Perspective in Art History

History of Perspective in Art

• The works of famous artists contributed notably to perspective as a concept or its specific techniques
• Henri Dorra's, "Art in Perspective" is a book, as are the others
• Key artists' works can be viewed to increase understanding of perspective

Books

• "Art in Perspective" by Henri Dorra, 1972
• "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" by Betty Edwards ,1989
• "Graphic Design Manual: Principles and Practice" by Armin Hoffmann, 1965
• "Art Context and Criticism" by John Kissick, 1993
• "Design Basics" by David Lauer and Stephen Pentak, 1995
• "Design Principles and Problems" by Paul Zelanski and Mary Pat Fisher, 1984

Websites

• The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco: www.thinker.org
• The Museum of Modern Art: www.moma.org
• The Smithsonian: www.si.edu/
• The Asian Art Museum of San Francisco: www.asianart.org
• Other art sites: www.artchive.com
• The Louvre: http://www.louvre.fr/en/clefanalyses/using-perspective-represent-space

Artistic Contributions Through The Years

• Linear perspective's current understanding is influenced by visual reality explorations
• The painter and architect, Giotto Bondone, from Florence, Italy significantly altered space construction on flat surfaces in the 13th-14th centuries
• Techniques used by di Bondone included light/shadow, foreshortening, and diminishing size
• The Renaissance era occurred from the early fifteenth to the late sixteenth century
• A new passion for and understanding of the natural world stimulated Renaissance artists
• Artists focused on depicting 3D reality on 2D surfaces
• Filippo Brunelleschi contributed remarkably to architecture, emphasizing viewer's gaze to develop a system for rendering 3D space
• Brunelleschi is considered to be the first to recognize the all-important vanishing point and determine the laws of linear perspective
• Masaccio incorporated Brunelleschi’s findings with an understanding of depth and perspective, combining linear perspective with techniques enhancing volume
• Light and shadow, reflective lighting, and highlights increase perspective
• Circles in perspective
• Parallel receding lines
• Leon Battista Alberti developed a veil (transparent grid of string on a frame) as a device that helps the artist draw what he/she saw onto a flat surface
• Sixteenth-century woodcut print by Albrecht Durer depicts Alberti's veil

Techniques For Showing Space and Depth

• Artists often aim to convey feelings of space or depth in drawings, paintings, and prints
• Artists can transform a flat plane into a "window" by employing certain techniques
• Artists can simulate a three-dimensional environment

Scale

• Distant objects appear smaller than near objects
• Artists create "near and far" senses using varied sizes (scales) of representational and nonrepresentational forms
• Pieter Brueghel the Elder’s, "Hunters in the Snow" is scale example

Aerial Perspective

• Aerial perspective (atmospheric) relies on gradients to create depth
• A gradient is a change in value of a particular quality
• Artists employing aerial perspective blur focus on certain areas, dull colors, reduce texture details, and lessen light and dark contrast regions
• These help simulate air amount when increasing distance

Placement

• Gravity influences perceptions of horizontal and vertical placement
• The bottom often seems like the ground
• The top often represents the sky
• Artists represent real-world arrangements, drawing/painting objects near/on ground as closer, with objects being positioned higher on the vertical axis

Overlapping

• Most visible environments have overlapping objects
• Objects hide parts of others when moving above or in front, resulting in depth
• Diego Rivera's, “Night of the Rich” uses overlapping to illustrate a gathering
• Overlapping may only establish shallow depth, which makes a combination for creating perspective useful

Perspective Basics

Terms

• Proportion: Comparison of object's linear measurements of its shape, or ratio of major dimensions
• Viewpoint (station point): Artist's location when viewing a subject
• Line of vision: Imaginary straight eye line to the subject
• Right angle: A 90-degree angle between adjacent sides, planes, or edges
• Horizontal: Edge or plane parallel to the ground
• Vertical: Upright edges or planes at right angles to horizontal plane
• Parallel: Equidistant, lines, edges, and planes extend in same direction, never meeting
• Format: Picture plane boundaries
• Eye Level: Height at which eyes are in relation to horizontal plane
• Depth: Dimension measured through an object, running downward/ horizontally
• Volume: Space the object occupies in height, width, & depth
• Space: Indefinite three-dimensional expanse where all objects are located

Measuring stick

• Helps artist draw what they see, determining proportions, figuring position relative to others, and aligning objects within boundaries
• Measuring stick should be a wooden dowel about 1/8 or 1/4 in. diameter and approximately 12 in. long, found at crafts and hardware stores

How To

• Hold at arm’s length, stick at a 90° angle to line of vision
• During measuring, shut one eye while using the other to view the object, maintaining same viewpoint
• Look across stick, lining up end with an edge, then adjust the thumb tip, so its lines are with the bottom edge
• Space between top edge & thumb tip comprises the height
• Rotate, putting thumb tip at a side edge to know object's width compared its length, in order to know space the object will use in drawing
• Refer to placement to know how much space is needed

Further Measurements

• Use the measuring stick to measure other object details, comparing them to previous measurements
• Align stick, note where an edge's extension intersects with other objects

Horizontal level

• Using the stick, determine the degree the edges angle away on the horizontal plane, relating it to the drawing
• Plumb - Hold lightly, checking the object’s position
• Compare model & pencil sketch, lightly drawing a reference line

Viewing Frame

• Viewing Frame (viewfinder): Hand-held border device focuses a particular object that frames the drawing subject
• Allows composition exploration
• Crafted by cutting cardboard into 7 in. square, placing 1 in. interval marks, drawing with lines of 1 in. square, and removing 1 corner square

Foreshortening

• Foreshortening: Apparent distortion of the object's shape/size when angled away from observer, creating dramatic and dynamic results, with an unusual point of view
• Linear perspective also causes foreshortening

