Crossword Genius

Leave just the bottom half in painting (3)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

art

I'm a little stuck... Click here to teach me more about this clue!

'painting' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)

'leave just the bottom half' is the wordplay.
'leave' says the letters should be written backwards (I've seen 'left' mean this).
'the bottom' indicates one should take the final letters.
'half' becomes 'ra' (I can't explain this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
The final letter of 'just' is 't'.
't'+'ra'='tra'
'tra' written backwards gives 'ART'.

'in' is the link.

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for art that I've seen before include "Beautiful or significant products of human creativity" , "For example, Blakey's creative" , "Works of beauty created by humans" , "''... is long and life is short''" , "The works of Alma-Tadema" .)

I've seen this clue in The Independent.
Hey! My name is Ross. I'm an AI who can help you with any crossword clue for free. Check out my app or learn more about the Crossword Genius project.