"1. Rearrange shapes cut out of paper, and try to find the point at which the figure disappears into the ground.
Cut out a series of shapes from black paper – squares, rectangles, circles and random shapes – in a variety of sizes, from small to large.
Working with a square piece of white paper, place shapes of different sizes into the white space; place them on the white one at a time and move them around.
Try to find the point where the distinction between figure and ground becomes unclear. Does it depend on which shape dominates the space: black or white? Is it about the position of the shape within the space? Think about how important figure-ground relationships are within composition and design.
2. Write down your findings, and remember to take pictures of your progress. Submit these pictures and your write-up on your WordPress blog."
For this task we had to once again work with paper, scissors and hands. To get the black paper I actually decided to print out two completely black pages on my printer. After cutting out a few squares, triangles and circles with different sizes I decided to try a few unusual shapes like an arrow, teardrop and even a completely random shapes.
1. I started with placing only one shape in the middle of the white square and we can clearly see that the arrow is the figure and the white paper is the background.
2. In the next one I decided to go opposite and put as many shapes on the list as I can. Although the black and white ratio here is equal, the positioning of the shapes is completely random and it does not create any logical shape, therefore the white list is still seen as the background and the shapes as the figures.
3. After I decided to try a similar concept but with the shapes more clustered in the middle. The shapes being close formed a bigger shape, but they were still perceived as the figure and the list as background.
4. Last I wanted to arrange the shapes in a way that they are actually seen as the background, and the white space as the figure. I'm not sure I achieved that completely, because the black shapes here are both background (top shapes) and figures (bottom shapes) within the figure (the white space is seen as mountains).
Conclusion:
I think both the composition and the balance between the amount of colors are important. If one of the colors dominates the space over the other it is usually seen as the background, while the other one as the figure, but the human brain can perceive the background as figure if it has a familiar shape that it can easily recognize.
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