Critique Francesco Clemente

Critique the painting of Temples with its Clothing By Francesco Clemente.

I. Color in this painting.

1. Dominant Color

2. Subordinate Colors.

II. Design in this Painting.

1.Emphasis 

2. Movement

3. Balance

This critique should be a minimum of 225 words.

I will upload an example of a critique from Scarubs Drunk on Anis by Francesco Clemente that would help give a better understanding to see how the critique should be done using Artist wording.

Introduction to Critiquing a Painting.

Let’s start with baby steps. When critiquing a painting think of two things- Color and Design.

I. Color in this painting-

When you think of Color think of Dominant and Subordinate.

There can be only one Dominant color and it should cover 65-75% of the painting. All Subordinate colors should agree with the Dominant in either Chroma (intensity of the color), Value (tint, tone and shade or the lightness or darkness of the color), or Hue (family of the color).

1. Dominant Color-I’m not sure there is one. This is a case of the artist pushing the rules. There is an area  of a light pinkish color in the top half, and what I see as mainly neutral white in the bottom. You see how the white has a rather low value because it is thinly painted over low chroma colors? Well, I’m going with white as the dominant color. It’s used on the houses and it’s used in the scarubs which spreads it out a little. Even if it’s not at least 65% it’s enough to control the painting and I told you a dominant neutral changes the rules.

2. Subordinate Colors- I see red, orange, blue, green and pink. I also see a little neutral gray in that right scarub and a little black here and there. When I try the ‘squint test’ nothing jumps out. He solved the red problem by putting some white on top of it to calm down the Chroma.

II. Design of this painting-

When you think of Design think of three principles of art- Emphasis, Movement and Balance.

1. Emphasis– The first thing I see when I look at this odd painting is the red shape of a ‘scarub’ located in the upper central part of the painting. That is known as the focal point or ‘hook’. It should always be in that general area and is the first thing you see. After you get ‘reeled in’ by the hook, the next thing is eye movement. A good design will make you look around the entire painting.

2. Movement- This painting is divided in half horizontally with a Horizon Line (where the land meets the sky). That line, along with the line of scarubs and houses, form three horizontal lines used to pull your eyes back and forth across the painting. Subtle movement is implied with the two chimneys on right and left pushing your eyes vertically. Other vertical lines in the houses, scarubs and crowns on top of the scarubs move your eyes up and down. There is also a little ‘push-pull’ going on with the warm red and orange and the cool green and blue.

3. Balance- The large shape of the orange scarub on the left is balanced out by the large cluster of houses on the right. He also painted a good bit of orange on the far right house and especially in the bottom right corner to balance out the orange scarub. Look how he placed blue all around the work. This helps with balance and eye movement. Finally, the very subtle use of black in the windows, chimney, scarubs and horizon line serve to balance and anchor the entire composition.