The Theology of Perspective

Robert Good | a-n | 27th March 2022

Hockney – he of the sunny swimming pools – has a serious side. He argues that western painting is too influenced by ‘linear’ Renaissance perspective. Cameras and camera-devices are to blame (excellently explained here) and it matters because a single point view doesn’t reflect our actual visual experience. For starters, linear perspective puts the viewer outside a scene whereas two-eyed viewers experience a scene from within. The “one-camera view of the world” Hockney says “can’t show you that much.”