Foxtrot and representation

[Foxtrot, November 3, 2002. Click for a larger view.]

I just found a print copy of this Foxtrot strip in a box of odds and ends. The joke reminds me of Alain’s 1955 New Yorker cartoon of an Egyptian life class: there too the idea of codes or conventions of representation gets turned on its head, with artists depicting reality as it really is. I must have clipped this Foxtrot to use in teaching.

The little window on the fourth apple is a near-lucaflect. If it were a four-pane window, Paige’s drawing would really, really look like a photograph.

[Bill Amend’s fair-use policy is a model of generosity and sanity: “For non-commercial websites, I’m generally okay with people reposting a strip now and then, so long as you include a link back to foxtrot.com.” This strip is available online. Alain’s cartoon is the opening exhibit in Ernst Gombrich’s Art and Illusion (1960).]