Principles of Art - Balance

Balance

Balance is arranging elements so that no one part of a work overpowers, or seems heavier than any other part. The three different kinds of balance are symmetrical, asymmetrical, and radial. Symmetrical (or formal) balance is the most stable, in a visual sense. When both sides of an artwork on either side of the horizontal or vertical axis of the picture plane are exactly (or nearly exactly the same) the work is said to exhibit this type of balance.

Read more about this topic:  Principles Of Art

Famous quotes containing the word balance:

    The perfect aphorism would achieve classical balance and then immediately upset it.
    Mason Cooley (b. 1927)

    Partisanship should be kept out of the pulpit.... The blindest of partisans are preachers. All politicians expect and find more candor, fairness, and truth in politicians than in partisan preachers. They are not replied to—no chance to reply to them.... The balance wheel of free institutions is free discussion. The pulpit allows no free discussion.
    Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)

    Both the man of science and the man of art live always at the edge of mystery, surrounded by it. Both, as a measure of their creation, have always had to do with the harmonization of what is new with what is familiar, with the balance between novelty and synthesis, with the struggle to make partial order in total chaos.... This cannot be an easy life.
    J. Robert Oppenheimer (1904–1967)