Artists throughout the history of art have used different techniques to created the illusion of space or depth on the flat surface of paper, canvas, wood,etc. Let us take a look at these selected works of art for us to compare which techniques the artists' are using to convince us, the viewer, of distance within the landscape.
Landscape with Cornfields, Salomon van Ruysdael, 1638, From the collection of: Hallwyl Museum
Placement of horizon line is located in the lower half of the landscape.
Sunny Day, Seiki Kuroda, 1897/1897, From the collection of: Aichi Prefectural Museum of Art
Placement of horizon line is in the top half of this landscape. The artist draws your attention to that area of landscape with the placement of buildings.
The Parthenon from the Northwest, Lusieri Giovanni Battista, 1802, From the collection of: Benaki Museum of Greek Civilization
The building in this landscape is placed in the foreground and overlaps the horizon line in the lower half of the painting. The building's vertical columns overlap each other to create depth also.
Undergrowth with Two Figures, Vincent van Gogh (Dutch, b.1853, d.1890), 1890, From the collection of: Cincinnati Art Museum
This artist also uses vertical shapes, trees, that create a repeating pattern that becomes less detailed as it draws our eyes from the foreground to the background of the landscape to create depth.
Woodland Glade, William Trost Richards, 1860, From the collection of: Amon Carter Museum of American Art
This artist is using a combination of flowing vertical,horizontal, and diagonal shapes and curved lines to direct our eyes to the horizon line in the center of landscape.
Balcony Room with a View of the Bay of Naples, Carl Gustav Carus, around 1829/1830, From the collection of: Alte Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin
This artist uses the idea of being in an enclosed area like the painting but geometric shapes and perspective is used to bring our attention from the foreground to the horizon where the sunlight is.
View of the Grand Canal, Giovanni Antonio Canal, called Canaletto, Late 1720s, From the collection of: Birmingham Museum of Art
The artist uses linear perspective to lead our eyes to the horizon line. This technique creates the geometric shape for the body of water to help move our eyes from the foreground to the background.
Spring frost, Elioth Gruner, 1919, From the collection of: Art Gallery of New South Wales
This artist uses perspective too with the dark shadows in the foreground that represent the of placement of fence and cows. These linear shadows move our eyes into the background of the painting.
Looking Down Yosemite Valley, California, Albert Bierstadt, 1865, From the collection of: Birmingham Museum of Art
Our sense of depth begins with the lighter colors that represent sunlight in the background. Our eyes begins to move towards the foreground as the sunlight fades as objects begin to appear larger.
Rhyl Sands, David Cox, 1854 - 1855, From the collection of: Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery
This artist is captures our attention with the sunlight falling on the people in the foreground who we clearly can see. we are drawn back to the horizon line as shapes become less detailed and smaller
Credits: All media
This user gallery has been created by an independent third party and may not represent the views of the institutions whose collections include the featured works or of Google Arts & Culture.
