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In this investigative tour de force, Victor I. Stoichita untangles the history of one of the most enduring technical and symbolic challenges to confront Western artists: the depiction and meaning of shadows. Stoichita's compelling and expansive account draws on texts by Renaissance artist-authors such as Vasari and Cennini, folk and fairy tales, and classical myths; works by van Eyck, Poussin, Malevich, De Chirico, and Picasso, among other masters; as well as German Expressionist cinema, photography, and child psychology. It is a wholly original investigation of a subject that for centuries has challenged the very meaning of art as representation.