Establishing a Focal Point
from Kenn Backhaus
Establishing a focal point will help keep the artist in line with the goals of the painting. When Kenn starts to look at subjects to paint on location or from a reference, he has to begin by figuring out what the goal and idea of the scene is. After he establishes that in his mind, he will look to find a good vantage point and composition. When he is establishing his composition, he is looking for the focal point.
The focal point will generally fall where the darkest dark and the lightest light are merging. It’s an automatic element our eyes are attracted to; where the most contrast it. When your eye is attracted to this area, that is where the focus will be. It does not mean your focus has to be on a particular element that is part of your idea (but it could be). Looking at and establishing that focal point will help keep you in line with the goals of your painting.
An established focal point also keeps an artist from over-developing other areas of the painting. Once you have developed and identified the focal point, and you have that in your painting, everything else should be subordinate to that. In Kenn’s early stages of painting, he did not establish the focal point right away. He would develop other areas as his eyes moved around the scene. Then, these areas became competitive with what he should have originally designated as a focal point. Designating that to begin with, early on in the painting process, will help keep everything else from not competing with the focal point. And, instead, will support it.
“Looking at and establishing that focal point will help keep you in line with the goals of your painting.”
An established focal point forces the viewer to see where you have determined the location you want them to first look. Often, we see paintings where it is hard to figure out where the artist wants us to look. It is similar to how a camera takes a photo; it captures the whole scene and everything is in focus. When we as humans look at a scene, we can only focus on elements as we see them. This is how we should paint our scenes. If you are working from a reference photo, the camera can often put a lot of things in focus, where your eye cannot naturally do that. We can only look at one element at a time, then move onto the next one. This is how we see and how we decipher what is in focus at the time. As artists, we can control the visual by placing a focal point. We can automatically make the viewer see this or that first. Then, you can use all of the other elements, principles, and foundations to allow the viewer to move around the painting. But then, making sure you are taking them back to the focal point.
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