The Artist and the Garden Roy Strong

This extraordinarily beautiful book gathers together and examines for the first time a delightful collection of English gardens rendered by artists from 1540 to the early nineteenth century, many of which are unknown. Sir Roy Strong, widely recognised for his expertise in both art history and garden history, surveys garden pictures ranging from Elizabethan miniatures to eighteenth-century alfresco conversation pieces, from suites of paintings of a single garden to amateur watercolours. He inquires into the origin of the English garden picture genre, its development prior to the invention of photography, its greatest exponents, its reliability as historical evidence of actual gardens, and its place within the larger European tradition of picturing the garden.

Sir Roy Strong is former director of the National Portrait Gallery in London and of the Victoria and Albert Museum. He is now a full-time writer, broadcaster, consultant and gardener. Among those he has assisted in his capacity as a garden consultant are the Prince of Wales, Gianni Versace and Elton John.

"wonderful... This is a work of great scholarship, as well as being one of the most desirable books to come my way for ages" Mary Keen, The Spectator "a delicious book" Victoria Glendinning, Literary Review "Based on a profound knowledge of the subject, this superbly illustrated book amounts to a major achievement." Richard Cork, The Times"