Lines, Shapes and Diptychs
I live with racing thoughts, often talk too much and reveal myself too quickly. I am intentional when searching for and shooting lines and shapes. It has served as a therapeutic way to slow down my mind. Intention adds curiosity in these reflective moments, instead of feeling the dead weight of worry and the self-consciousness that plauges my scattered thinking. The wide variety of emotions I feel when looking at lines and shapes includes - solace, possibility, spiritual calm, constraint and persistence.
When discovering breaks in lines and shapes I usually feel a great sadness and fragility. The order of things has been interrupted and the skew seems to bring uncertainty.
Lines, Shapes and How We Consume Them
Our brains form images based on pattern recognition. We don't see images; our eyes see line and motion, our brains interpret that to attempt to recognize what sort of thing those lines and motion might represent. There are many types of lines: thick, thin, horizontal, vertical, zigzag, diagonal, curly, curved, spiral, etc. and are often very expressive. Lines serve to affect photographic composition in two ways. First, they serve to create a mood. Second, they lead the eye through the photograph. By affecting mood, lines add emotional content to images. By leading the viewer’s eye, they keep the viewer’s attention focused on the image.
Geometric or Biomorphic
Shape is a flat area surrounded by edges or an outline. Geometric shapes are precise and regular, like squares, rectangles, and triangles. They are often found in human-made things, like building and machines while biomorphic shapes are found in nature. Biomorphic shapes are often rounded and irregular, and unlike most geometric shapes, often found in nature. Like line, different types of shapes convey different messages. Regular shapes such as circles, squares and triangles with even sides convey a sense of order and stability. Irregular shapes such as rectangles, skewed triangles, parallelograms and ovals can give a photograph the illusion of motion or simply make it seem more dynamic. Curved, organic shapes suggest relaxation and lazy motion.
Diptychs and Triptych
Diptychs and Triptychs are a form of storytelling. They present two or three images which can be from the same session or they can be polar opposites to show opposition or contrasting ideas. When taken together, they are viewed as illuminating each other and comprising a distinct work of art from the individual parts. The personal narrative derived from studying a diptych or triptych is particularly interesting to me, many people leave with personal stories containing a huge variety of emotion.
I construct lines and color combinations on a flat surface, in order to express general beauty with the utmost awareness.
I believe it is possible that, through horizontal and vertical lines constructed with awareness, but not with calculation, led by high intuition, and brought to harmony and rhythm, these basic forms of beauty, supplemented if necessary by other direct lines or curves, can become a work of art, as strong as it is true.
Published "De Nieuwe Beelding in de schilderkunst”, 1914