Looking for Rembrandt episode 1 : Rembrandt’s art is much loved and admired, but his remarkable life is less well-known. 350 years after his death, his surprising story told from an unusual perspective – his own. Rembrandt arrives in Amsterdam ‘like a thunderclap’ and his star rises as he is courted by the city’s wealthy elite. But he […]
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Art of Scandinavia episode 3 – Democratic by Design: In the final instalment of Andrew Graham-Dixon’s windswept journey through the art of the Norselands. We arrive in Sweden – home of Ikea and a tradition of brilliant furniture design stretching back to the early years of the 20th century. Sweden has made its modern democratic mission one of
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In The Victorians, Jeremy Paxman takes his love of Victorian paintings as the starting point for a journey into Victorian Britain. Such pictures may not be fashionable today, but they are a goldmine of information about the most dynamic age in British history. The Victorians Part 1: Painting The Town He investigates the most dramatic event of Victorian Britain:
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Gauguin – A Dangerous Life: documentary that sets Paul Gauguin’s artistic achievement against his sexual relationships with young girls in the Pacific and his role in 19th-century French colonialism. ‘I am indeed a savage. And civilised people sense it. My works surprise and disturb them because they see in them the savage that I can’t repress. That’s what
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Tales of Winter – The Art of Snow and Ice: A look at how mankind’s struggle with winter has been reflected in western art throughout the ages, with contributions from Grayson Perry, Will Self, Don McCullin and others. Art of Snow and Ice Part 1Â Art of Snow and Ice Part 2Â Winter was not always beautiful.
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The Taking of Christ: The extraordinary story of one of world’s great, lost masterpieces: Caravaggio‘s “The Taking of Christ”. This film traces the painting’s journey from its birth in Rome in 1602 to its amazing re-discovery in 1990. “The Taking of Christ” by Italian Baroque master Caravaggio today holds pride of place in the National Gallery of Ireland
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The story of the Mystic Nativity – Sandro Botticelli’s beautiful image of hope in troubled times. This masterpiece was painted 500 years ago in Florence, at the height of the city’s fame & influence. Botticelli’s Mystic Nativity is a painting that lovers of mystery fiction should like: a Renaissance masterpiece crammed with cryptic symbols disguising a dangerous message.
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Simon Schama celebrates the masterpieces of Rembrandt’s last years. Although the artist fell into bankruptcy and scandal in later years, it took him to new creative heights. Icarus-like, Rembrandt flew ever higher towards the sun – the most successful artist in the richest city on earth, 17th-century Amsterdam. He lived like a prince and he loved living like
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Documentary telling how the fabulously rich Scottish aristocrat, the 3rd Marquess of Bute, spent a Welsh fortune and left a dazzling architectural legacy in Scotland and Cardiff. John Patrick Crichton Stuart, the 3rd Marquess of Bute, was one of the richest men in the British Empire in the late 19th century. With an annual income in excess of
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In 1919 an art school opened in Germany that would change the world forever. It was called the Bauhaus. A century later, its radical thinking still shapes our lives today. Bauhaus 100 is the story of Walter Gropius, architect and founder of the Bauhaus, and the teachers and students he gathered to form this influential school. Traumatised by
Civilisation episode 8 – The Light of Experience: Kenneth Clark’s story takes him from the Holland of Rembrandt and Vermeer to the London of Wren, Purcell and the Royal Society. Kenneth Clark’s classic 1969 series tracing the history of Western art and philosophy. Civilisation episode 8 – The Light of Experience Rembrandt Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn
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Civilisation episode 7 – Grandeur and Obedience: Sir Kenneth Clark presents one of the classic episodes of his history of the civilised culture of the western world. He examines the Catholic world in the 16th Century, especially the city of Rome which blossomed architecturally and sculpturally during the Counter Reformation under the hands of the baroque artist Bernini. This programme
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