Finding your Rectangle

One of the most important steps in creating the composition of your painting is "finding your rectangle". If you don't define the edges of your painting, you can't make a strong composition. Why? Because good composition depends on placement of shapes, and you can't place your shapes if you have not

first defined the space into which you are placing them. It sounds a lot simpler than it really is!

There are lots of tools to help a painter define her rectangle. One recent offering is a piece of plexiglass, marked in a grid pattern. The one pictured at the top of this post is called  the "Viewfinder", and is made by Artwork Essentials. I usually use a simpler option, the Guerrilla Painter Composition Finder. It fits in the palm of your hand, and consists of two pieces of heavy paper stock that adjust to create an opening of various dimensions. It is my favorite--it has the benefit of being marked at the sides to indicate the sizes of standard canvases (8x10, 9x12, etc). 

For "thinking outside the box"--literally and figuratively!--you can just create your own rectangle by measuring off space, holding your brushes to create a rectangle. This is the preferred method of Maggie Siner, and you can't argue with success! Here's Maggie finding her rectangle this way. The brushes define the top and bottom of the rectangle, and your index fingers define the sides. This takes some manual dexterity, but it offers endless flexibility. Plus there is one less piece of equipment to carry. I'm all for the simplicity this offers!