Critical Conversations: bridging pathways forward to greater understanding and creative solutions.

Rectilinear Exercise

Rowena Reed Kostellow Digital Archive

a color photograph showing a variety of clay studio exercises, each made of three intersecting rectilinear forms
Student Work
a black and white photograph of a studio exercise featuring three intersecting rectilinear forms
Student Work, Author Unknown, 1980s
a color photograph of a studio exercise featuring three intersecting rectilinear forms
Yihong (Hugo) Li, BID 2019
a black and white photograph of a studio exercise featuring three intersecting rectilinear forms
Student Work, Author Unknown, 2010s
a color photograph of two studio exercises featuring intersecting rectilinear forms
Student Work, Author Unknown, 1980s

In the first Foundations exercise, students are asked to organize clay rectangular volumes into groups of three. The volumes should vary as much as possible. The volumes should be linear, planar and volumetric. One, a dominant volume, should be the largest and most engaging. The subdominant volume compliments the dominant. The third and smallest volume is called the subordinate. It should introduce a third axis, and make the form more three-dimensional. It should fill in what is missing from the dominant and subdominant volumes.