How Did Painters Create the Illusion of Depth Without Photography?

Imagine you are looking at a road that goes off into the distance. The lines on either side of the road get closer and closer together as they go further away, this is how painters used linear perspective to make flat pictures look like real places. By drawing things smaller as they move farther back, it tricks your eyes into seeing depth.

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Examples

  1. A painter draws a road where the sides get closer together as they go further away
  2. A picture of a hallway with lines converging at one point in the distance
  3. A scene where buildings shrink as they move back into the background

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