The Three Movements of the Neck; Faults of the Painter
Never lend your own bodily defects to the figures you compose
This leaf treats the joints once more, urging the painter to study how flesh swells on one side of a bend and falls away on the other, best observed in the necks of animals, whose motions are of three kinds: bending toward a shoulder, twisting without curving, and the composed movement that joins both. A short chapter warns painters to measure their own proportions and never lend their personal defects to the figures they invent. A closing note insists every limb perform its proper office, and that in the dead or the sleeping no limb should appear alive or awake.
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The three movements of the neck: two simple, one composed
The neck's motions are of three natures, two simple and one composed. The first simple movement bends the neck toward a shoulder or raises and lowers the head; the second twists it right or left without curving, keeping it upright while the face turns toward a shoulder; the composed one adds a twist to the bend, as when the ear inclines to a shoulder and the face turns the same way, or to the opposite shoulder with the face to the sky.
Flesh grows on one side of a joint and falls away on the other
In the joints of the limbs and the variety of their bendings, one must consider how the flesh grows on one side and is wanting on the other. This is best sought in the neck of animals, where the movement makes the change most evident.
Do not give your figures your own bodily faults
Measure in yourself the proportion of your own limb-structure, and if you find any part discordant, note it and take strong heed not to use it in the figures you compose; for it is a common vice of painters to take pleasure in making things similar to themselves.
In the dead and sleeping no limb should look awake
Let all the limbs perform the office for which they were destined; and in the dead and in the sleeping let no limb appear alive or awake.