15 / 198
14
A related facet of perspectival design involved a kind of natural magic in which wonder and
astonishment were the prime ends in view. Some of the perspective books in themselves cultivated
the “wow” factor, such De Vries’s elaborately confected scenes of buildings in perspective.*
39
In 17
th
century Holland we also encounter “perspective boxes”, optical peepshows which beguile us with a
precocious form of virtual reality – the most famous of which is the elaborately staged box of optical
tricks by Hoogstraten in the National Gallery, London. Perhaps the most wondrous of the effects were
created by anamorphosis, in which an image projected from an extremely shallow angle of view outside
one lateral edge of the picture plane was reconstituted into a naturalistic illusion when viewed from
the corresponding position.*
40
In 17
th
century Rome, Maignan and Niceron (whose copy of Dürer is in
the present collection) used the anamorphic technique to conjure up a visionary image of St. Francis of
Paola in a corridor in Sta Trinità dei Monti.*
41
The title of Niceron’s own learned and splendid treatise,
Curious Perspective or the Artificial Magic of Marvellous Effects, perfectly captures the spirit of the
enterprise*
42
. Generally with such extreme illusions, some of which involved cylindrical and conic
mirrors,*
43
entertainment rather than devotion was involved.
As expanded public access to visual entertainments developed in the later 18
th
and 19
th
centuries, we
encounter miniature pop-up theatres constructed from card, mirroring the optical delights of full-
scale scenery. Only a small proportion of them survive. The present collection contains a fine set of
Theatres d’Optique, together with a Polyrama Panoptique, which used light effects to enhance views
of Paris, and a Telorama tour of the Rhine. The “scientific” titles are designed to enhance the viewers
participation in a privileged “modern” experience.*
44
By the time we reach the 18
th
and early 19
th
centuries we find on one hand books of sober and technical
geometry, projective and descriptive (dealing with the nature of 3-D forms rather than their optical
appearance), which moved beyond the concerns and grasp of most painters, and were not designed for
visual appeal.*
45
The teaching of perspective at a technical level also persisted in military academies. On the
other hand we have publications of more affordable text-books, neatly illustrated and parading manageable
techniques. The more pedagogic of the books are aimed not least at the kind of well-bred amateurs who
*
39
243, 384, 389
*
40
223, 249-251
*
41
223
*
42
249-251
*
43
15-16, 364
*
44
289, 351-353, 354-355
*
45
159, 181, 204