A new book by the English art historian and critic Martin Gayford (b. 1952), author of collections of interviews with David Hockney and Lucian Freud, studies of British painting of the 1960s-1980s, Van Gogh and Michelangelo, is a fascinating art history travelogue: it brings together stories of unique pilgrimages to the shrines of classical and contemporary art. Proving the thesis that any work of art, and especially a great one, can only be fully perceived and felt in person (not in a reproduction), Gayford shares his impressions of trips to the Dordogne to examine the Paleolithic cave of Les Eyzies, to Tiruvannamalai, the center of the Indian cult of Shiva, to the museum of minimalist sculpture in the town of Marfa (Texas), as well as meetings with artists - Anselm Kiefer, Marina Abramovic, Robert Rauschenberg and others - in their studios.