The Secrets of Painting

An engaging history of painting as told through the eyes and hands-on insights of a practicing artist.

When looking at a work of art, the first question that painter Lachlan Goudie considers is not why but how was it created?

Goudie knows from experience that masterpieces don’t simply emerge from an artist's studio. They are the result of a long tussle between dirty hands and crushed pigment, hog's-hair brushes and linseed oil, rabbit-­skin glue and pulverized chalk. Great paintings are the product of a struggle involving artists and their materials, one that pushes the practitioner to the very limits of technical ability.

Above all else, the secrets of painting lie in the physical elements from which an image is crafted. The nature of these elements has changed over time and across continents. And as each generation of painters exploits the new materials and technical innovations of their era, they define the essence of their work and shift the course of art history. Hardcover, 384 pages.