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“
A remarkable collaboration between the scientific, printing and visual arts. Intended for use in Jesuit
schools, Aguilon’s work was primarily a synthesis of classical and modern writings on optics ; however, it
also contained the first discussion of the stereographic process (which Aguilon named), one of the earliest
presentations of the red-yellow-blue color system, an original theory of binocular vision and the first
published description of Aguilon’s horopter... His ideas had some influence on the great theories of vision
from Huygens to Newton to Helmholtz
” (Norman).
“
A master treatise on optics that synthesized the work of Euclid, Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen), Vitellion,
Roger Bacon, Pena, Ramus (Pierre de la Ramée), Risner, and Kepler... Aguilon treated, successively, the
eye, the object, and the nature of vision ; the optic ray and horopter ; the general ideas that make possible the
knowledge of objects ; errors in perception ; luminous and opaque bodies ; and projections
” (DSB).
“
A landmark of baroque book illustration, this is one of seven works known to have been illustrated by
Rubens
” (Becker).
Très bon exemplaire, complet, quelques feuillets brunis ; gardes modernes.
First edition of this 17
th
century optical treatise containing the first discussion of the stereographic
process. The work is also of particular interest for the collaboration between the theorist Aguilon and
the artist Peter Paul Rubens who designed the principal illustrations.