Subtest III: Visual and Performing Arts - Dance, Music, Theatre, and Visual Art
Subtest III Visual and Performing Arts covers all four disciplines - dance, music, theatre, and visual art - through the five California VAPA strands: artistic perception, creative expression, historical and cultural context, aesthetic valuing, and connections to other learning.
Visual art
- Elements of art: line, shape, form, color, value, texture, space (including positive/negative space and perspective).
- Principles of design: balance (symmetrical, asymmetrical, radial), emphasis, contrast, pattern, rhythm/movement, proportion, unity and variety.
- Color: hue, value (lightness to darkness), intensity (saturation); complementary pairs sit opposite on the wheel, analogous colors are adjacent; warm versus cool.
Music
- Elements: pitch/melody, rhythm (beat, meter, tempo), harmony, dynamics, timbre, texture, form.
- Form is labeled by letter: AB (binary), ABA (ternary), AABA (32-bar song form), ABACA (rondo), theme and variations.
Dance and theatre
- Dance elements: space, time, and force/energy; locomotor versus axial movement; choreographic devices such as canon, retrograde, and repetition.
- Theatre: plot, character, setting, dialogue, monologue, tableau, improvisation; audience etiquette and the rehearsal process.
Worked example. A student paints a small orange figure against a large blue field. Orange and blue are complementary, so the contrast creates visual vibration and directs the eye - the figure becomes an emphasis point through color, not size. Asymmetrical balance keeps the composition from feeling stiff: the small intense warm shape balances the large cool field. Linking the observation to the artistic-perception strand turns a preference statement into an evidence-based description.
Teaching and assessment
Integration is common: dance to demonstrate a science process, rhythm to teach fractions. Assess with rubrics, portfolios, and performance tasks that name criteria in advance.
Traps. Confusing elements (line, color) with principles (balance, emphasis); mixing value with intensity; swapping complementary and analogous; calling asymmetry a flaw; conflating beat with rhythm or tempo; mislabeling ABACA as ternary; treating aesthetic valuing as unstructured personal opinion rather than informed judgment against criteria.