City Lights, City Life

By the Mid 15^th Century any artist who failed to demonstrate competence with the new illusion-geometry of linear perspective found themselves without commissions.  In 1450 the middle aged and popular Piero Della Francesco relied on linear perspective to build persuasive urban contexts for his narratives.  He was a pioneer with Masaccio using this tool.  Previously, others had tried to build cityscapes but without the use of linear perspective their cities were unconvincing.  Busy with commissions requiring architecture constructed from linear perspective, Pinturicchio enjoyed success in the last half of the 1400s (see example from 1486).  The system enjoyed even more persuasive effects in the 17^th through 19^th centuries as artists from Vermeer to Canaletto used tools like the Camera Obscura to support their linear perspective designs.

An 18^th century contemporary of Canaletto, Francesco Guardi, relied on linear perspective as he built his scenes celebrating Venetian life.  First he sketched in smaller scale drawings then, he worked them into larger works.  Example 2 provides us with his image of the Venetian piazza before the Scuola di San Marco with the Pope giving a blessing.  Elaborate staging was built before the Scuola for the event.  A century later John Singer Sargent (as well as many other artists from London and Paris) arrived to apply a more relaxed and spontaneous response to the same bridge and Piazza. Compare the watercolor of Sargent’s (example 3) with Guardi.  Both paint the city but with different methods and intentions.

Example 1. Pinturicchio, 1486.

Example 2. Francesco Guardi  paints the Scuola di San Marco.

Example 3. John Singer Sargent paints the Scuola di San Marco.

Following the rich history of cityscapes that explored variations of the Italian piazza/plaza, my next examples experiment with New York City and its dynamic sense of movement. Its feeling of motion anchors to the organizing principles of linear perspective.  Example 4 presents pedestrians crossing into the sunlight as it generates coronas and long shadows.  One of those figures was modeled by my wife, Rebecca.

The painting refers to art of the early 15^th century when Leon Alberti describes the principles of linear perspective in Della Pittura in Florence, Italy.  Immediately artists like Raphael and Pinturicchio apply these principles to painting piazzas with convincing depth.  Located in a contemporary city crosswalk, pedestrians walk into the light. Their shadows create vectors pulling us into a luminous distance.  The attraction to light is universal in diurnal creatures like us.  It is a foundation of our theology and art across time and cultures.

Example 4.  Sunlight On Madison, 24×36.

The next examples (examples 5 and 6) rely more heavily on linear perspective for structuring the feeling of space as the architectural information moves further toward abstraction.

Example 5.  Crossing Midtown, 36×36 oil on linen.

Example 6, Race Across Town, 30×30 on aluminum.