JF Ptak Science Books LLC  Addition to Post #88

I’ve
found another extraordinary image that would fit just perfectly in an an
earlier post, Missing People—Pelerin, Schoen and Marey and Picturing Absent and
Empty People for the Study of Perspective.

This
wood engraving comes from the Flemish Joachim Sterck van Ringelberg’s (1499-1536
or so) book Lucubrations, printed in Basel in 1541 Ringelberg was one of those famous wandering
scholars from the first half of the 15th century, and the book was no doubt constructed for the use of his pupils. This is one of about 30 books that Ringelberg
wrote–he intended to wrtie a thousand, but times being what they were, and
living to only 37 or so, he fell short of the mark. He did produce quite a lot
though given his youth, the hardship of travel, access to published works, and
tools, and general annoyances of the 16th century traveler who was not a
royal. It is really quite
remarkable. Ringelberg taught a wide
range of subjects belying his quest for M books–he was competent in astronomy,
mathematics, literature, classics (of course) , and languages.

This “missing people” image comes from a section of this book dealing
with perspective. I’m just endlessly
entertained trying to get inside the head of a 16th century student seeing
these empty, missing, place-holder human forms for the very first time. As I’ve said earlier, these figures just
don’t occur in Western art.