Eye Level

• Eye level: Imaginary plane starting from the eye, extending from position observer situated, whether standing or lying down
• Varies depending on the eye-height

Line of Vision

• Line of Vision is imaginary line extending in a straight path from the eyes to an object
• To remain consistent in perspective drawings, maintain a single line of vision
• Vertical Picture Plane: Imaginary picture plane is fixed between observer/object, creating the illusion of spatial depth, but are different from physical walls of buildings
• Picture Plane: Imaginary vertical plane fixed between observer/object, determining the image
• For a consistent perspective, eye level, vision line, and picture frame must stay constant
• Changing any element alters the work's final product
• Subjects too large need perspective or might draw segment
• Large subjects require best possible position for viewing

Linear Perspective

• Parallel lines converge into a common point to indicate spatial depth
• Receding lines run parallel to earth, vanishing at eye-level (horizon line)

The Vanishing Point

• Vanishing point (VP): Common point of parallel lines that seem to converge, seeming to disappear
• Two rails appear closer and ties get smaller & narrower

Types of Perspective

• There are one-point, two-point, and three-point perspectives
• One-Point: Most object edges are parallel to picture plane
• Horizontal edges at right angles recede to a single vanishing point
• Two-Point: Object’s horizontal “parallel” edges aren’t parallel to picture, and they go two VPs at the eye-level line

How To: Edges

• In 1 & 2-point, parallel vertical edges stay unchanged, without converging (mostly)
• Three-point perspective requires objects are positioned at an angle and vertically converge at the VP, either the above or below the eye level

Drawing Perspective

• Nearest pole appears tallest and thickest
• The further away they are, the shorter, and slimmer they seem
• Both tops and bottoms of seem closer to horizon

Key Ideas For Perspective Drawing

• Perspective is apparent in depth
• Horizontal and vertical must be truly horizontal/vertical
• Use your T square or the drawing triangle to create “perfect lines and corners“

One Point Perspective

• Yields 1 “vanishing point" located directly at observer’s eyes
• One-point is used to represt objects that are parallel to picture plane
• However, the VP “always exists” straight ahead on the eye-level line

How To Draw A Cube?

• Opposing cube sides run parallel to each other, and their extended sides narrow
• Reflect & Respond for further examples

Box Shapes In One-Point Perspective (Beside One-Point)

• If one were to move these points it could still be used as depicted in Reflect and Respond with some considerations below
• The "Horizontal and Vertical Edges" is critical while drawing

Drawing, Chair, & Interiors

• There is a 1-point perspective to draw interiors of boxlike objects, by doing things like taking one dimension all the way
• The next objective is to "proportion" the inside of a "Room’s Dimensions"
• All can be achieved through constant practice

Two Point (Objects & Scenes)

• You may "Notice That Objects" arent "Always Viewed Head on" technically, and could be angled along the picture plane
• However, you’ve been studying it with One Point thus far, and might need two
• The VPs is positioned to the eye-level line
• Objects appear at angles to the picture plane, and so that's going to be explained

Drawing Cubes at a 45 Degree Angle

• Working could be fun and knowing the technique makes the object possible
• A Square (Square or Rectangle) makes drawing easier when the corner is parallel because two sides would be visible but receding

Important Drawing Items

• Always Draw the eye-level line
• Draw the receding line, which determines where edges are
• Hidden edges should be included
• In the end, points have to be on the Horizon line.
• However, everything must make clear, and one thing is important; “You'll understand the overall processes
• Then you’ll have to know when to see the hidden edges and use "Receding Line"
• "Diagonal Angle" is crucial here
• It all can be achieved with time

Checking Perspective Errors

• Some things that can occur are misplacing eye level or the point itself
• That's why observe any object in the composition in "Relation To The Eye Level"
• Distance between observer and object/location in connection of will affect slants
• If the points are too close to be considered and placed, an awkward distress comes to the view
• Make various sketches to the point is and should start in the final composition
• At times the VPs could extend beyond edges of the actual paper.

Extending Lines and Drawing Papers

• You may "Want A Larger Sheet Of Paper "
• Then, tape the drawing paper over or in a way that everything can still be worked on such as lines touching

Chairs

• Using two-point is to take two sides on that is the point of the degree for the chair, both at the level of eye

Inclined Planes

• How exactly does horizontal "Parallel Sides of The Object" or buildings meet at VPs on the ''Eyelevel Line''
• How should it be adjusted then so rules match the surface
• "The Vanishing Points" has set parts and pieces meet below the eye level, depending on direction

The Eye Level

• Only parallel horizontal edges can have VP that is at the "EyeLevel"
• "Vertical Line'' extends that point from the leveling/vanishing point
• Points are on a trace or trace lining point.
• Slanted planed shapes will have a lid shape or parts like open books
• Vertical levels and angles "Always Locate" to the same vertical lining from above or below
• You must know what the high or low of the position of your slanting

Vertical and High Distance

• It can be a bit obscure to know which part is which.
• Make "The Plane" obvious. However, know if the level increases its high distance while it leaves

Other Box Shapes

Open Doors

• One Aspect Of Structure "Interiors and Exteriors" can be the easy to make "Door Shape "
• Doors have a VP on "Eye-level," requiring estimations to draw, extending, and making it to its hinge or base

Bottles and Cylinders

• Helpful shape like the box like tool
• With sides seeming to tapers. "Cans Placed At The Line" will connect there

Pyramids

• The Shape Is Drawn Alike A Cube for people facing
• With a side below. There also have to be different edges in order

Explore the evolution of perspective in art through the works of famous artists and key techniques. Study notable books like Henri Dorra's "Art in Perspective" and visit museum websites to deepen understanding. This exploration enhances comprehension of spatial representation in art.