Greenville County

Psychiatrist Andrew Marlowe, devoted to his profession and the painting hobby he loves, has a solitary but ordered life. When renowned painter Robert Oliver attacks a canvas in the National Gallery of Art and becomes his patient, Marlow finds that order destroyed. Desperate to understand the secret that torments the genius, he embarks on a journey that leads him into the lives of the women closest to Oliver and a tragedy at the heart of French Impressionism....

"Artists are expert lookers: they have learned to pay attention. The rest of us spend most of our time on auto-pilot, rushing from place to place, our overfamiliarity blinding us to the marvellous, life-affirming phenomena of our world. But that doesn't have to be the case. In his inimitable engaging style, Will Gompertz takes us into the minds of artists--from contemporary stars to old masters, the well-known to the lesser-so, and from around the...

Within each time period, provides examples of significant works in painting, sculpture, drawing and other media. Highlights themes that were important at various times such as nudes, landscape, still life, and love. Includes brief biographies of some artists and a "closer look" in depth for the most significant works.

An introduction to the history of art from ancient times to the beginning of the twenty-first century with Internet links.

Uses the subjects of well-known paintings to introduce the numbers from one to twenty.

Unlocking the human stories behind millennia of art, the eminent curator, taking us from ancient Babylon to contemporary Pyongyang, explains art's power to illuminate our lives and reveals how great art resonates powerfully by transcending the boundaries of time.