This art text is designed to stimulate interest in all aspects of visual art, with coverage and illustrations of drawing, painting, printmaking, sculpture, architecture, photography and crafts, dating from prehistory to the modern day. Lois Fichner-Rathus discusses the relevance and beauty of art, the media and methods used to produce art, and the place of art not just within its own history, but of civilization. Each chapter features different perspectives on multiple treatments of one subject, for example, how the "Mona Lisa" has figured as a subject throughout the history of art. There are also specialist insights into topics not usually covered, such as women weavers in Ancient Greece.