For the last week, I've found myself mainly reading The Power Of Art, by Simon Schama. It's the book that goes arm in arm with the TV series, currently running on BBC2 on Friday nights. It takes a look at eight artists from across the past four hundred years or so and tells the story behind their work and the reasons behind one of their defining pieces. Schama skilfully paints a picture of men on the edge, men in situations that most of us can't even imagine, and demonstrates how the calm, quiet setting of a gallery is so far from representing the paintings power in an accurate light.

The most captivating of the artists stories I have read so far has to be the opening section on Caravaggio, whose life is the kind of swashbuckling, whore-visiting, on going struggle to overcome his own bad self and achieve redemption that would have been perfect in a Shakespeare play. It is a story in the end summed up by one of his own paintings, David with the Head of Goliath, which features a double self portrait, his younger self as David, while Goliath's head is the head of Caravaggio the murderer, fleeing from the Knights of St John with a price on his head. The finally irony of the tale is that while a pardon was awaited in Rome, in exchange for paintings of course, until that was granted there was a reward for the one to bring Caravaggio's head, when he died before making it to Rome his head was delivered to Rome by himself, in the form of Goliath's head on the painting which arrived after his death. Knowing the stories behind his works adds so much to the power of them, and explains a lot about the reasons behind his style. His paintings don't show the previous views of Saints in deified light, with the physical attributes of Greek God's as oppose to real people, the protagonists in Caravaggio's work instead show real people, with real emotions, such as in The Crucifixion of St Peter. The style manages to convey not just the moment captured but the moments preceding and after, it brings images to life in a way previously unimaginable.

Caravaggio - As good with the sword as with the brush.

The book continues in the same vein with explorations of the life and work of such luminaries as Bernini, who burnt his own 15 year old legs while looking at himself in a mirror so to better model the expression of pain for the Martyrdom of San Lorenzo, Rembrandt at a low ebb being forced to mutilate his own work just to earn the money to get by or Picasso during the war. We don't just see the paintings, although the book is full of quality glossy pictures of them, but we see the events, we see the tumult that caused them, we see people pushed to the very edge. The writing is vivid and evocative with relaxed prose that flows well, and achieves just what Schama set out to do. It proves interesting not just on the level or art or history, but also for the stories it provides of people against the odds. Dan Brown ain't got nothing on this.

The book is out now in Hardback and is a worthy investment for any coffee table or bookshelf, it's really changing the way I'll look at the artists in questions work, and provides so much artistic eye candy that you'll find yourself constantly pausing to flick back and wonder how anyone could produce such brilliant works. The TV series is currently showing at 9pm on Friday evenings on BBC2 and is well worth setting the DVD recorder for...