Artists work with line, shape, color and texture. It can be hard to pull those elements apart.
Toni Yuly illustration from Gracias Abejas
Where does shape end and color begin?
Edouard Vuillard
When a shape is right it dances.
Suzy Lee
A shape can be positive or negative (i.e. created by the space around it.)
Ben Shahn
Ben Shahn
A well drawn shape gets to the essence of things, eliminating detail.
Lois Ehlert
Dick Bruna
Bill Traylor
With compression and distortion a shape can convey movement. Exaggeration makes it more active (and more delightful).
Bill Traylor
Margaret Chodos-Irvine – detail from Where Lily Isn’t
Mayumi Oda
As it moves toward abstraction a shape is enlivened by what is real.
Matisse papercut
Henri Matisse
Salud – here’s to this shapely world!
Bill Traylor
Bjorn Wiinblad
Mayumi Oda
Books Around The Table 
Wish I could put these images on a continuous loop! Fascinating to compare and contrast.
Wow! These images are wonderful!
Thanks!
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Thank you, Julie. A wonderful curation of shape. Have you read “The Age of InsightThe Quest to Understand the Unconscious in Art, Mind, and Brain, from Vienna 1900 to the Present ” by Eric Kandel? https://amzn.to/2RIa55j
Kandel won a Nobel Prize for his work with neuroscience. In this book he looks at the role of the beholder in the relationship between the artist, the work of art and the beholder. It’s brilliant.
Love your work and your thinking.
I have not read that book – in fact I hadn’t heard of it. Thanks for the tip and the link!