Art

Video documentaries about all art forms

Metalworks episode 3 - The Blacksmith's Tale

Metalworks episode 3 – The Blacksmith’s Tale

Metalworks episode 3 – The Blacksmith’s Tale: In a story where progress meets creative invention, this film looks at how the blacksmith created items in wrought and cast iron that both served and embellished society. From the earliest ornate hinges and doors to magnificent baroque gates and mass-produced street furniture, it reveals the mastery of metalworkers such as Jean Tijou, Robert Bakewell and John Tresilian, the designs of Robert Adam and George Gilbert Scott, and the mass marketers of the Victorian age such as the Saracen foundry.     Treasures are drawn from all corners of the UK in a […]

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Metalworks episode 2 - The Knight's Tale

Metalworks episode 2 – The Knight’s Tale

Metalworks episode 2 – The Knight’s Tale: Art historian and curator Tobias Capwell celebrates the great age of armour. Referencing the unstoppable rise of the Royal Almain Armoury at Greenwich, he tells the forgotten story of how Henry VIII fused German high technology with Renaissance artistry in the pursuit of one aim – to become the very image of the perfect knight. Using the talents of foreign craftsmen and his court artist Hans Holbein, Henry transformed himself into a living metal sculpture. His daughter Elizabeth I further exploited that image, making her courtiers parade before her in the most innovative

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Metalworks episode 1 - The Golden Age of Silver

Metalworks episode 1 – The Golden Age of Silver

Metalworks episode 1 – The Golden Age of Silver: Dan Cruickshank visits Britain’s finest country houses, museums and factories as he uncovers the 18th- and 19th-century fascination with silver. Delving into an unsurpassed era of shimmering opulence, heady indulgence and conspicuous consumption, Dan discovers the Georgian and Victorian obsession with this tantalising precious metal which represented status, wealth and excellent taste. He gives us a glimpse of some of the most extensive collections and exquisite pieces of silverware to have ever been made on British shores.     Series looking at aspects of British metalworking over the centuries, including the

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Mary Beard's Forbidden Art episode 2

Mary Beard’s Forbidden Art episode 2

Mary Beard’s Forbidden Art episode 2: Mary unpacks the complex subject of art and ideology, considering a range of very different works that have challenged the political and social status quo, expressing opinions and attitudes that many have wanted to silence – and even erase.     She examines artwork ranging from the etchings of Otto Dix, banned by the Nazis, to the paintings of artist and gay activist Derek Jarman and the now famous (or infamous) statue of Edmund Colston. She considers the challenges of the representation of religious images from England to West Africa, examines how art has

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Civilisation episode 6 - Protest and Communication

Civilisation episode 6 – Protest and Communication

Civilisation episode 6 – Protest and Communication: Kenneth Clark investigates the Protestant Reformation in northern Europe. He looks at Holbein, Thomas Moore, Erasmus, the printing press and Durer.     Kenneth Clark’s classic 1969 series tracing the history of Western art and philosophy.   Civilisation episode 6 – Protest and Communication   Albrecht Dürer sometimes spelt in English as Durer or Duerer, without umlaut, was a painter, printmaker, and theorist of the German Renaissance. Born in Nuremberg, Dürer established his reputation and influence across Europe when he was still in his twenties due to his high-quality woodcut prints. He was

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Mary Beard's Forbidden Art episode 1

Mary Beard’s Forbidden Art episode 1

Mary Beard’s Forbidden Art episode 1: Classicist and broadcaster Professor Mary Beard explores a broad range of thought-provoking and sometimes controversial works of art that tackle unsettling subjects – works that have been fought over, removed from view or simply ‘forbidden’. She delves into the questions of what, why and how art gets forbidden, who gets to decide and how that has changed over time.     In the first programme, Mary explores some of the challenging ways that artists have shown the human body. She begins with the Romans, heading to the British Museum to discuss a statue of

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Andy Warhol's America episode 3

Andy Warhol’s America episode 3

Andy Warhol’s America episode 3: The final episode sees a much more cautious Warhol: a man obsessed with money and security as he reflects on the upper echelons of American society, drag queens and racism.     Documentary looking at the history of 20th-century America through the life and career of Andy Warhol. This three-part series, richly supplemented with archive footage and talking heads, starts by taking us back to his immigrant beginnings in Pittsburgh and his early screen prints which perfectly reflected the instant, mass-produced culture of America and its obsession with celebrity. Among those describing how the enigmatic

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Andy Warhol's America episode 2: Charting Andy Warhol’s response to major events in the Sixties and how he faced his own nightmare when he was shot by an associate.

Andy Warhol’s America episode 2

Andy Warhol’s America episode 2: Charting Andy Warhol’s response to major events in the Sixties and how he faced his own nightmare when he was shot by an associate.     Documentary looking at the history of 20th-century America through the life and career of Andy Warhol. This three-part series, richly supplemented with archive footage and talking heads, starts by taking us back to his immigrant beginnings in Pittsburgh and his early screen prints which perfectly reflected the instant, mass-produced culture of America and its obsession with celebrity. Among those describing how the enigmatic artist evolved and the impact of

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Andy Warhol's America episode 1

Andy Warhol’s America episode 1

Andy Warhol’s America episode 1: Documentary looking at the history of 20th-century America through the life and career of Andy Warhol. Episode one examines the artist’s childhood in Pittsburgh and his rise from poverty to wealth and fame in New York City in the 1950s. Warhol establishes his name by making everyday foodstuff the subject of his work, and in turn creates a sensation which propels him to the A-list of American society     He was a pioneering artist and cultural icon – and his work is a history of 20th-century America. A country reinventing itself – as seen

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Quentin Blake – The Drawing of My Life

Quentin Blake – The Drawing of My Life

Quentin Blake – The Drawing of My Life: The illustrator and author paints scenes from a 70-year-long career, including his work with Roald Dahl. With David Walliams, Joanna Lumley, Peter Capaldi, Ore Oduba and Michael Rosen.     In this celebration of one of Britain’s best-loved artists, the illustrator and author Sir Quentin Blake tells the story of his 70-year-long career in his own words and with his own pictures. Specially for this documentary, he has been filmed creating an extraordinary new work: a canvas 30 feet long and seven feet high, on which self-portraits and classic characters emerge in

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Steps of Freedom: The Story of Irish Dance

Steps of Freedom: The Story of Irish Dance

Steps of Freedom – The Story of Irish Dance: Across the world, Irish dance has captivated people’s imaginations, with millions of people in more than 60 countries learning the style, and hundreds of millions more having watched it on TV and on stage. This documentary tells the story of how it evolved from a traditional peasant dance to become a global phenomenon.     Steps of Freedom: The Story of Irish Dance, a major entertainment documentary tells for the first time the story of how Irish dance developed over centuries from the traditional dance of the Irish people to become

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Gaga for Dada: The Original Art Rebels

Gaga for Dada: The Original Art Rebels

Gaga for Dada: The Original Art Rebels – Jim Moir goes on an irreverent trip into the world of influential avant-garde art movement Dada. First broadcast in 2016 to coincide with the one-hundredth anniversary of the emergence of Dada.      Absurd, provocative and subversive, Dada began as a response to the madness of World War I. But its radical way of looking at the world inspired generations of artists, writers and musicians, from Monty Python to punk, Bowie to Banksy. Jim restages an early Dada performance in Zurich’s Cabaret Voltaire, where the movement began. Among those joining him

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