Blind man draws using diminution in three dimensions

Abstract

Can the principle of convergence in three spatial dimensions be reflected in drawings by the congenitally blind? A man who had been totally blind since birth was asked to draw scenes such as a tabletop with three cubes receding to the observer's left side. He used converging lines to show the tops of the cubes receding in depth. He drew the cubes to the left smaller than the cube in front of the observer. He drew faces of cubes to the left with tilted lines, pointing to below the front face of the cube in front The result approximates three-point perspective. We note that the directions of objects from a vantage point in touch converge much as they do in vision. Copyright 2006 Psychonomic Society, Inc.