Definition: Texture (fine art; photographic composition)

Texture (fine art; photographic composition)

Regatta - the River Thames at Marlow, Buckinghamshire, UK. The layering and texture in the trees in this image give the picture a feeling of realistic depth. It is almost as if you could reach out and touch the trees to feel their texture.
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The representation of the structure and minute moulding of a surface (esp. of the skin), as distinct from its colour.

OED online version: Second ed., 1989; accessed 15 June 2012  .

If we were unable to see, woven cloth would feel slightly upstanding, a little rough and of a regular, repeating pattern. This ‘feel’ would guide our use of the term texture.

In a photograph we cannot feel the fine upstanding grain of things with our fingers. However, we can see the variations in pattern, shape and form which are defined by the colours, light and shadows. Indeed, in some photographs the variation in the light and the dark are so convincing that we can almost ‘feel’ the texture although it is not there. It is this three dimensional ‘feel’ that convinces us there is a ‘texture’ on the page. Referring to a texture in an image suggests the eye is fooled into believing that the depth, roughness and pattern in the image is real.