There are three standard methods to visually represent a building: the plan, elevation, and section. The section drawing is a vertical slice of a building, depicting the relationships between interior and exterior as well as any level changes. While the section can serve as merely a functional drawing for construction, it can also be an exciting, revelatory drawing that can artfully depict a building, landscape, or object. Throughout history, many individuals have used the cross section as a tool to create, explore, or investigate. Visual Discoveries: A Collection of Sections is an image-forward book that is devoted to showcasing notable section drawings throughout history and demonstrating that the section drawing, while having roots in architecture, has spread to many other professions and disciplines. These professions include medicine, transportation, product design, geology, and landscape architecture. Some of the greatest thinkers and inventors in history like Leonardo da Vinci, Charles Darwin, and Robert Fulton, have created remarkable section drawings for their investigations, research, and work.

Weimin He's 324 ink drawings, pen sketches and woodblock prints comprise an intimate record of the progress of construction in the newly designed Ashmolean Museum that opened late last year. An unusual approach to documentation in the age of digital photography, the catalogue provides a delightful art experience for readers who will never set foot in the Ashmolean, which is the museum for the University of Oxford. Weimin has drawn workers lifting roof beams, welding metal rods and pouring cement into the mixer. He gives us behind-the-scenes portraits of museum personnel, making each individual come alive, for example, an objects conservator at her work and a researcher in the prints room at his. An artist-in-residence at the museum and an art scholar, Weimin employed Chinese drawing and woodblock printmaking methods. His portraits were drawn on pi, xuan papers or album leaves, with Chinese brushes and inks that have been used for over a millennium. Seven of the prints and the catalogue were presented to Queen Elizabeth for the museum's opening.