A stunning exploration of our enduring fascination with birds through art, literature and culture

Birds have captured the human imagination for centuries. From Icarus to Peter Pan, our desire to fly is deeply rooted in our fascination with these creatures, which have come to represent our hopes, fears, dreams and fantasies.

In this beautifully illustrated bird art book, internationally renowned art historian Simon Schama and Martine Gosselink, director of the Mauritshuis, explore our relationship with birds through art, literature and cultural history.

From Carel Fabritius’s famous Goldfinch and Picasso’s Dove to Brancusi’s Bird in Space, an Egyptian falcon mummy and a striking feather dress by Iris van Herpen, the book takes readers on a visual journey through centuries of bird imagery. Alongside the artwork is a fascinating collection of bird stories and writing, including extracts from The Epic of Gilgamesh and One Thousand and One Nights, as well as poems by Rabindranath Tagore, Ted Hughes, Bob Marley and Rumi.

Part art book, part cultural history and part literary collection, this is a fascinating exploration of birds and the remarkable place they have occupied in human imagination.