Home > Terms > English, UK (UE) > Format

Format

Format is traditionally used to describe the shape or proportions of the support, for example the canvas, of a painting or other essentially flat work of art such as a relief. The two commonest traditional formats for paintings are the horizontal rectangle often referred to as landscape format and the upright rectangle known as portrait. Another traditional but less common format is the circular one known as the tondo. Square formats have sometimes been used, notably for example by JMW Turner and in the twentieth century Ad Reinhardt. The abstract painter Piet Mondrian occasionally used a square canvas hung by one corner as a diamond. From the 1960s on a much freer approach to format became evident in some of the work of artists such as Frank Stella and Ellsworth Kelly and the shape of the canvas became an important element in the composition of the work.

This is auto-generated content. You can help to improve it.
0
Collect to Blossary

Member comments

You have to log in to post to discussions.

Terms in the News

Featured Terms

Harry8L
  • 0

    Terms

  • 0

    Blossaries

  • 1

    Followers

Industry/Domain: Geography Category: Cities & towns

Brooklyn

The most largely populated of the five New York City boroughs and the second largest in area, which has occupied the same boundaries as Kings County ...

Contributor

Featured blossaries

Parkour

Category: Sports   1 10 Terms

Discworld Books

Category: Literature   4 20 Terms