Drawing Perspective - Why People Seem to Hate it

The amazing thing about perspective is that we live with it every day. Our brains neatly sort out images supplied by our eyes and put things into a sensible, logical and acceptable order for us all the time. Most of us never even question what we are looking at. Thing that are further away seem smaller, maybe fainter in color, perhaps a different shape compared with the same object perceived from another position, but why would that concern us? We don't really need to think about it because it's all done automatically to give us the change to go through life with some perceptions of reality and to stop ourselves bumping into things.

If you are reading this then you must already have an interest in perspective. Although you are not necessarily an artist, I'm presuming that you would like to think a little more about what you are seeing. Who knows? Even though you have never felt inclined to sketch before, perhaps you will want to have a go is you feel you have the knowledge you need to do so.

Perspective is the key to successful drawing and painting, yet it is a subject that many people find daunting. Why? The first problem with perspective is the word itself. It sounds so spiky! Doesn't it sound like 'prickly', 'strict', 'respect', 'correct'? All the things that gentle and sensitive artistic types absolutely hate. The dictionary definition of perspective makes frightening reading. I'm sure that any gentle minded person would run a mile is they thought they were supposed to comprehend its meaning. Try this, for example: "Perspective: The art of delineating solid objects upon a plan surface so that the drawing produces the same impression of apparent relative positions and magnitudes, or of distance, as do the actual objects when viewed from a particular point."

We really need a simpler definition. We like things that are comfortable, peaceful and intuitive, and are likely to switch off our minds completely if something looks as though it's going to involve a lot of straight lines, discipline and, worst of all, maths!