They dramatically illustrate a point that you can observe more subtly in almost any group of buildings or structures: Things settle a bit and get out of alignment over time. Or they weren’t built perfectly in the first place, especially before the laser-beam era. When it comes to drawing a row of buildings, it is usually preferable to give them a little wobble. To do that, you can construct a whole set of slightly varying vanishing points.
When it's done very subtly, it gives architectural forms a certain naturalness and believability that beats the kind of cold rendering that comes from aligning an entire parallel facade with a single vanishing point.
(And yes! We saw the machines...more on that in a future post.)
9 comments:
My French is a little rusty, so after looking at some of the photos from the Île de Nantes I looked at the Nantes article on the English side of Wikipedia instead.
I loved this line from the article about Nantes after being repeatedly sacked and then laid to waste by the Normans in 843:
"The city of Nantes remained for many years deserted, devastated and overgrown with briars and thorns."
Now tell me that doesn't conjure some fun images?
Nantes article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nantes
Jim - how can those buildings be safe? And can you imagine trying to bake a cake in one of those buildings? It would be all lopsided!
Sorry if I make some mistakes, I'm not fluent in English...
I was born in Nantes, and I know very well the "Ile Feydeau". Most of these buildings have been renovated and are straight indoors. But I agree that it's quite impressive ! :)
Reminds me of the appartement in Paris where I lived for two months this spring. The floor was practically a slope. Not a single right angle in there.
I agree; little imperfections, subtly as you say, are a source of naturalness and hence of great beauty!
It was a pleasure to listen to your conference at the Utopiales, and I was very impressed to see your paintings for real!
And then I live in the black building on the picture, it's worst inside :D! There're no walls or windows at right angles, but Mary don't worry it hasn't move since 2 centuries and I can bake cakes like everyone else ^^!
And Mr Gurney, thank you for your beautiful work!
Thank you, Denis! That is amazing to hear from someone living in those houses. It must give you a different sense of gravity and balance.
Yes! The first weeks were strange. Inside the living-room, it's just like if there were a big windstorm and now everything's tilting to the left!
Sometimes, when you look at the unparallel racks, you feel like you're drunk :D! But it's funny, if you put an apple on the floor, it rolls to the other side of the flat... Might your pencils not fall down :D!
I had a Brooklyn poster project for my Illustration class a few weeks ago, and I naively designed the buildings to be out of alignment with each other. When you're walking around a city, the tall buildings around you feel like a jumble, so that is what I drew. They aren't like walls, more like a forest of tree trunks, and of course trees do not grow in perfect parallel. However, I was less than subtle with my buildings...
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