Practicing each of these art fundamentals requires us to also practice Drawing from Life, which is the next area of fundamental practice I recommend for beginning artists.
Top 5 Art Fundamentals for Beginners
Welcome fellow artists! Thank you for sharing part of your day with me to talk about art fundamentals ?. Since you’re here it means you are looking for answers regarding the fundamentals of art and other art concepts like painting, color, composition, anatomy, value, and many others I’m sure. When we start our art journey, we have tons of questions about art and its elements. I’m happy to share everything I have learned as an artist because I remember the struggle of becoming. There are almost always pre-established paths, curriculum, video courses, books, and other avenues for getting whatever knowledge we seek. These avenues lay out what the essential or fundamental parts are for any discipline and stress the importance of learning those fundamentals to achieve success—and for good reason, as our work and understanding tend to fall flat without them. Everything there is to learn has fundamentals intended to serve as our foundation. A foundation is our primary source of essential knowledge and skills, and once completely established it supports us as we grow from it and built on it. Have you ever heard the phrase “We stand on the shoulders of giants”? The artists that came before us, from masters to hobbyists, have already laid the groundwork for us. We don’t need to reinvent anything, all we must do is learn the basics, each art concept, and do the work to make our art. Yes, it is a process. Yes, it does take years. That’s okay! It’s worth it, and so is your art dream.
What are the Fundamentals of Art?
Search for “art fundamentals” or “what are the fundamentals of art?” online and you quickly get a cornucopia of mish-mashed information about art and design. There is a difference between a fundamental, a principle, and an element. A fundamental is something you start with and then build on. A principal is similar to a fundamental, but it can also be a set or list of things that make up one encompassing fundamental. I think about it this way: if there are multiple principles, then whatever heading they’re all listed under is the actual fundamental. Take the Principles of Design, for example. There are at least seven of those, but Design is the fundamental. Make sense? An element is literally a component, one part, of a whole. All fundamentals have elements, but no single element is a fundamental on its own.
Because you want to draw and paint awesome stuff without tearing out your hair, that’s why. Making quality art requires us to understand all the fundamentals of art as well as their elements, including painting, color theory, composition, color mixing, anatomy, perspective, design, etc. Understanding each of the fundamentals, each concept, in depth is a process and an investment in ourselves as artists. You have goals as an artist that you dream of meeting, and your journey is about equipping yourself to get where you want to be and rocking it when you arrive. So let’s gear up by going over this list.
My Top 5 Art Fundamentals for Beginners
- Forms
- Line
- Shapes
- Structure (Construction)
- Proportion (Illusion of Mass and Dimension)
- The Fundamentals of Light (Tones/Values,includes basic Color Theory & Mixing)
- Drawing from Life
- Gesture Drawing & Anatomy
- Perspective
My key reasoning for the order of this art fundamentals list is quite simple: Historically and to this day, most times when I hit a wall it’s in one or more of these five areas that I find the solutions I need. Had I built a stronger background in these earlier on, I would’ve hit fewer snags. The strength of our foundation plays an important role in how we navigate our way through any challenge, and no matter how experienced we become, problem solving and corrections will always be part of our creation process.
It’s good to get different perspectives on things, so here’s the awesome Bobby Chiu on what the fundamentals of art are:
With all that in mind, let’s start digging into these top five fundamentals and help you on your way.
What Are The Fundamental of Art?
The fundamentals of art are Color, Composition, Value, Form, Anatomy, Brushwork, and Perspective. These principal art fundamentals are constitute concrete visual components that work together as they overlap and influence each other. Understanding the functions of all the elements will constitute a solid base from which to begin practicing art. With a good knowledge of these elements, it will be easier to analyze art, decipher art, appreciate art, and, most importantly, create art.
Color is a figment of light, the small portion of the light spectrum our eyes perceive in nature, that is, color. From cave art to contemporary art, artists have come to understand how to take advantage of the color wheel and its combinations. Time and deep analysis have demonstrated how certain colors and combinations can naturally evoke a specific sensation in the human brain. Even in psychology, we can find several studies on color’s effect on behavior, mood, and emotions. Color translates into color theory for plastic arts, one of the seven art fundamentals, so of course, it is necessary for every artist. However, it is important to note that color theory and color mixing will sometimes go in different directions.
Color Theory
Color theory studies how different colors can be combined to create harmony and contrast, a set of rules and guidelines that help visual artists understand color better. The history of color theory is fascinating. It began with the ancient Egyptians, who believed that colors had healing powers. They used combinations of colors for their paintings and sculptures. The Greeks also studied color theory, and they were the first to divide it into three elements: hue, value (lightness), and chroma(saturation). See more below. For a full guide, see our comprehensive article on Color Theory for Artists.
