The Space Between

Listen to the Dogbert, boys and girls, for the moral of today's lesson: Perhaps a better title for this post would be something along the lines of "Nothing New Under the Sun" as I plan on blatantly plagiarising as much material as possible in an attempt to make a point that I'm not even sure exists.

A 'textbook-style' definition of negative space lives on your friend and mine here, but I prefer examples (but I have to admit their swan pic is pretty decent).

I think my favorite use of negative space (besides the works of M. C. Escher who has now appeared twice on these pages) is in the logo for the NCAA Big Ten conference. For those who aren't aware, the Big Ten Conference has eleven teams. And that's just what the logo says. Cool, huh?

While we're at it, let's just go ahead and throw in a work accenting negative space by the main man M.C.E. This is his woodcut (another woodcut, dang!) Sky and Water I. This man had a brilliant mind for seeing the patterns and intricacies of things that I can barely comprehend.

Speaking of barely comprehending anything, let's throw in a life application via song lyrics section, okay?

The first song that came to mind was the DMB song mentioned in the title. My most favoritest lines in this song are as follows:

The space between
what's wrong and right
is where you'll find me hiding, waiting for you.
The space between
your heart and mine
is the space we'll fill with time

Then you've got the classic power-ballad from Rush called "Free Will" with the 'more true and complicated than it sounds on first listen' line:

If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.

Our next exhibit is brought to you by those good folks at Corporate Logo Design Incorporated, or wherever it is that the Fed Ex logo was made. That's got a bit of a coolness factor going on with the negative space thing too, dontcha think?

Your homework: Think about the negative space this week. The things we don't do, or don't say, or don't think about, or don't pay attention to have just as much impact, and sometimes more, as the things we do. Once again I must use outside material to make a point. Attributed to St. Francis of Assisi:

Preach the Gospel always, and if necessary, use words.

And finally, a 'first appearance on the web Microsoft Paint original' work by Tim "came to snuff the rooster" James