Composing Narratives: Relief, Foreshortening, and Variety of Men
Nearer figures show more relief; avoid foreshortening a lone figure; vary the bodies in a scene
This page of the Treatise on Painting gives three rules for composing narrative scenes. First, the figure feigned nearest the eye shows the greatest relief, because a colour with least air interposed appears most perfect, so shadows read darker and bodies rounder up close, whereas distant shadows are weakened by the intervening air. Second, in a single figure the painter should avoid foreshortenings, which would test the ignorance of the untaught, but in narratives, and above all in battles, foreshortenings and countless twistings are welcome. Third, a scene must hold men of varied constitutions, ages, complexions and builds, and the passage begins to list them, tall and short, fat and thin, fierce and civil, old and young.
On this page
Nearest figures carry the greatest relief
The figure feigned closest to the eye shows the greatest relief, because a colour with the least air interposed appears most perfect. Its shadows read darker up close and give more relief, whereas distant shadows are corrupted and weakened by the intervening air.
Avoid foreshortening a single figure
In a lone figure the painter should avoid foreshortenings of the parts and the whole, lest he contend with the ignorance of the untaught; but in narratives, and above all in battles, countless twistings and bendings of the combatants are not only allowed but required.
Fill a scene with varied kinds of men
A narrative should contain men of various constitutions, ages, complexions, attitudes and builds, stout and slender, tall and short, fat and thin, fierce and civil, old and young, so that no two resemble each other.