Poore's line drawing in two parts. Left: two tall uprights rise from a frame, with a tiny slice of landscape low between them, labeled 'The Picture'. Right: lines fan out from a frame to take in 'The Vision', a wide view of sky, clouds, hills and a winding river or path.

History · Foundations

Alberti's Window

In 1435 Leon Battista Alberti wrote that a painting works like an open window onto its subject.

He made composition one of the painter's three tasks: fitting the parts into one picture. Poore's drawing shows a related idea: the frame as a cut from the whole field of view.

  • To copy a view, Alberti advised looking through a thin veil divided by threads into squares.
  • Raphael ruled the Garvagh Madonna into four equal parts; the center line became the Virgin's axis (National Gallery, London).

Image: Project Gutenberg · Public domain

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