The internationally bestselling author on how art can help us appreciate life in all its strange and exhilarating beauty

Artists have learnt to pay attention. The rest of us spend most of our time on auto-pilot, rushing from place to place, our overfamiliarity blinding us to the marvellous, life-affirming phenomena of our world. But that doesn't have to be the case.

In his typically engaging style, Will Gompertz takes us into the minds of artists - from contemporary stars to old masters, the well-known to those at the artistic vanguard - to show us how to look and experience the world with their heightened powers of perception.

In See What You're Missing we learn, for example, how Rembrandt can help us see ourselves, how David Hockney helps us to see nature, and how Frida Kahlo can help us see through pain. In doing so we come to know the intoxicating feeling of being truly alive.

'Will Gompertz is the best teacher you never had' Guardian