Line, implied shape, and implied line

            When people look at one artwork, how do they define if one is good or not? You may say everyone has his or her own point of view of things, especially for artwork. But every artwork is composed by different elements such as lines, shapes, colors etc. and we usually evaluate artwork by them.

            For me, I like things to be simple and to the point and I believe less is more. The first pencil drawing by Toulouse Lautrec only has several lines but actually shows us the movement of ballet dancers. The agile shape of their moving legs seems to tell us how relaxed and smooth their action is. We suddenly know what the artist is trying to tell us from those simple lines. 

           The second drawing is by Peter Paul Rubins, which is a great illustration of implied line. When we follow the smooth shape of the back of the man we can see an implied line with his movement. The man moves freely with forward reach and driving force. It flows with finesse. 

           The last one is about implied shape. We can see, at first glace in picture, there are nine arrows pointing at different directions but stare at it carefully enough and you can see five people hand in hand and walking downstairs. I found this to be a good example of implied shape.