On Painting (Revised)

"For a thoughtful approach to the aesthetic and the attitudes of the art of the Renaissance as it emerged, Alberti's On Painting is clearly the one most valuable source book."--Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism

Alberti's Della Pittura was the first modern analytical study of painting, a pioneering treatise on the theory of art. A systematic description of the one-point perspective construction, it was primarily designed to persuade both patron and painter in the Renaissance to discard the old tastes in painting for the new. John R. Spencer's translation of Della Pittura is based on all the known manuscripts and is edited with an Introduction and Notes.