Holbein
Hans Holbein the Younger has claims to be the greatest portrait painter who ever wielded a brush, a central figure in the spread of the Renaissance in Northern Europe whose deftness and remarkable accuracy captured the spirit and faces of the court of Henry VIII. He made the human individual seem more real and more exposed than any other artists before him and is the father of a tradition of portraiture which continues to this day.
In the programme Tim Marlow looks at works such as Holbein’s portraits of Erasmus and Henry VIII, as well as one of the most fascinating paintings in the history of art, The Ambassadors.
Great Artists
This major 26-part series takes a fresh look at the most important artworks of some of the greatest artists in history. Shot on location in over fifty museums, churches and palaces throughout Europe and the United States, this series is a comprehensive survey of the history of Western art. Both intelligent and informative, it’s the perfect introduction to the art of the Old Masters.
This set contains all 26 episodes of the Great Artists series: Giotto, Leonardo, Durer, Michelangelo, Raphael, Titian, Bruegel, Rubens, Rembrandt, Vermeer, El Greco, Velazquez, Turner Van Gogh, Piero della Francesca, Holbein, Caravaggio, Constable, Whistler and more.
Tim Marlow takes us on a unique tour of the life and times of the artists and examines what makes them great. Each episode takes a fresh look at the artists, their work and the world in which they lived. We learn why John Constable, often considered to be a painter of chocolate box scenes of the English countryside, was in fact, a radical artist of his time. See how Goya’s masterful painting style and haunting visions combined to produce some of the most powerful images in the history of Western Art.
We discover how the American painter Mary Cassatt, the only female artist in the series, challenged the male dominated world in which she lived, and against the odds, became the only American accepted into the group known as the Impressionists. And why Caravaggio, who lived a life marred by violence and even murder, produced some of the most remarkable art ever made.