ABSTRACT
No one sees it coming. We behold a stage bisected by train tracks that run straight toward the back wall. As we look into the distance where the tracks seem to meet, we presume we see a painted backdrop of a central vanishing point perspective. (In fact, we are wrong. Real tracks disappear down an actual four-mile corridor visible through the missing back wall of the theatre. The meeting of tracks is an illusion of convergence caused by distance—not, as we believe, an illusion of distance caused by convergence.)
