Perspective of "Annunciation" (17th of April 2014)

The day before yesterday, 15th of April, was >> Leonardo da Vinci's birthday, and as I >> last wrote about him more than three years ago (!), it was about time for a new post on Leonardo.

The motiv for the post is also >> Google's digitalization of Leonardo's painting "Annunciation" from Uffizi gallery in Florence. >> Click THIS link to examine Leonardo's painting in large resolution, and you can also >> download it from >> Wikipedia's page on da Vinci's painting.

The painting was made probably in year 1472, when Leonardo was twenty years old. In it, one clearly sees Leonardo's talent, but also a potential that is still to be realized. Concerning "Construction of Reality", it is interesting that Leonardo uses perspective with single vanishing point, denoted by letter F in the image above. The perspective is mostly correct, but there are also small errors which I will describe in the following.

I have already written two posts on perspective ( >> first part and >> second part), but I am procrastinating the writing of the third part (soon to be). For analysis of "Annunciation", it should be helpful to read the two posts of mine on perspective. From there you can conclude that one can learn a lot on the "observer" of the scene from the analysis of the painting. Eyes of the observer must be on the horizon (i.e. horizontal line containing vanishing point(s)). Examining horizon's relation to the figures of Mary and Gabriel, we may conclude that the eyes of the observer are about at the same height as Gabriel's eyes, i.e. that the observer is kneeling, as Gabriel (below)!

This is already a very interesting information which gives the painting additional context, almost certainly subconsciously registered by our mind, but it is nevertheless useful to bring it to consciousness using elementary geometric analysis of the painting.

Additional information on the scene of "Annunciation" can be gained by studying the perspective in the parts of the painting representing very distant space (around the vanishing point, below).

From the analysis of deep background, we are led to conclude that the observer's eyes are at quite some height, i.e. that the scene takes place in some mountainous surrounding. But, Leonardo makes some errors. One can see that the see level in the background crosses the horizon, which suggests that he observers looks down a bit. If this were the case, the vertical lines (building edges) would need to be slightly skewed, which is not seen.

We could thus conclude that Leonardo's application of (geometric, linear) perspective with single vanishing point is mostly correct and that small errors appear only in the deep background, close to the vanishing point.

The next post on perspective should deal with perspective with THREE vanishing points. Soon, I hope.

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Last updated on 17th of April 2014.