Film: Tim's Vermeer In the previous chapter we studied how painters used techniques such as perspective to deploy an appearance of a three dimensional space into a flat canvas surface. Master painters
ied depth, Value, and Space - Professor's Point of View Lecture
Value
Pierre-Paul Prud’hon, La Source, c. 1800–10. Black and white chalk stumped, on light blue paper, 21⅛ × 15⅜".
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts
Value refers to the lightness and darkness used to create a sense of volume.
The Italian terminology for this is called chiaroscuro. (For correct pronunciation, refer to the audio glossary) The Renaissance artists found out that most volume can be created by five to six different shades of lightness and darkness.
NOTE: When you see a word like chiroscuro that is unfamiliar, resist the urge to say “I don’t know how to pronounce this." Make every effort to look it up online or in our audio glossary. Note that this class deals with a lot of foreign words, and if you resist learning these words, it will prevent you from learning.
Notice how the use of value/chiroscuro translates to a more sophisticated form: a human figure. In La Source, artist Pierre-Paul Prud’hun uses chiaroscuro to draw a female figure. He is using black and white chalk on very pale blue paper which results in this beautifully sensual drawing.
Image Sources: La Source, by Pierre-Paul Prud’hon, from WikiArt (Links to an external site.). Educational use (Links to an external site.)
Diagram of Chiaroscuro, Gateways to Art: Understanding the Visual Arts, Debra J. DeWitte, Ralph M. Larmann, M. Kathryn Shields
Value
1.3.5 Pierre-Paul Prud’hon, La Source, c. 1800–10. Black and white chalk, stumped, on light blue paper, 21⅛ × 15⅜". Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts
Notice how the figure is placed at one-third of the image (marked red line). This is called the rule of thirds. The Renaissance artists discovered that the rule of third makes a pleasing picture.
Also notice the play of light and shadows. Can you determine the origin of the light source? Slightly right and from the top. We know this because the shadows will form in the opposite direction. If you want to know where the light comes from look at the shadows!
Image Sources: La Source, by Pierre-Paul Prud’hon, from WikiArt (Links to an external site.). Educational use (Links to an external site.)
Perspective
Ugolino di Nerio's The Last Supper
Lets look at Ugolino di Nerio's depiction of The Last Supper. Notice how the ceiling is skewed and how the figures seem out of place; The people and the table seem too large for the size of the chamber they are in. The table seems to be tilting in an odd angle. The overall result that the picture somehow looks unnatural.
By the time of the Renaissance, though, artists began to solve this problem. They devised another “trick.” This trick is called perspective drawing.
Perspective drawing is a mathematical system that uses lines to create an illusion of depth. When artists use perspective drawing, the spaces starts to look more natural. By the time of Leonardo Da Vinci’s Last Supper (1497), we are seeing more natural solutions for depth.
3.6.15 Leonardo da Vinci, The Last Supper, c. 1497. Fresco: tempera on plaster, 15'1" x 28'10½", Refectory of Santa Maria delle Grazie, Milan, Italy
On this image, I have noted with a red pen the vanishing point of the image. Notice how the parallel lines intersect at the head of Christ and dead center of the image. Because the lines intersect at one vanishing point on the horizon, we call this one-point perspective!
Image Sources: The Last Supper, by Ugolino di Nerio, from The Met (Links to an external site.). Educational use (Links to an external site.)
The Last Supper, by Leonardo da Vinci. Licensed under Public Domain 
One-Point Perspective
1.3.18 The effect of convergences: Edith Hayllar, A Summer Shower, 1883. Oil on panel, 21 × 17⅜". Private collection
Here’s another example of one-point perspective—a wonderful painting by Edith Hayllar titled A Summer Shower. In this image, the artist placed the vanishing point, between the male tennis player and the young female. One point-perspective not only renders a sense of depth, but in this case communicates the stability of a middle class Victorian household in England.
( Also, notice how the female figure is placed exactly at the left-third of the image and the male servant who is serving the beverages is at the right-third of the image. =Rule of thirds!)
Image Source: A Summer Shower, by Edith Hayllar. Licensed under PD-US
Two-Point Perspective
Raphael The School of Athens
I will not go into too much details on two-point perspective, but I want you to know that there is such a thing!
Here is Raphael’s The School of Athens. Raphael painted this work as an homage to the great philosophers of Ancient Greece. All of the men depicted here are well known scholars. Think of Aristotle, Socrates, Euclid, etc. The eagerness to learn from and emulate Greek antiquity is a hallmark value of the Renaissance.
Just take a moment here to notice the two-point perspective the artist is using. We have, of course, two vanishing points that fall on the horizon. The block is used as an anchor for the vanishing points.
Image Source: The School of Athens, by Raphael. Licensed under Public Domain
Three-Point Perspective
1.3.23 M. C. Escher, Ascending and Descending, March 1960. Woodcut,
14 × 11¼". The M. C. Escher Company, The Netherlands
Now, there is another one! Three-point perspective. Notice how it’s different from one or two-point. You got it. The three-point technique is used to depict depth from a birds-eye point of view. Many superhero films use three point perspective because we want to see from the same angles as, for instance, Batman leaping from the tall buildings of Gotham City.
The work you are seeing in this slide is by printmaker Escher. In this image, look carefully especially at the marching figures and stairs. Are they going up or down? Are the stair cases going up or down? Pretty tricky!
Escher is using three-point perspective to depict the enormity of the large piece of architecture. By the way, this image is a wood cut print, different yet again from a drawing or painting. We will learn more about printmaking in the later modules.
Image Source: Ascending and Descending, by M. C. Escher, from M. C. Escher website (Links to an external site.). Fair use (Links to an external site.)
Atmospheric Perspective
1.3.13 Asher Brown Durand, Kindred Spirits, 1849. Oil on canvas, 44 × 36". Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas
One final perspective technique! We have atmospheric perspective.
Take a look at Asher Durand’s Kindred Spirit. This is a beautiful painting from eighteenth-century America. In this painting, Durand is paying respect to two of his mentors. The figure holding the portfolio is his teacher, the very famous landscape painter Thomas Cole. Many early American painters painted landscapes to glorify the newly born nation. Here, Durand is continuing that tradition by placing his recently deceased mentor in a beautiful mountain forest.
Notice how, in this painting, the far away mountains are painted faint and blurry. Notice how the tree and shrubs in the foreground are much more distinct in shape and color. This is the atmospheric technique. Pretty common sense, right? If you keep your eyes open, you will see this technique used in many paintings.
This concludes our lecture into depth. Again artists can either use value or perspective techniques to create a sense of depth and illusion in a two-dimensional (flat) surface. We are learning their bags of tricks!
Image Source: Kindred Spirits, by Asher Brown Durand. Licensed under PD-US
