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Art and Life of William H. Johnson:
A Guide for Teachers

Glossary of Art Terms

background: The part of a picture or scene that appears to be farthest away from the viewer.

color: Color is produced when light strikes an object and then reflects back to your eyes. It has the following qualities: hue, which is the name of a color; intensity, which is the purity of a color; and value, which is the lightness or darkness of a color.

folk art: Art made by people who have had little or no formal schooling in art. Folk artists often make works of art using techniques that have been handed down through many generations.

foreground: The part of the picture or scene that appears to be closest to the viewer.

form: The shapes or the groupings of shapes in an art work.

frontal: The head-on view of a person or object.

history paintings: Paintings of scenes from the past that teach a moral lesson.

impasto: The thickness or roughness of paint or deep brushmarks, as distinguished from a flat, smooth paint surface.

line: A mark with length and direction. Line can be the outline of a shape, or it can create patterns and movement.

painting: Works of art made with paint on a surface. Often the surface is a tightly stretched piece of cloth called a canvas. Also, the act of painting.

perspective: The technique artists use to make three-dimensional objects look real on a two-dimensional surface. Perspective helps to create a sense of depth and receding space.

portrait: A work of art that represents a person or a group of people. Portraits usually show what a person looks like as well as reveal something about the subject's personality.

profile: The side view of an object or person.

realism: The realistic and natural representation of people, places, and things in a work of art.

space: The length, area, or depth shown in a work of art. Also, the open areas between, around, or inside the shapes.

symbol: An image that stands for, or represents, something else.

three-dimensional: Having, or appearing to have, length, width, and depth.

two-dimensional: Having length and width, but no depth.