"I can resist everything", wrote Oscar Wilde, "except temptation". What is it that makes a painting so attractive, so irresistible? In this collection of essays, Dominic van den Boogerd writes with passion about the exhibitions he has seen, the painters he has spoken with, and the talks by artists that he has organised as the director of De Ateliers in Amsterdam. About the pleasures and pitfalls of painting, forbidden favourites and the flirtation between the art of painting and other muses.