Painting a Forty-Braccia Figure in a Space of Twenty
Projecting a monumental standing figure onto a curved wall seen through an aperture
This leaf of Book Three first finishes a note that a bird's descent will be of little obliquity, then opens a chapter on painting a figure that appears forty braccia tall within a space of only twenty. Leonardo argues the painter need not worry whether the wall is flat or curved, since a viewer looking through a window or aperture attends only to the feigned landscape beyond the partition; such a giant figure is better set upon the curvature f r g. The lower drawing shows a nude man projected at monumental scale, with sight-lines converging from a small observer at the lower left up to lay out the enlargement against a faint landscape.
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A figure forty braccia tall shown in twenty braccia of space
Leonardo sets the problem of making an upright figure that reads as forty braccia high though it occupies only twenty, with limbs in proportion. He insists the flatness or curvature of the wall does not matter when the work is seen from a fixed window or aperture, because the eye attends only to the things shown beyond the partition in the feigned countryside. He concludes the figure would be better placed in the curvature f r g.
Monumental nude laid out by converging sight-lines
A standing nude man is drawn at giant scale within a boxed frame, one arm raised to a vertical staff and the other pointing. Construction lines fan out from a tiny figure at the lower left toward the body, showing how the enlargement is projected. Measured marks and letters accompany the lower portion of the frame.