For more than half a century, Erwin Panofsky's
Perspective as Symbolic Form has dominated studies of
visual representation. Despite the hegemony of central
projection, or perspective, other equally important
methods of representation have much to tell us. Parallel
projection can be found on classical Greek vases, in
Pompeiian frescoes, in Byzantine mosaics; it returned in
works of the historical avant-garde, and remains the
dominant form of representation in China. In Oblique
Drawing, Massimo Scolari investigates "anti-perspective"
visual representation over two thousand years, finding
in the course of his investigation that visual and
conceptual representations are manifestations of the
ideological and philosophical orientations of different
cultures. Images prove to be not just a form of art but
a form of thought, a projection of a way of life.
Scolari's generously illustrated studies show that
illusionistic perspective is not the only, or even the
best, representation of objects in history; parallel
projection, for example, preserves in scale the actual
measurements of objects it represents, avoiding the
distortions of one-point perspective. Scolari analyzes
the use of nonperspectival representations in
pre-Renaissance images of machines and military
hardware, architectural models and drawings, and
illustrations of geometrical solids. He challenges
Panofsky's theory of Pompeiian perspective and explains
the difficulties encountered by the Chinese when they
viewed Jesuit missionaries' perspectival religious
images. Scolari vividly demonstrates the diversity of
representational forms devised through the centuries,
and shows how each one reveals something that is lacking
in the others.
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