Perspicio: To Look At, Through and Beyond the Picture Plane

This Research by Drawing uses linear perspective in the reconstruction of Proto-Renaissance (hence pre-perspectival) painted space, in such manner that the act of drawing becomes a re-observation of as well as a dwelling in the unlocked imaginary world that exists behind the canvas. Drawing (by hand) and reading drawings is harnessed as a way of exploring other works and, thereupon, the idea of space and how we look at it. By reading Proto-Renaissance pictorial space through the lens of linear perspective — a projection method it shares no common ground with — it is possible to reveal and access the Proto-Renaissance spatiality in a new way and have it serve as a looking machine (to question conventions we too often still perceive to be true).

Linear perspective is principally known as a method for systematically projecting a spatial representation onto a two-dimensional surface, and has dominated (architectural) representation and spatial understanding since its conception in the Renaissance. Upon closer examination, however, it proves to be more multifaceted than a mere geometrical tool for composing two-dimensional imagery. This research instrumentalises the inversion of perspective so that it becomes not simply a means of disclosing space but a crowbar for opening up our way of looking. More than just for its geometrical potential, this research is invested in perspective as a device for unlocking a space and, consequently, opening up our gaze. In other words, perspective itself is not the object of investigation, but the tool to observe perception.

Perspective is deployed because of its theatricalising character — for the construction hinges on the central element or picture plane, which, like a fourth wall, has the ability to present the spectator a world of different space and time. In the first place, the picture plane is a barrier between Here and There, a two-dimensional plane that contains the composition, determines the position of the onlooker and directs their gaze. Secondly, it is a threshold that can be crossed, a doorway opening up to an imaginary space. Moving through the different positions in relation to the picture plane — looking at, through and beyond its surface — we zoom in on and examine how we look at the image, at the spatial construction and finally at our own looking, respectively. By gradually expanding our space of exploration in regards to the picture plane, we also aim to broaden our understanding of how we look at it, with a particular focus on specific points of view and the framing of moments.

This research draws on two paintings that present themselves with pre-perspectival pictorial language: The Birth of the Virgin (1303-1305) by Giotto di Bondone and The Head of Saint John the Baptist Brought before Herod (1455-1460) by Giovanni di Paolo. These two cases, and the spaces they display, are construed through the performance of analogue perspective drawing experiments within self-reflective cycles, where thinking turns into drawing and drawing into thinking. With case 3 the bridge is built between mental and physical experience by the presentation of a diptych of existing spaces: a built Here and There in the guise of a chapel comprising two adjoining rooms. This chapel is a stepping stone for the reader in two respects. On the one hand, it is an intermediate step before accepting the invitation to mentally dwell in a diptych of drawn spaces. On the other hand, it is a materialized suggestion (a built metaphor) of how the way of looking investigated in and presented by this research could be incorporated into architectural practice.

This thesis is an account, in words and drawings, of the author’s personal experience while drawing/in the drawing, in which the spatialities that are generated by perspective are imaginatively accessed and function as looking machines. This research perpetuates, firstly, the role of drawing as a way of observing, entering and mentally exploring. In addition, it also identifies the potential of perspective drawing as a scenographic device in particular whereby the central picture plane is transformed into and instrumentalised as place. This plane-as-place, paradoxical and subjective in nature, is recognised as an important mental space to dwell in and return from with a new pair of eyes. The research also exposes the significance of Proto-Renaissance imagery as a “distorted” fictional playground. To reconcile “correct” linear perspective with pre-perspectival pictorial language brings about friction that is propulsive. The confrontation between expectation (dictated by the analytic, because metrical Here) and experience (inherent in the ambiguous, because atmospheric There), provokes linear perspective as a cultural given (not to say prevailing paradigm) and questions its impact on our architectural reading and understanding of space.