The distinctive background view across to the peak in The Miraculous Draught of Fishes by (1444) is often cited as the first Western rural landscape to show a specific scene. The landscape studies by Dürer clearly represent actual scenes, which can be identified in many cases, and were at least partly made on the spot; the drawings by Fra Bartolomeo also seem clearly sketched from nature. Dürer’s finished works seem generally to use invented Australian Landscapes, although the spectacular bird’s-eye view in his Nemesis shows an actual view in the , with additional elements. Several landscapists are known to have made drawings and watercolour sketches from nature, but the evidence for early oil painting being done outside is limited. The made special efforts in this direction, but it was not until the introduction of ready-mixed oil paints in tubes in the 1870s, followed by the portable “box “, that painting became widely practiced.
