Shape is the form of any object or figure. The shape of the object can
be seen, and has visual weight. Donald Sultan's Lemons, are flat. The lemons
were outlined on vinyl. The outline was a guide to scrape out the area inside the
outline. It does have texture and color, but it does not make the object three
dimensional. The Rubin Vase is a great example of shape. It uses figure ground
reversals. Being that the vase is completely black, and the background is all
white; the vase looks like a cut out from paper. You clearly see a black vase,
with an illusion to be outlined in white.
Mass is any solid that occupies a three dimensional volume. Barbara
Hepworth, Two Figures, occupy three dimensional space and negative space.
The negative spaces are craved out from the middle of the figures. They give the
figures a sense of volume and form. Being that mass can be from any solid,
Head of a King is made of brass. It is solid and contains negative spaces, that
are craved in the face of the head; just as Hepworths two figures. The
contrasting colors in the brass head are darker. They define the negative space
in brown and textured waves craved deep in the face.
Shapes can be in the form of squares, circles, triangles,
rectangles, and ovals. Mass can be anything we wish it to be, as long as it is
three dimensional. The artist makes the choice on what he or she envisions to
be there perception of reality. These artist took pretty basic ideas and made
them their own. The subject choice for some of these works were everyday
objects, that we use or see daily. The distortion or exaggeration of an object