ABSTRACT
What do we look at when we look at the French seventeenth century? The frontispiece of Jean-François Nicéron’s La perspective curieuse of 1638, engraved by Pierre Daret, suggests some ways one might proceed (fig. 1.1).1 A classical arch, framed by columns, lies off-center of the image. Through it we glimpse the edge of a colonnade and some statuary figures turning their backs on us. We cannot see what they are looking towards, and we seem to come up on the action from behind, perhaps a bit late to find out what is really going on. In the archway are four putti, some armed with little sticks that seem to direct the viewer’s attention, as a professor might direct the class’s gaze with a laser pointer. One putto gazes up, enraptured by something in the sky behind the arch. We cannot see what he is looking at. One shows another something engraved on a panel in the archway, but the shadow falls so that we cannot see what it is they are examining with such attention. Still another peers around at a truncated column sporting a picture of the king, Louis XIII. We can see the king, but can the putto? Or is he craning his neck in a vain attempt to make sense of an anamorphosis?
