Depicting the human body: ideal and real
The body is the oldest subject in art. Artists must decide: show people as they are, or as they should be?
- Egyptian art: used a grid of fixed proportions. Heads in profile, eyes and shoulders from the front, a calm standing pose. This made figures clear and timeless.
- Classical Greece: a sculptor named Polykleitos worked out a canon (a rule of proportion) where the body is about 7 heads tall. Later sculptors used about 8 heads for a more heroic look. They also invented contrapposto: weight on one leg, hips and shoulders tilted, so a still body seems alive.
- Medieval art: bodies were often flat and symbolic, to show spiritual meaning rather than flesh.
- Renaissance: artists studied anatomy and perspective, so bodies were real and in space, while still idealised.
- Modern art: artists stretched, broke or simplified the body to show feeling, movement or ideas.
Counting heads tall (height ÷ head length) is a simple way to compare styles. Real adults are about 7 to 7.5 heads tall.
Portraiture: from rank to person
A portrait shows a particular person. But what it shows depends on the time.
- Rank first: early rulers were shown in profile with crowns or halos, calm and perfect. Many Mughal court portraits in India show emperors in profile, with a halo-like glow for royal majesty, though the faces were also carefully observed.
- Truth to the face: Roman busts of older citizens kept the wrinkles and warts, because a wise old face was a sign of experience. Painted mummy portraits from Roman Egypt show real-looking faces.
- Individual and place: in the Renaissance the head turned to three-quarter view, which feels more alive. Artists put people before a landscape or room and gave them a direct gaze.
- Later: group portraits, informal portraits and portraits of ordinary people grew, as new rich and middle-class customers could pay. In the 1800s photography took over many portraits and painters were freed to try new styles; Indian painters such as Raja Ravi Varma made realistic oil portraits.
Portraits can be idealised (kind to the sitter) or honest. Both are choices.
Symbols, setting and identity in a portrait
A portrait says more than "here is a face". Painters use attributes (objects with meaning) and setting to tell us who the sitter is.
- A crown or throne: power. A book or pen: scholar or writer. Tools: trade. A skull or fading flower: life is short.
- Clothes and jewels show wealth and status; dark simple clothes may show seriousness.
- Landscape or room shows land owned, home life or interests.
- Gaze and pose: a direct look can feel confident or friendly; a looking-away profile can feel distant or noble.
When you look at any portrait, ask the four Ps: Pose, Proportion, Props, Place. The answer shows what the artist and the sitter wanted us to think.
The changing image of the artist
The way people think of artists has changed.
- Anonymous craftsman: in many ancient and medieval workshops, makers were rarely named. Their work was a skill, like carpentry, and often done by teams in guilds or royal workshops.
- Named maker: Greek vase painters and some sculptors signed. In the Renaissance, writers such as Vasari wrote lives of artists. Painting was now an art of ideas and science (perspective, anatomy), not only manual work.
- Genius: by the 1500s and later, some artists were treated as special individuals. Dürer painted a frontal self-portrait with a very strong, almost holy presence, showing the artist as a creator.
- Self-portrait: an artist looks in a mirror and paints himself or herself. Rembrandt made dozens across his life, showing ageing honestly. Women artists such as Artemisia Gentileschi and Frida Kahlo used self-portraits to speak about their own lives.
- Modern view: the artist becomes a rebel, a thinker or a brand. Selfies and social media have made everyone a self-portrait maker.
Try it: draw two portraits of a friend
Draw your friend twice. First in the old style: side view, calm face, neat clothes, a symbol of rank (a crown made of paper!). Second in the new style: turned three-quarters, a real face with its small details, and a real place behind. Then draw yourself in a mirror. Compare: what does each picture say? Then try the 3D sliders and match your drawings.
Key formulas and definitions
- Heads tall = total height ÷ head length (real adults ≈ 7 to 7.5; Greek ideals ≈ 7 to 8)
- Head length for a figure of n heads: head = height ÷ n
- Four Ps to read a portrait: Pose, Proportion, Props, Place
- Ideal = how a person should be; realism (verism) = how the person really is
- Key terms: canon, contrapposto, profile, three-quarter view, attribute, verism, self-portrait
Worked examples
1. A statue is 176 cm tall and its head is 22 cm. How many heads tall is it? Is that more heroic or more real?
Heads tall = 176 ÷ 22 = 8. Real adults are about 7 to 7.5 heads tall, so the statue is longer-legged than real people. It is idealised, heroic.
2. A real man is 170 cm tall and his head is 23.5 cm long. How many heads tall is he?
170 ÷ 23.5 ≈ 7.2 heads. This is the natural proportion, so a realistic portrait would use about 7 heads.
3. You are drawing an ideal figure 8 heads tall, and the whole figure must be 40 cm on paper. How long is the head?
Head = 40 ÷ 8 = 5 cm.
4. A portrait shows a woman in a three-quarter view, a book in her hand and a river valley behind her. What can we say about the picture?
The three-quarter view and direct gaze give her a lively, individual feel. The book is an attribute that suggests she is educated or a scholar. The valley may show her home or land. So the picture presents a specific person with a character and a place.
5. Why did Roman sculptors of old citizens keep wrinkles and warts, while Greek sculptors of gods and athletes smoothed them away?
Greeks wanted ideal beauty and perfect bodies for gods and athletes. Romans of the republic valued age, experience and duty, so a lined face showed wisdom and character. Both are choices about what to praise.
6. How is a self-portrait different from a portrait of the artist made by someone else?
In a self-portrait, the artist chooses the pose, look, props and mirror view. It shows how the artist wants to be seen, and the artist is both the maker and the subject. A portrait by someone else shows the artist through another person's eyes.
Common mistakes
- Thinking all portraits show what a person looked like. Many portraits flatter the sitter or show rank and symbols first.
- Thinking Greek bodies were drawn from real measurements of one person. They followed a canon, an ideal rule.
- Thinking realism and idealism cannot mix. Renaissance artists studied real bodies and still improved them.
- Thinking artists were always famous individuals. In many cultures and times, makers were anonymous craftsmen.