<P> De pictura ( English : `` On Painting '' ) is a treatise written by the Italian architect and art theorist Leon Battista Alberti . The first version , written in vernacular Italian in 1435 under the title Della pittura , was for a general audience . The Latin version , the De pictura of 1439 -- 41 , was more technical and intended for scholars . The work is the first in a trilogy of treatises on the `` Major arts '' which had a widespread circulation during the Renaissance , the others being De re aedificatoria ( `` On Architecture '' , 1454 ) and De statua ( `` On Sculpture '' , 1462 ) . </P>
published a treatise on perspective della pitture ( or on painting ) in 1435
Italian architect and art theorist Leon Battista Alberti