Perspective in Art

Perspective is a clever trick that makes a flat picture look three-dimensional. It helps artists show depth and distance on a flat surface. When you look down a long road, it seems to get smaller and narrower until it disappears at a point in the distance. Artists use this idea to make their drawings and paintings look real. Learning perspective is one of the most important skills for any artist.

How Perspective Works

In perspective drawing, things that are far away are drawn smaller. Things that are close are drawn bigger. Lines that go into the distance all point toward one spot called the vanishing point. This is usually on the horizon line, where the sky meets the ground. Railroad tracks are a great example. They seem to get closer and closer together until they meet at a point far away. But we know they really stay the same distance apart.

Who Discovered It

Artists in ancient times tried to show depth, but they did not have exact rules. In the early 1400s, an Italian architect named Filippo Brunelleschi figured out the math behind perspective. Soon, Renaissance artists like Leonardo da Vinci used perspective to make their paintings look amazingly real. Before perspective, paintings looked flat. After it was discovered, art became much more lifelike. Today, perspective is used in everything from paintings to video games.

Fun Facts

• Filippo Brunelleschi demonstrated perspective by painting a building on a mirror and having people compare it to the real thing.
• One-point perspective has one vanishing point, but artists can also use two or three vanishing points for more complex scenes.
• Video game designers use perspective rules to make 3D game worlds look real on a flat screen.

Did You Know?

Before artists discovered perspective in the 1400s, paintings looked flat and people in the background were the same size as people in the front!