The Squared Net: Drawing the Nude in a Good Pose
A threaded frame with a wax sight aligned to the throat-pit to transfer the figure to paper
The chapter teaches a drawing device for learning correct poses: a frame or stretcher squared inside with threads, set between the eye and the nude, with the same grid drawn on the paper. A ball of wax fixed on the net serves as a sight, kept aligned with the pit of the throat (or a vertebra when the figure turns away), so that every limb can be located by the squares and transverse lines. Leonardo gives exact dimensions for the net (three and a half braccia high, three wide, seven from the artist, one from the model). The page closes with the heading of the next chapter and carries no diagram.
On this page
The threaded net and its measurements (chap. 97)
Fix a squared frame of threads between the eye and the nude, and draw the same squares on the paper. Everything the nude occupies within the net is reproduced in the corresponding square of the drawn net; the drawn squares may be as much smaller as the figure is to be smaller than life. The net should be three and a half braccia high, three wide, seven braccia from the artist and one from the model.
Sighting the throat-pit to fix the limbs
A wax ball on the net serves as a sight, kept aligned with the pit of the throat, or with a neck-vertebra when the figure faces away. The threads then teach which parts of the body fall beneath the throat-pit, the shoulder-angles, breasts and hips, while the transverse lines show how much higher the figure rises on one leg than the other.