The Renaissance art movement began in Florence, Italy around 1400, and lasted until about 1550. The Renaissance was a European cultural movement that marked the end of the Middle Age, and it included a scientific way of examining human life on earth instead of relying exclusively on religion. Traditional Chinese visual art is markedly different from Italian Renaissance art because of its use of symbols and text as well as its treatment of perspective. Accurate use of geometric perspective gives visual art a lifelike, three-dimensional effect.
Find the Vanishing Point
Identify an object in both the Italian Renaissance art piece and the traditional Chinese visual art that has level, horizontal lines. Keep in mind that the horizontal lines will not appear exactly flat if the artwork uses geometric perspective.
Lay a sheet of tracing paper over each image, working with one at a time. Outline the level, horizontal lines you identified in each work.
Transfer the tracing paper to a larger piece of blank paper, and place the tracing paper near the right side of the sheet. Extend the level, horizontal lines you traced using a pencil and ruler. Draw each line's extension until the lines converge in a single point.
Examine the respective points where the lines converge on each artwork. This point of convergence is known as the vanishing point, and it is essential for producing visual art that appears three-dimensional and realistic. Traditional Chinese art from the same time period as the Italian Renaissance rarely shares the same treatment of perspective as European artwork. Instead of level lines that converge into a vanishing point, the viewer's gaze shifts focus and perspective when observing a piece of traditional Chinese art.
Identify the Lines of Perspective
Select an object at one side of the artwork. Position a ruler so it lines up with the horizontal lines of the object and draw an extension of that horizontal line across the image.
Repeat Step 1 with other peripheral objects on either side of the picture so that there are crisscrossing lines across the image.
Identify the horizon line. The horizon line is the horizontal line whose midpoint is where the lines of perspective you drew converge.
Compare the horizon lines on both the Italian Renaissance painting and the traditional Chinese artwork. Italian Renaissance painters such as Brunelleschi, Masaccio and della Francesca were early visual art innovators. Their unique use of perspective increases the viewer's empathy with the image, and makes looking at the painting a more immersive and realistic experience.
