This document provides information about still life drawings, including their composition. It defines a still life as a painting or drawing of objects that cannot move, like bottles, bowls, fruit, and flowers arranged on a tabletop. The composition of a still life uses principles of design like pattern, balance, movement, and unity to organize elements. Analyzing a still life involves identifying the overall shape, center of interest which draws the eye, and how the composition moves the eye through the work. Artists often use pyramid formations or contrasting values and colors to emphasize focal points and guide movement.

1. Still Life Drawing
Using modified contour line
drawing to create a still life
drawing

2. A Still Life Is….
• A Painting or drawing of
objects that cannot move
• Bottles, bowls, fruit,
flowers and cloth are
frequently used by artists
and set up on a table top in
the studio
• Pictures can be simple or
quite complex

3. Composition
• The formal properties of an
artwork tell how the art
elements are organized
using the principles of
design(pattern, balance,
movement, rhythm, unity,
variety, emphasis, contrast
and proportion.)
• The following questions
can help discover how a
still life composition is
organized by the artist.
• What is the center of interest?
• How does the eye move to it in
the work?
• How did the artist establish the
center of interest?
• Does the work have a sense of
rhythm? Why?
• Is the composition vertical or
horizontal?
• How is balance achieved?
• How is unity achieved?
• What shapes are repeated?

4. Analyze the composition
• Look at the next still life examples
• Try to find the:
– over all shape the objects seem to form
– the center of interest
– way the eye moves through the work
• Make thumbnail sketches of three different types of
arrangements you found in the textbook or print collection
in your sketch book.

5. Analyze the composition
• Many artists
choose to use
a pyramid
format to
organize their
composition

6. Center of Interest
• The center of
interest is usually
the first thing you
notice in a picture.
• This focal point is
often highlighted
by strong value or
color contrast

7. Movement
• Artists use
focal points
to move the
eye through a
picture

8. Make a Sketch/Diagram of
the Composition
The diagram just needs to make sense to you
it does not have to be an exactdrawing