Seventeenth-century Europe swirled with conjectures and debates over what was real and what constituted nature, currents that would soon gather force to form modern science.Natural LightJulian Bell guides the reader through key Elsheimer artworks, examining the contexts behind them before exploring the new imaginative thoughts that opened up in their wake. He also explores the experiences of Elsheimer and other Northern artists in the literary, artistic, and scientific culture of 1600s Rome.Although his life was tragically short, Elsheimers legacy endured and prints of his work were widely spread throughout Europe, with his influence extending as far as the Indian subcontinent.