Full of new information and beautiful illustrations, this fascinating history of the European still life from the ancient world to the twentieth century is a pleasure to read and a joy to look at. Readers will learn about the still life's origin in Greco-Roman images of xenia, or "hospitality gifts," and how these evocative pictures evolved into the superb trompe l'oeil still-life paintings of the Roman Empire.

The book continues with the still life's re-emergence in sixteenth-century Europe and its new associations with the cycles of nature and with Christian moralism, and follows its development to the pure still lifes of the eighteenth century and later. This astonishing pageant encompasses the meticulous realism of the Old Masters and the powerful forms of Courbet and his fellow Realists. It continues with the gorgeous visions of Monet and Renoir, the dynamic compositions of Cezanne and Picasso, and the Pop witticisms of Tom Wesselmann and Roy Lichtenstein.

Taken together it is one of the great epic stories of Western art history.