Thanksgiving Gratitude List: Formal Elements

It is the Thanksgiving holiday this week in the US, which means that Americans tend to focus on things for which they are thankful. I thought it would be fun to compile a list of the formal elements in art for which I am grateful. In other words, these are all of the physical (formal) aspects of art which I find aesthetically pleasing. To me, these things make art beautiful:

I am grateful for compositions with strong diagonals.

Athena Battling Alkyoneos, Detail of the Gigantomachy Freize from the Altar of Zeus, c. 175 BC

I am grateful for strong light and dark contrasts.

Caravaggio, Madonna of the Snake, 1606

I am grateful for impasto.
Van Gogh, detail of Wheat Field with Cypresses, 1889 (Metropolitan Museum)

I am grateful for volume, particularly when it creates
an illusion of the human figure.
(Look at how Pluto's fingers press into Proserpina's body!)
Bernini, detail of Pluto and Proserpina, 1621-22 (Borghese Gallery)

I am grateful for flat planes of solid color.
Gauguin, Self Portrait with Halo, 1889

I am grateful for thick, dark outlines of figures.

Brian Kershisnik, Artist Devoured by a Terrible Beast, n.d.

I am grateful for monochromatic backgrounds.
Whistler, Arrangement in Grey and Black: Portrait of the Artist's Mother, 1871

I am grateful for the luminescent colors afforded by oil paint.
Robert Campin, detail of the Merode Altarpiece, 1425-28

You can really tell what artistic periods (and centuries) I prefer, huh? What formal elements are YOU grateful for?