Chapter 7: One-Point Perspective—Eye Level and the Vanishing Point
From my Upcoming Book, "Energize Your Art"
One point perspective is a spectacular art technique that is relatively easy to use once you understand how it works. It is essential for drawing interiors, urban landscapes, and still lifes, as well as any man-made object, such as streets, buildings, furniture, vases, boxes, and tubes. One of the most famous examples of this technique is Leonardo da Vinci's painting, The Last Supper.
To create one point perspective, an artist draws parallel lines of man-made objects, such as walls and furniture, so that they appear to converge at a single point on the horizon line. This point is called the vanishing point and is typically located at the artist's eye level.
In The Last Supper, da Vinci used Jesus's head as the center of the vanishing point, giving him prominence as all the parallel lines converge towards him. I marked the horizon line in the painting with a blue horizontal line at the artist's eye level, while the gold lines represent the one point perspective, where the parallel features of the rectangular room converge.
Understanding an artist's eye level is crucial to creating perspective drawings. The eye level refers to the height of the artist's eyes and the imaginary horizontal plane on that level. The eye level is constant and remains straight across at the height of the artist's eyes, regardless of whether they look up or down. The rule of thumb is to mark the eye level where the artist looks straight across at something.
While da Vinci horizontally centered the vanishing point in The Last Supper, in other artworks the vanishing point can be anywhere along the eye level horizontal line. For instance, in Edvard Munch's painting Girls on a Bridge, the vanishing point is off to the right side. It's worth noting that in this painting, we see the girls from slightly above, indicating that Munch was likely painting them from a platform or an elevated bank, and his eye level would be somewhere above the girls' heads. Although not as precise as da Vinci, Munch effectively used one point perspective in this painting to create a sense of depth and distance.
In conclusion, one point perspective is a powerful and essential technique for creating the illusion of depth and distance in art. By understanding the concept of the vanishing point and the importance of an artist's eye level, you can use this technique to draw believable interiors, urban landscapes, and still lifes. Mastering one point perspective will greatly enhance your drawings and paintings, and it will make drawing urban settings much easier, more dramatic, and more rewarding.
Energize Your Art will be available sometime this Summer. The concept behind the book is that any one of the tutorials is guaranteed to enliven your art work.