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There are no rules in composition, really?

Jay Hambidge ("Elements of Dynamic Symmetry"), (The Periodical "The Diagonal") tried to come up with compositional rules based of golden mean geometry, most notable the "Whirling Square" Rectangle, with a ratio of 1:1.618. Most of the pictorial efforts I've seen using this "method" or formula, were just that stiff and formulaic. However, in the hands of George Bellows-already a formidiable Ashcan School artist, the results are close to Renaissance composition. If you hold up a golden section grid to every painting in the Uffizi, you'd be surprised at how consistently the placements hit the grid lines EXACTLY. This produces an effect that is WAY different than kinda, sorta, feeling it. The great artists were able to use the geometry and still have the painting appear natural, like breathing-no stiffness. E.g. Caravaggio, or Vermeer.

Kandinsky, in I think "Point, Line, Plane" discussed the effect of the proportions of the rectangle itself-notable the "speed" of the long diagonal of the rectangle.

It is important to understand the structural "laws of the rectangle" in order to have some control-because the principals are operative in your work whether you like it or not. But superficial use can actually worsen your work, and until there's mastery, I say "good Luck".
 
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