Hue
It is what we commonly call color. The difference between each slight shift in the color wheel is what makes a hue. In digital art, it is easier to determine the hue since each software has its own color wheel and color slider with specific numbers for each degree of hue change. However, in traditional art, hue needs to be determined and even created by the artists by color mixing.
Lightness
Hues can move around the color wheel and interact with the neutral Black and White. Lightness defines the level of interaction of determined hues with white (Tints) or black (shades) The more a color gets close to white, the lighter the tint gets, for example: 
The more a color gets close to black, the darker the shade gets, for example: 
Saturation
Saturation traduces to the intensity of the color, we can take any color and trace a straight line from it to gray, changing its saturation to the lowest, and we would get gray, see this example: This applies to all colors, and sometimes saturation can be confusing since desaturated colors can create complex palettes that can be difficult to handle in contrast with saturated colors.
Temperature
Colors (or hues) can be perceived as cool and warm, some colors are associated with cold, like blue, green, and cyan, and some are associated with warmth, like red, yellow, and orange. However, that doesn’t mean there isn’t a “warm” shade of blue or a “cool” shade of red. The same goes for all other colors. In painting and color mixing, we can find pigments already labeled by their associated shade.
The Color Wheel and Color Mixing
As is widely known, two main models are used nowadays, the additive model RGB and the subtractive model CMYK. 
Those work with light in a very different way. However, way before these models existed, artists used the RYB model: 
Yes, the one we all were taught in school, Red, Blue, and Yellow. Although we were led to believe that these colors were able to produce every color on the wheel, that was proved wrong in the 1960s, establishing that the RYB model, in reality, is a very basic model and produces a quite limited palette when color mixing. RYB is present in our color wheel structure. However, along them are Orange, Green, Magenta, and Cyan. 
Classic Theory is based on the RYB model, thanks to Sir Isaac Newton, and was adapted by painters and artists mainly due to the lack of pigments and the excessive price of some. Nowadays, we have access to most pigments for very affordable prices, so Modern Theory takes place, along with digital art, new techniques, new pigments, new paint brands, and new art. This is an excellent video that explains it all.
Still, it is not easy to master color theory completely. Years of practice are necessary to understand the relations of color, how some pigments change each other entirely when mixed, producing not the expected color at all, how the contrast works in our favor when using monochromatic palettes, etc.
2. Composition
Composition in art refers to the arrangement of elements in an artwork. Composition is one of the most basic artistic skills. It is the way that the artist decides to organize space, shapes, and colors on a two-dimensional surface in a way that makes sense and appeals to the viewer. Any composition can be broken down into three main parts: the foreground, midground, and background. The foreground is made up of all elements that are closer to the viewer than any element in the midground and background. The background consists of all elements that are further away from the viewer than any element in the foreground. Here is where the most complex forms tend to be. An artist can use composition to create depth, play with light, change elements of perspective, etc. There are many different ways to compose an artwork: symmetrical, asymmetrical, geometric, organic, formalistic, impressionistic, and more. Using basic forms to build structures and scenes, you can build your composition skills, but of course, you need to learn perspective and practice a lot in order to master this fundamental.
Thumbnailing
One of the secrets to mastering composition in a short period of time is thumbnailing. Thumbnailing consists of drawing /creating multiple mini-artworks, very rough, where you lay your values, shapes, and sometimes colors on different angles and perspectives (one-point perspective, two-point perspective, radial perspective, etc.) for the same scene and go for the one that has stronger focal points and looks more appealing to you. This will help you build a mental database of compositions that work with your techniques and skills. Here is a fantastic example and a tutorial on Cubebrush.co by Deiv Calviz:
3. Value
Value is defines as the scale of lightness or darkness of a particular color or hue. Value is one of the seven art fundamentals and is deeply connected with color. However, to be able to use value and color together, it is imperative to learn value from the basics (i.e. monochrome/black and white). You can’t just look at the color wheel and see the value of a certain color, but you can for sure train your eye to differentiate the darkness and lightness of each color and compare it to a grayscale value. Our world is filled with shapes, textures, and colors, but they all rely on light for their definition. We are able to see all of these because of light, light defines objects and shapes, and the artist is able to reproduce this by using a scale of values.
The Value Scale
We can better portray value with the scale below, going from pure whiteness to absolute black. The same can be done with any color. Nonetheless, it takes time and practice to train the eye how to see colors as values. 
Value plays an essential role in realistic drawing and painting. One exercise that is very common in painting classes is to do several still-life paintings with only three values (black, gray, and white or light gray). You must avoid blending and focus on turning shadow areas into defined lines filled with each value’s paint. 
Value can change the way we perceive any object, photograph, scene, or artwork. It can create and shift the mood of a painting or composition. It can impact the perspective and create a more accurate three-dimensional feel by showing how the light moves over the surfaces. The contrast between high and low values plays an impactful role in the audience.
