Universal Principles of Design, Updated and Expanded Third Edition

067 Figure-Ground

The brain automatically makes elements objects of focus or background.

Figure-ground, one of the Gestalt principles of perception, asserts that the human perceptual system separates stimuli into either figure elements or ground elements. Figure elements are the objects of focus, and ground elements compose an undifferentiated background. This relationship can be demonstrated with visual stimuli, such as photographs, as well as auditory stimuli, such as soundtracks with dialogue and background music.1

Whenever visual elements are juxtaposed, we automatically perceive relationships among them. Elements are perceived as either figure or ground in accordance with the following visual cues:

• The figure has a definite shape, whereas ...