Compose styles
Rather than blending styles toward a middle, this gives them roles. The first one carries the structure, the next comes in as the accent, and anything after that shows up in a single detail. Where they fight each other, it says so before you start.
How to divide the work
- Composition
- Follow Đông Hồ Prints: Set the main animal large at center and align the rest in a row
- Type
- Set in Đông Hồ Prints's manner (A short inscription cut into the block and left in the margin), and let Lubok's lettering (Hand-written text poured around the picture and framed as one unit) appear only where you want the eye to catch.
- Material
- Ground in Đông Hồ Prints's material (Dó paper coated with shell powder, natural pigments printed color by color); bring in exactly one thing from Lubok (Thick woodcut outlines with red, yellow and green washed past the line).
- Colour
- Build on #d3a75e, #a9393e, #211712 and admit one accent from #eee6cb, #ce5740, #080303.
Where they fight
- Đông Hồ Prints and Lubok both belong to Popular Prints, so the difference is small. Push the roles further apart than feels comfortable.
Caution
- Đông Hồ Prints Reusing the satire as cute animal artwork drains the village philosophy out of it and leaves a souvenir motif.
- Lubok Tidying the outline and keeping the color inside it removes the misregistration and rough hand that carried the warmth of a popular print.
Image prompt
Produce four original images that take their structure from Đông Hồ Prints (style, 17th century–) and their accent from Lubok (style, 17th–19th century). ## What to make Make the kind of thing Đông Hồ Prints exists for: new Year promotions told in the village voice of auspice and satire, or animal fables that raise a laugh instead of preaching a lesson. Choose one subject and hold it across all four. ## Structure comes from Đông Hồ Prints - Shell-powder paper that glimmers - A limited natural palette - Satire through animals - Renewed each New Year Composition: Set the main animal large at center and align the rest in a row. Type and lettering: A short inscription cut into the block and left in the margin. ## Accent comes from Lubok, used sparingly - Thick outlines - Flat hand-coloring - Image and text together - Satire and story Let one material quality come from it: Thick woodcut outlines with red, yellow and green washed past the line. ## Colour and feeling Build the ground on #d3a75e, carry the structure in #a9393e and #211712, and let a single accent come from #ce5740. These are read off real works, so a direction rather than a fixed palette. Feeling to carry: play, intimacy, nostalgia. ## Where they fight - Đông Hồ Prints and Lubok both belong to Popular Prints, so the difference is small. Push the roles further apart than feels comfortable. ## What goes wrong - Đông Hồ Prints: Reusing the satire as cute animal artwork drains the village philosophy out of it and leaves a souvenir motif. - Lubok: Tidying the outline and keeping the color inside it removes the misregistration and rough hand that carried the warmth of a popular print. ## Across the four Keep the roles fixed in all four. Vary the framing, the scale and the arrangement so the set shows what this pairing can do rather than four versions of one picture. ## Constraints - Do not imitate, reference or name any specific artist, studio, brand, character or copyrighted work. - Do not reproduce the composition of an existing work. - Produce original compositions in the general period languages described above.
Related entries
- Đông Hồ Prints 17th century– / Style / Popular Prints
The woodblock prints of Vietnam's Đông Hồ village: printed with natural pigments on dó paper coated with ground seashell, New Year pictures like 'The Rat's Wedding' carrying village philosophy in satire and auspice.
- Lubok 17th–19th century / Style / Popular Prints
Russia's popular print: thick outlines, flat hand-coloring, image and text sharing the sheet, circulating sacred stories and satire cheaply. The avant-garde rediscovered it in the 20th century as Russia's native form.
Share this composition:https://indexstyle.org/compose?ids=dong-ho+lubok