Dots in their smallest incarnations are an essential ingredient in all the visuals we process.

Too small to be separately perceived, they make up everything we see on screens or paper.

Enlarge them a bit, and they can become informative matrices. Or stunning colour fields.

Expand them even further, and they become beautiful patterns on papers or fabric.

And when you blow them up to create giant discs, they become powerful enough to completely alter the perception of an urban landscape.

Dots can morph into many things. And this weekend, the shape they take is up to you.

After spotting dots all week now is the time to create your own.

Here are some suggestions.

You may think, like me, that dot-to-dot puzzles are a bit lame. But have you ever tried creating your own? It forces you to decide what parts of a picture are essential - and what you can easily leave out.

You can upload an image of your choosing (a photograph, or a picture of an artwork for example), to:

http://www.picturedots.com/

And then start to painstakingly create your own dot-to-dot puzzle.

I thought I’d try this for part of the Mona Lisa, which wasn’t at all easy.

Dot-to-Dot Mona Lisa - Created using http://www.picturedots.com/ and a photograph of the original

Want to improve your composition skills?

Then get some coloured paper and cut out three dots in three different colours and sizes.

Grab a sheet of white paper to use as your canvas and experiment placing your dots on it in different constellations.

How does it look when they’re all heaped together on one side, for example?

Or when you put as much space as possible between them?

What does it feel like when they overlap? Or when they take sides against each other?

To help you remember which compositions you prefer, take pictures, positioning your camera perfectly parallel above your canvas.

Dots & colour

If you can get your hands on some paint, dot paintings are a great way to start experimenting with colour. Especially if you’ve never held a brush before.

Simply Google “dot painting” and you will find hundreds of tutorials showing you how to get started.

After a week of focusing on them I’m still not clear on why dots, especially in their larger incarnations, are so irresistible.

Is it the tension created by the space between them?

Is it because they remind us of patterns in nature? Is it because we, as humans, are drawn both towards circles and patterns, and fields of dots combine the best of both worlds?

Maybe I’ll find out some day, but for now, I’ll leave you with what Japanese dot-artist par excellence Yayoi Kusama has to say about them:

A polka-dot has the form of the sun, which is a symbol of the energy of the whole world and our living life, and also the form of the moon, which is calm. Round, soft, colourful, senseless and unknowing. Polka-dots can't stay alone; like the communicative life of people, two or three polka-dots become movement... Polka-dots are a way to infinity.

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