Michael Peppiatt has been studying, meeting and writing about artists for almost sixty years. In this brilliant selection of his biographical writing, he introduces us to some of the best-known artists of the modern age, from Vincent van Gogh and Pierre Bonnard to Francis Bacon and Lucian Freud.

We follow the writer into the studios of some of these individuals, observing their creative process at close quarters, and gaining insight into the way their personal histories have shaped and directed their work, bringing both the art and its maker alive.

Peppiatt meets an elderly but spirited Sonia Delaunay in Paris to hear her revive long-forgotten worlds; visits Catalan artist Antoni Tapies, ‘the alchemist’, and joins him on late-night walks around Barcelona; interviews poet Jacques Dupin, in his pyjamas, on his memories of Giacometti; makes the life-changing acquaintance of Bacon in the bars and clubs of Soho; and gives us a considered opinion on Picasso’s trousers.

These essays are essential reading for anyone wanting to find out more about the lives of some of the great creative figures of modern times, from a writer who is not only an authority on art, but also one of the liveliest and most entertaining observers of artists and their worlds.