Spike Bucklow sets out to unravel the myths behind the pigments, like dragonsblood, which is said to be a mixture of elephant and dragon blood. Examining both the medieval palette and the often cloak-and-dagger science that created it, he uncovers the secret recipes behind the luxurious colours we are familiar with today. Driven by an overriding passion for art, Spike Bucklow's aim is to restore value to colour.

The Year takes us on a journey exploring how nature transforms across twelve months, each chapter focusing on a specific month’s natural events, from spring’s beginning through to winter’s end. It opens with an overview of our evolving understanding of time and nature, from ancient astronomy to the present, and concludes with a chapter on the impact of climate change. Spike Bucklow draws on both modern ecological studies and historical naturalists such as Aristotle, Gilbert White,...

Children of Mercury is a bold new account of the lives of pre-modern painters, viewed through the lens of the Seven Ages of Man, a widespread belief made famous in the ‘All the world’s a stage’ speech in Shakespeare’s As You Like It. Spike Bucklow follows artists’ lives from infancy through childhood, adolescence and adulthood to maturity, old age and death. He tracks how lives unfolded for both male and female painters, from the famous, like Michelangelo, through Artemis...

The Riddle of the Image explores the materials and methods that lie behind the production of historic paintings. Spike Bucklow, who works as a research scientist and restorer of paintings, analyses some of the most well-known and important medieval works of art, as well as less familiar artworks, to throw new light on art production techniques that have been lost for centuries. By examining the science of the materials, as well as the techniques of medieval artists, he adds new as...

The Anatomy of Riches tells the story of one family’s long rise from rags to riches, and their rapid reversal of fortune. It focuses on the life of Sir Robert Paston, who experienced the family’s fall from grace at a time of momentous change, the beginning of the modern world.The Paston wealth had brought luxuries from across the globe to an idyllic retreat in rural Norfolk. The family commissioned Europe’s finest craftsmen to enhance their rarities, and their lavish hospit...

Red grabs your attention. Today we associate red with danger, sex, anger and more, yet the colour was once so significant that things which have a profound impact upon our lives were widely called red, even though they are often not red at all.Spike Bucklow takes us from a 34,000-year-old shaman burial dress to the iPhone screen, exploring the myriad of purposes we have put red to as well as the materials from which it comes. The pursuit of the colour drove medieval alchemy and mode...

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER'A mind-expanding tour of the world without leaving your paintbox. Every colour has a story, and here are some of the most alluring, alarming, and thought-provoking. Very hard painting the hallway magnolia after this inspiring primer.'Simon GarfieldThe Secret Lives of Colour tells the unusual stories of the 75 most fascinating shades, dyes and hues. From blonde to ...

Homework for Grown-ups is a brilliantly informative and entertaining book of old-school knowledge for adults. It is the ultimate refresher course on mathematics (remember Pythagoras' theorem? You will!), English grammar and literature (do you know your Margarets?), and chemistry and the sciences (including the big bang theory). It spans geography (can you name the planets in order?), history (what exactly was the Family Compact?), art, Latin, phys. ed. (hockey!), home economics an...

In the grand tradition of the scholar-adventurer, acclaimed author Richard Cohen takes us around the world to illuminate our relationship with the star that gives us life. Drawing on more than seven years of research, he reports from locations in eighteen different countries. As he soon discovers, the Sun is present everywhere—in mythology, language, religion, politics, sciences, art, literature, and medicine, even in the ocean’s depths. For some ancient worshippers, our star was a man aba...

This Dictionary is part of the Oxford Reference Collection: using sustainable print-on-demand technology to make the acclaimed backlist of the Oxford Reference programme perennially available in hardback format. What is a ham-and-egger? What are Anglo-Saxon attitudes? Who or what is liable to jump the shark? Who first tried to nail jelly to the wall? The answers to these and many more questions are in this...

The Naming of Names traces the search for order in the natural world, a search that for hundreds of years occupied some of the most brilliant minds in Europe, reaching its apex during the renaissance.Anna Pavord takes us on a thrilling adventure into botanical history, travelling from Athens in the third century BC, through Constantinople, Venice, the medical school at Salerno to the universities of Pisa and Padua. The journey, traced here for the first time, involves the c...

In the late nineteenth century, the first discoveries of prehistoric painting were greeted with incredulity. How could there have been such deft and skillful artists in the world over 30,000 years ago? Noted art historian Nigel Spivey begins with this puzzle to explore the record of humanity's artistic endeavors, and their impact on our own development. How Art Made the World , in conjunction with the PBS miniseries, reveals how artists from the earliest caveman to the most studie...