Now a picture should look right from whatever distance we
view it, even across the room or gallery, and of course in decorative work and in scene-painting a long distance is necessary.
We need not, however, tie ourselves down to any hard and fast rule, but should choose our distance according to the impression of space we wish to convey: if we have to represent a domestic scene in a small room, as in many Dutch pictures, we must not make our distance-point too far off, as it would exaggerate the size of the room.
Fig. 16. Cattle. By Paul Potter.
The height of the horizon is also an important consideration in the composition of a picture, and so also is the position of the point of sight, as we shall see farther on.
In landscape and cattle pictures a low horizon often gives space and air, as in this sketch from a picture by Paul Potter—where the horizontal-line is placed at one quarter the height of the canvas. Indeed, a judicious use of the laws of perspective is a great aid to composition, and no picture ever looks right unless these laws are attended to. At the present time too little attention is paid to them; the consequence is that much of the art of the day reflects in a great measure the monotony of the snap-shot camera, with its everyday and wearisome commonplace.