The works of the late Professor Camper : on the connexion between the science of anatomy and the arts of drawing, painting, statuary &c. &c. ; containing a treatise on the natural difference of features in persons of different countries and periods of life, and on beauty, as exhibited in ancient sculpture ; with a new method of sketching heads, national features, and portraits of individuals, with accuracy, &c. &c.. / ...by T. Cogan.

  • Camper, Petrus, 1722-1789.
Date:
1821
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The works of the late Professor Camper : on the connexion between the science of anatomy and the arts of drawing, painting, statuary &c. &c. ; containing a treatise on the natural difference of features in persons of different countries and periods of life, and on beauty, as exhibited in ancient sculpture ; with a new method of sketching heads, national features, and portraits of individuals, with accuracy, &c. &c.. / ...by T. Cogan. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

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    “ is merely beautiful by its own beauty.” — How extras vagant! To return. I mud further remark, that the excellent prints from the works of Rafael, Pouffin, Titian, and Pietra Telia, pleafed me much better than the fineH pieces of Rubens or Van Dyck; in both of which, the divifions of Albert Durer, and the imperfections of his oval were very confpicuous. This is particularly the cafe in the painting of the Holy Vir- gin and Child, in the celebrated gallery at Dulfeldorp ; which is in every other refpeCt an excellent performance. By frequently modelling in clay, after the fined heads of antiquity, I learnt that Albert Durer, by looking at the object with both his eyes, had made them too broad ; and I alfo learnt that a painter, to excel, mud be a proficient in model- ling as well as in drawing. This will bed enable him to form a genuine idea of the real form of all objects. A knowledge of optics is alfo requifite; as has been fully proved in my Inaugural Diflertation In a feparate chapter, on the condituent beauty of forms, I fhall hereafter flrow how much depends upon avoiding a defective manner of viewing the object which is occafioned by the refraction of the rays of light. In order to fucceed, it is alfo necedary to attend to the excellent rule of Lyfip- ■ Publifhed in the year 1746. It treats of the conftruftion of the eye, and the nature of vifion.