The ways in which artists and their audiences view art have drastically evolved since ancient times. They have been impacted by the constantly changing time periods and the different cultures of each of those periods. In Chapter 3 of Looking at Art, Alice Elizabeth Chase discusses how these perspectives, specifically those of landscapes, have evolved among artists from ancient times to the modern era. Chase starts off by saying that in ancient times, artists focused on capturing only the most basic, two-dimensional features of a landscape. For instance, an Ancient Egyptian artist would only capture the important details of a lake in his painting, as if he was drawing a map. His strokes would be in proportion to the real-life sizes of the subjects of his work, but they’d lack any kind of 3D form. As time gradually progressed, according to Chase, artists tried to put a personal purpose into their depiction of landscapes. Wealthy Romans, for example, adorned their halls with banners that depicted the lands they conquered and their courtyards with paintings that told stories about nature. Similarly, Chinese artists painted landscapes in order to show their reverence of God.

Another transition in the artistic perspective of landscape occured in the Medieval era. By this time, many artists started viewing landscapes as merely backgrounds for their works, while people, words, and tangible objects became the central subjects. For instance, in 15th century Italy, artists used landscapes as backgrounds for illuminated manuscripts. Attention to detail had drastically improved by this time, but in works such as illuminated manuscripts, the main focus was on intricate lettering or drawings of people, not on the landscape background. However, Chase then says that by the 17th century, artists started concentrating on the life around them, bringing the attention back to landscapes. Dutch artists, in particular, tried to signify the shadows and different tones of light in their paintings of landscapes. By this time, people felt the need to emphasize the real-life quality of artwork, which is why artists paid attention to the color and atmosphere of their objects in a landscape.

Now that this shift towards maintaining real-life qualities in art had occurred, Chase exclaims that by the 19th century, artists were able to combine their knowledge of color, light, and air with the understanding of their own emotions and feelings. This gave rise to a new brand of landscape art. For example, Vincent van Gogh’s “Starry Night” is his way to express the idea that forces are constantly in motion on Earth, as seen by the various whirling colors in his sky and the unique shapes of his buildings. By the end of this chapter, Chase succeeds in proving that the perspectives of landscapes have substantially progressed over time. Depicting landscapes has transformed from Ancient Egyptian artists drawing simple, 2D features to the elaborate work of the modern era, in which artists have combined 3D, color, light, atmosphere, and their own emotions and ideas to create magnificent landscapes.

Moving on, in Chapter 4, Chase describes how the representation of space has evolved over time. We start off, once again, in the time of the Ancient Egyptians, who had little to no understanding of space. As seen on their wall paintings and hieroglyphs, Egyptian artists drew almost all people figures in side profiles. They had no understanding of direction or space, for shoulders would usually be front view while the legs side view. Heads would appear abnormally big and wouldn’t even have full bodies attached to them. But as we go later in time to the 5th century BCE, Chase credits Greeks of being the first ones to start using light and shade in their modeling of space. Pots depicting myths such as those of Athena and Hercules showed characters as having actual dimensions, instead of just profiles.

Another concept that evolved over time is that of perspective. Before the Middle Ages, artists stuck to drawing things as they saw, but they couldn’t comprehend the phenomenon of perspective. Chase says that it was not until the Middle Ages that artists started to understand ideas like the vanishing point perspective. By the 15th century, artists began to explore sizes and shapes of objects in their art as they appeared in real life. Italian artists like Paolo Uccello, for instance, painted interiors of rooms by incorporating foreshortening and the vanishing point perspective. Due to such advancements, by the 17th century, artists were able to bring the mastery of perspective to architecture, creating actual 3D figures in space. This gave rise to famous ceilings in the churches of Rome and other forms of architecture that we still use today.

In addition, Chase introduces the isometric perspective used by the Chinese and Japanese. Contrary to the vanishing point, in this form of perspective, parallel lines do not eventually meet at a point, but continue to be parallel. The Japanese, in particular, also tended not to use shadow or foreshortening in their artwork. Chase uses this example to prove that although different schools of art and cultures have various understandings of perspective, there isn’t exactly the “right” one. Each of these perspectives contributes to making pieces of art more enigmatic and notable, for all them have the same purpose: to capture the attention of the viewer.