How to create the illusion of recession

Making a piece of art is a magical process because in essence you are taking a threedimensional form with bulk, weight and scale in conjunction with depth of field and creating an illusion of this on a flat piece of paper. It is the ultimate challenge, but it is so rewarding when you are happy with the results. A street scene, a landscape, a still life and a portrait will all have areas of the subject that are closer to the viewer and others that are in recession.

Recession

In a landscape one of the biggest challenges is to avoid the finished work looking flat. The basic issues I tackle are recession, proportion and light. With recession, tone moves towards blue/ grey with the influence of air, light and atmosphere falling on the surface of the landscape. By that I