Seeing Reality in Perspective: The “Art of Optics” and the “Science of Painting”

This chapter examines the adaptive assimilation and innovative conceptual prolongations with practical applications of the classical Greek–Arabic science of optics Optics in Renaissance perspectival pictorial arts Pictorial arts , as mediated by European mediaeval optical theories and experimentations. This line of inquiry gives a historical account of the epistemic bearings of the connections and distinctions between the exact sciences and the visual arts, with an emphasis on the role of classical optics Optics in the art of painting Painting , and the function of pictorial art in pre-modern natural sciences. A special focus will be set on examining the optical and geometrical legacy of the eleventh century Arab polymath, al-Hasan ibn al-Haytham Alhazen—seeIbn al-Haytham (known in Latinate renditions of his name as “Alhazen Ibn al-Haytham ” or “Alhacen”; d. after 1041 CE). This investigation considers the fundamental elements of his theories of vision, light Light , and space in the context of his studies in optics Optics and geometry Geometry , while taking into account his use of experimentation and controlled testing as a method of demonstration and proof. This course of analysis will be furthermore linked to the adaptation of Ibn al-Haytham Ibn al-Haytham’s research within the thirteenth century Franciscan optical workshops, while scrutinizing the impress that his transmitted texts had on Renaissance perspectival representation of spatial depth and its entailed organization of architectural locales and spaces.