Doodle-A-Day 8

My last prompt, so I had to deviate. No ‘s’ today, but NOTAN. And don’t feel bad, I also hadn’t heard of this Japanese design concept involving the play and placement of light and dark as they are placed next to the other in art and imagery (definition from Wikipedia). Not until someone mentioned this book about it.

Another friend (Hi Lori!) bought it and decided to do some of the exercises with her aspiring-artist daughter. Which inspired me to get it from my library  – and I am fascinated! It strongly reminds me of my training in composition during my first year studying advertising design at FIT (we were not all fashion freaks there!). I had a wonderful teacher whose name sadly eludes me. She worked us hard, and I believe it paid off. But with this book I feel like I’m taking a refresher course, and I wanted to share it with the doodlers. For those in the know, yeah, it’s all about positive and negative space – the bare essentials.  I won’t attempt to explain more (watch video below!), but I’ll list a bunch of links at the bottom, in case you’ve been ‘ignited’!

susandaguequilts.wordpress.com

cargocollective.com

http://www.stlukechicago.org

http://www.mitchalbala.com

http://www.arts-in-company.com

coloroncloth.com

http://www.explore-oil-pastels-with-robert-sloan.com/notan.html

A blog called Notan Drawing

Virtual Art Academy Notan Painting Lessons

Notan Expanding the Square

 

I’d like to thank Alison Hertz again, for helping me get back to doodling, and all the members on our facebook page, who inspire and encourage each other every day!