Joseph Cornell remains one of the most popular artists of the 20th century. This work provides an insight into the artist"s remarkable inner world: a universe populated with empty cages, mirrors, clay pipes, postage stamps, marbles, thimbles and paper scraps, Cornell collected in his basement repository and fashioned into self-contained constructions, montages, collages and films. The artist"s relationship to both American and European Romanticism, his involvement with the Surrealist movement, the peculiar mechanics of his work, and a glimpse at his cinematic explorations are accompanied by an illuminating biography and numerous illustrations. This survey brings to life the work of a brilliant artist whose imaginative re-ordering of the world"s chaos is still as inspirational as ever.