Annotation Plan
- Group: Wenrui Zhao (just me)
- Annotation description: I came across some recipes in the manuscript mentioning the use of compass for drawing figures, straight lines or perspectives, which I find quite interesting. There seemed to be a very ambivalent attitude towards the use of compass – on the one hand, one needs it to draw circle/straight line. On the other hand, a “true artist” would not use compass. The manuscript also mentions the coordination between the hand and the eyes when using the compass, saying “The ruler and compass without discernment of the eye will cause errors”. Michelangelo also said one needed to have the compass in the eyes not in the hand. This also reminds me of Vasari’s account of Giotto drawing the perfect circle without a compass – but what Giotto did was making his body as a compass, and used his bodily gestures to create a perfect circle. Moreover, it seems to me that renaissance self-portraits of artists rarely show them with compass, more with brushes/pigments. While the natural philosophers/scientists tend to be portrayed with compass.
So I am interested in 1) how compass was really used in renaissance art practice (it seems we take it for granted the function of compass, but a compass can serve multiple ends in creating an art work); 2) How is compass conceptualized – is it an artistic tool or scientific tool? How does the conceptualization of compass instill meanings in renaissance drawings and paintings? 3) the early modern idea concerning the relationship between eye and hand, body and tool – may also associate with the intellectual aspiration of drawings (disegno)?
3. Recipes:
p019v_1
Mathematic figures without a ruler or compass
you know how to draw a circle with a quill and otherwise with your right thumb nail and your folded big finger if you don’t have any ruler, fold a <m>paper</m> sheet in five or six folds to use it. And if you want to draw a column, arch, oval, cartouche correctly without a compass, fold your <m>paper</m> so the fold is a straight line from which you draw within the relevant distance a point or a line and fill it with some <m>ink</m>. Then fold again the <m>paper</m> and rub it on its reverse and it will stamp whatever you have made. In that way, A is the line without <m>ink</m> made by the <m>paper</m> fold, B is the line you have drawn, C is the stamped one.</ab>
062v
<head>Portraits</head>
<ab>To become an artist, it is necessary to draw by eye, without compass or ruler. Masters do not allow apprentices to use them.</ab>
<id>p062v_2</id>
<head>Perspective<head>
<ab>In order to tell where the <sup>vanishing</sup> point is one must lay a ruler over the lines, and the point will be where the lines meet. Some make a hole at the end of their rulers in order to fix the point by that hole while moving the ruler about. Others lay a ruler across the panel,, then on this ruler they place the tip of another ruler which, being attached to the former by a screw, will move about and reach as far as necessary without losing the point. The ruler and compass without discernment of the eye will cause errors. Perspective is very difficult.</ab>
<figure/>
<note>
<margin>left-middle</margin>
To paint a perspective in oil, you should not use a ruler, for you would smudge everything. Instead, in applying your colors you must keep and follow the lines of your first drawing.</note>
</div>
p064r
Eyes
An eye must always follow the circle of the compass and not be flat or square.</note>
p064v_4</id>
<head>Straight lines</head>
<ab>You can use the ruler, but do not lay it flat on the painting, but somewhat lifted and resting on the edges of the panel. Otherwise you would smudge everything, and also you would not see the strokes well.</ab>
4. Plan: 1) Recreate the ways to draw perspective and figures from the recipes in the manuscript. 2) Textual research – mentions of compass/rulers/artistic tools in early modern recipes; 3) object based research – look at portraits of scientists and artists; also drawings that might have been created with the help of compass
5. Materials I need: I guess just a compass and papers.
6. Safety Protocol: I don’t think it applies in my case.