The art treasures of Europe

"A work of art never speaks alone; it carries on a dialogue, every time anew, with each generation." Charles Wentinck In the towns and cities of Europe, paintings and sculptures in museums, churches and private collections reflect centuries of creative work. The Art Treasures of Europe takes as its central theme the paths this creativity took. It brings into focus those aspects of Europe's art treasures-whether of painting, sculpture or architecture- that are most relevant to today's aesthetic concerns. We have traveled a long road from the paintings of the cave dwellers to the art revolutions that have thrown the artistic life of our own age into turmoil. In this book, distinguished European art critic and historian Charles Wentinck chronicles the developments along that road, describing the changing perspectives of artists in each era. Beginning with the prehistoric art of the Stone and Bronze ages, we move on to Hellas, Etruria and Rome and the birth of Europe. From the Romanesque and the Gothic to the Renaissance in Italy, Germany and The Netherlands, new perspectives emerge. And on through the Cinquacento, the northern awakening in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, Rococo, Classicism, Romanticism, Impressionism . .. Finally we reach the ferment of experiment that has characterized the twentieth century. The new perspectives that opened up at the start of each era became the driving force and the mission for the artists of history. How well they accomplished that mission-of giving form to the conception of life in their time-is the story Charles Wentinck so brilliantly tells and over 450 plates lavishly illustrate.