Anamorphosis According to Timothy and Stephen Quay

Joanna Spalińska-Mazur

Abstract

In their film De Anamorphosis or Artificiali Perspectiva (1991) brothers Quay present, using striking examples, how anamorphic technique is used in European paintings. The intention of the filmmakers is to remind us of the concept of anamorphosis that was created by European painters. The Quay brothers highlight the idea of painters from the 16^th and 17^th century, for whom anamorphosis was the true way of representing vision. It is not the first time when Quay brothers used the technique for their animation work. They used it before in 1990 in Comb (from the Museums of Sleep), where an attentive viewer may recognise the influence of anamorphic art (e.g. in Emmanuel Maignan’s fresco) and the use of anamorphic technique, which nonetheless differs slightly from its use in paintings. The title comb becomes an object of changing proportions, depending on the point of view. Timothy and Stephen Quay argue that it is the point from which we observe that shapes what we see. The image is not created by the perspective, but it is the image that suggests the perspective of looking.