“THE ELEMENTS OF ART IRL”
Where do you SEE the Elements of Art in real life? Watch our videos on Value, Texture, Line, and Shape and then take photos of where you see these elements in your everyday life.
This is a PHOTO challenge! To complete this art dare, you’ll need to shoot at least 4 photos, 1 photo for each Element of Art.
In the Art Prof Discord Server, we have an #art-dares channel where you can post your WIP, and get feedback & support during the month!
Prize Winner
Nana
Sweden
@thetactility
“I only quite recently got myself a DSLR camera and love to take macro photographs of different harsh textures to the silky softness and depth of heavy bokeh. I usually take photos of things that catch my eyes, but for this art dare I had to train my eyes to catch things. Ordinary things but in an interesting way.
I’m chasing Nordic noir and the low-key melancholy that permeates the Scandinavian culture, which transfers to the edits of many of my photographs with cool shadows and a mood of twilight. Macro photography lets me isolate the different elements of art, take them out of the mundane context and into their own magical world.”
Honorable Mention
Ashis Sud
India
@sudashis
“Since the purpose of this art dare was to pause and observe Elements of Art IRL, I did not want to go out of the way or visit special places looking for Line, Shape, Value or Texture. I picked up everyday objects lying around the house and a couple of outdoor shots from my daily walk.
Since I have zero Photoshop skills, once I had the photos I applied some effects using an open source image editor. I loved this exercise. It’s quite exciting and satisfying when mundane everyday things can be elevated to the level of art.”
Johnmurf Aguinaldo de Vera
“My inspiration is seeing art in life, and where I might least expect it to be. It is often true that I am mesmerized by good artwork, and with these elements that I recognize I awe at the beauty of the artwork.
If I can see these elements in an artwork, maybe I can see these elements in real life and grow to love and appreciate life even more because of them.”
Gil Wanders
Germany
@gillwanders4
“This was the most refreshing exercise I have done in a long time, to observe and hunt for those lines, shapes, textures and values in the everyday objects especially while in quarantine, made me reevaluate my universe so to speak, it got me excited about the little things again. I tend to keep various objects or collect them for their textures and colors anyway, like autumn leaves, pine cones, pieces of wood, rocks, and the list goes on, but even so I have never stopped to really look for various aspects of art principles or play and combine things and try to look at them from all angles and explore their potential.
This is what this exercise inspired me to do, and it’s been a few weeks since and I find myself looking at the world with different eyes now! The more you observe the better you become at observing and a shadow is not just a shadow anymore but a source of wonder and magic! 🪄”
Sal Devito
“My motivation and process in creating my Art Dare pieces for February 2021 was looking back at my old art pieces and see how I used the elements of art in them. The piece I made for the Element of Line was my wire boot sculpture where I looked at where the wire intersected each other and how the lines worked in the piece.
Shape was done by dropping blue ink into a bottle of water and increasing the speed of my camera was able to take pictures of how the ink spread in the water. Texture was examining the hair of my cardboard Gene Simmons Portrait which was twine that was painted and glued.
Value has fun as it was a zoomed in photo of my hair when it was gelled and under florescent lights showing the lightness and darkness of something, I see every day.”
François Charette
Canada
@charettef14
“The goal of this photo shoot was to approach pet portraiture in unusual ways. Fortunately, my dog is really patient. I varied the placement of the lights and used different material to shine through. I also played with focusing the camera on other points than the eyes.
I always try to get each picture as close to the final result as possible in camera, but Photoshop is also an important part of my workflow, in order to really bring out the potential of the images, especially in the shadows.”
Nies Gila
“I had a lot of fun with tis challenge and I found so much in my flat that was kind of interesting. Sometimes you can really see, what I photographed, but some things are hard to recognize 😉
My “models” were: a big hair-clip (Shape) Headphones (line) A Lamp (Shape and line But the lines are hard to see) Furry-Christmastree (Texture) Mud on the ground (Texture and value) A piece of fabric (Value, Shape) Plant Shadow (shape) Wall (texture)”
Emmanuel Carter
“For my motivation I took pictures of things that were important and meaningful to me. One of the pictures I took consisted of buildings I took on my vacation in New York. That meant something to me because I’ve seen and experienced a lot during that time in New York.
It was very special and it was one of many great photos I have taken there. I also love the weather and the different types of seasons. Despite that the amount of snow outside was brutal and often overbearing to shovel, the snowfall looks so beautiful and appealing when taken and captured on camera. I chose to take this photo to give an appreciation of Winter and what it looks like in my state of Connecticut.
I also chose to take a picture of my Ugg boots to provide comfort with it’s fuzzy and soft texture. It provides comfort on my feet and feels like walking on clouds.”
David Knauber
“For the this Art Dare I wanted to have a common theme and look to the photos. I chose some of my musical instruments to convey the different elements. I also wanted to have a background to further unify the whole work.
The fun part was doing an animated GIF in Procreate, I mean, if you are going to have music you may as well make the photos dance.”
Madeleine Mate-Kole
“My inspiration for my photos are closeups, I like to take closeups because I believe that details are very much important in a photo subject and it feels more personal.”
Kristýna Hudíková
Czech Republic
@fuguhug
“I’ve always loved texture and working with ornaments. I have many photos of any kind. I am using them for my reference and idea ‘bank.’ These I’ve made specially for Dare. Because of quarantine in our country, I’ve decided to create those photos at home. Photo that represents value is actually special foil in the window so that nobody could see into the bathroom. For shape I chose a shell that was part of the decoration on the desk.
The texture winner is vase with spiky rises and finally close look up at tulip, thanks to the natural lighting, were visible beautiful lines in the petals. I was trying to capture ordinary stuff that I see everyday and see them with different eyes. Can’t wait to incorporate them into the art piece.”
