restricted to the professional artist.

Classical: in Western art, forms that conform to Greek and Roman models, or highly developed and refined styles of any culture; those which aspire to an emotional and physical equilibrium, and which are rationally, rather than intuitively constructed. Classical forms have developed all over the world.

Romantic: in Europe and America, 18th–19th century forms that express the individual’s right to expression and imagination.

Modern: forms that broke with romantic and classical traditions in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and which established new approaches to creating and performing based on ideas and technologies that looked toward the future; forms are sometimes called avant-garde, or before their time.

Postmodern: forms that emerged in the 1970s, primarily in the United States and Europe. As a reaction to modernism, artists — and particularly architects — returned to borrowing from the classical tradition, often using allusions ironically.

symbol
something that stands for or suggests something else by reason of relationship, association, convention, or accidental resemblance.

symmetry
natural or manmade forms that are balanced around a line or a point; bilateral symmetry (forms like leaves or the human body); radial symmetry (forms like snowflakes or composite flowers).

texture, surface texture, visual texture
the nature of a surface of a painting, sculpture, or building: rough, smooth, patterned. Visual texture refers to the illusion of texture created on a flat surface through line or brush stroke.

two-dimensional (2D), three-dimensional (3D)
the physical characteristics of artwork that are either carried out primarily on a flat surface (2D, most drawing, painting, printmaking) or that have depth, width, height, and volume (3D, most sculpture).

values and gradations of colors or greys
see color.