In the man-made landscape of the Innsbruck cyclorama


Is it natural or man-made? Landscape completes the panoramic illusion.

Man-made landscape between the observer and the painting makes the impression of reality in the panorama complete. In certain places, it's hard to tell what's three dimensional and what's two dimensional. In his memoirs, Zeno Diemer illustrates the effect his false foreground had on visitors with this anecdote: On the day the painting was opened to the public, an old farmer jumped over the railing to put out the campfire he thought was real. "The well-meaning hero," Diemer recounts, "broke through the boards and narrowly escaped plunging to the earth."