The first question Lachlan Goudie asks himself when he sees a work of art is not why it was created, but how. For this book, he poses that question of artworks created by the earliest humans to artists today, focusing on the technical inventions and turning points which at each stage have marked a new chapter in the history of art.

Goudie knows that masterpieces do not emerge serenely from an artist’s studio. Great paintings are always the product of a struggle between artists and their materials, between dirty hands and crushed pigment, hog’s hair brushes, linseed oil, rabbit skin glue and pulverised chalk. The secrets of painting lie above all in the physical elements from which an image is crafted, and the nature of these elements has changed over time and across continents.

Goudie traces this story all the way back to the original ‘big bang’ in the story of art: the very first painting pigments, made from charcoal and minerals, which were used to paint on cave walls at Chauvet in the Ardeche region of France 36,000 years ago. He goes on to explore the impact of numerous new inventions and discoveries over the centuries, including ink, fresco, egg tempera, oil paint, canvas, watercolour, gouache, impasto, tubes of manufactured oil paint, collage, household gloss, acrylic, digital media and AI. 

Each chapter focuses on a technical turning point as embodied in the work of a particular artist, including Giotto, Artemisia Gentileschi, Anselm Kiefer, David Hockney and many more.