Optical Illusions: is That an Exhibition of Trompe l’œil Coming to Florence and Paris?
Fancy pitting your powers of perception against some of history’s masters of deception? Then here’s your chance. Art and Illusions: Masterpieces of Trompe l'œil from Antiquity to the Present Day, the first major exhibition on visual illusion to be held in Italy, is on at Florence’s Palazzo Strozzi until January 26.
Visual illusion has been used in art for thousands of years to trick and deceive us. This exhibition is designed to chart this fascinating story of ‘trompe l’œil’, or optical deception; the story of the tug-of-war between reality and its simulation. The show places optical illusion not only in the context of painting but also draws in the many other forms of art that have fooled and deceived us through the years, including furniture design, fashion design, and cuisine.
The genre is all about exploring new ways of experimenting with reality – imaginary windows that open out onto cityscapes; table tops that tempt us to pick up objects that aren’t really there – artistic flair that draws us in and catches us out. Other exhibits include faux armoirs, half-open, with books inside; wood intarsia of small Renaissance studios; soup tureens and table furnishings in the shape of vegetables; anatomical and botanical wax models.
Exhibition 'Breaks Out of the Formal Confines of Art'
Organisers have chosen Escaping Criticism, Pere Borrell del Caso’s 1874 canvas of a boy breaking out of the confines of a picture frame, to represent the exhibition. Trompe l’œil’, they say, breaks out of the formal confines of art in the same way as the boy is breaking free of the frame.
More than 150 works of art are on display, from Greco-Roman mosaics and frescoes to European masterpieces of the 1300s and more modern examples of illusionary design. The exhibition dedicates a significant amount of space to wall decorations and interiors, where detached frescoes from Ancient Rome take centre stage.
It was after all in Classical Antiquity that deception became an art form. As far back at the 1st century BC, artists were pushing ‘verisimilitude’ – how a falsehood could be closer to the truth than it is to other falsehoods – to the point of illusion. After a break during the Middle Ages, it was reborn in early Renaissance Italy and in Flanders in the 15th century, and became a form of experimental art into the 20th and 21st centuries.
The exhibition is divided into 10 sections comprising works of different periods which either share a common theme or are akin to one another in type. It opens with a section entitled 'In the Footsteps of Zeuxis and Parrhasius'. It's inspired by a story told by Pliny the Elder in the 1st century CE. It's about a competition between Zeuxis, a Greek painter born around 464 BC, and Parrhasius, his contemporary. It is said that the pair held a contest to decide which of them was the better painter. So life-like was Zeuxis’ painting of grapes that birds flew in to nibble on them. When Zeuxis asked Parrhasius to pull back his curtain and revel his work of art, Parrhasius was able to inform his friend that there was no curtain – the painting was of a curtain. Zeuxis is quoted as saying: “I have deceived the birds, but Parrhasius has deceived Zeuxis.”
So life-like was Zeuxis’ depiction of grapes that birds flew in to nibble on them.
But it’s not only the Greeks who are left perplexed in this exhibition. While viewing masterpieces by Titian, Velázquez, Mantegna, Tiepolo, Tintoretto, Turrell and Pistoletto, visitors find themselves deceived by picture-frame doors and false floors designed to foster a sense of disorientation, turning the visit into an interactive experience. These are the work of Florentine architect Luigi Cupellini, who designed the exhibition layout to ensure the trompe l’œil theme was consistent throughout. His design has resulted in visitors getting to taste, touch, hear, smell and fully engage with the exhibition, challenging their perceptions of reality to the max. The aim is to allow visitors to probe the many ways in which the human brain can be deceived, and the pleasure a person feels when they find themselves involved in clever deception.
Art and Illusions closes in Florence on January 26; it will open at the Musée du Luxembourg in Paris from February 17, and run until August 1.
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