Vanishing Points

This work traces the history of three-dimensional perspective in art, its origins, and its impact on human outlook and our view of nature. From prehistoric times, when the portrayal of depth was virtually non-existent, and the tentative beginnings of perspective in Greek and Roman times, through its perfection by Brunelleschi and Alberti in 15th century Italy, to the return of flat style in the Middle Ages and the rebirth of perspective in the Renaissance, the work examines painters and works illustrative of the evolution of perspective.This history also emphasizes the relation of perspective to the development of humanism, analyzing scientific evidence of the role of the right cerebral hemisphere in the appreciation of three-dimensional art. It explores similar human attributes that have risen and declined in tandem with perspective: expressiveness in the human face, use of metaphor, love of the grand panoramas of nature, and the sense of individuality. The book shows evidence of the role of three-dimensional art in the rise of landscape painting and its contribution to the admiration and investigation of nature and the rise of the scientific age.