Why do humans make art? When did we begin to make our mark on the world? And where? In this film, Britain's most celebrated sculptor Antony Gormley is setting out on a journey to see for himself the very beginnings of art. Once we believed that art began with the cave paintings of Ice Age Europe, tens of thousands of years ago. But now, extraordinary new discoveries around the world are overturning that idea. Antony is going to travel across the globe, and thousands of years back in time, to piece together a new story of how art began. He discovers beautiful, haunting and surprising works of art, deep inside caves across France, Spain and Indonesia, and in Australian rock shelters. He finds images created by hunter-gatherers that surprise him with their tenderness, and affinity with the natural world. He discovers the secrets behind the techniques used by our ancestors to create these paintings. And he meets experts making discoveries that are turning the clock back on when art first began.
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The first in a four-part series exploring the life and works of the 20th century's most important artists: Matisse; Picasso; Dali and Warhol. Art critic Alastair Sooke sets out to discover why these artists are considered so great and how they still influence our lives today. He begins with Andy Warhol, the king of Pop Art. On his journey he parties with Dennis Hopper, has a brush with Carla Bruni and gets to grips with Marilyn. Along the way he uncovers just how brilliantly Andy Warhol pinpointed and portrayed our obsessions with consumerism, celebrity and the media, and then went on to re-invent them.
S1E1 • Modern Masters • 2010 • Creativity
Phillippe Parreno has radically redefined the exhibition experience. Rather than as a collection of individual works, Parreno sees an exhibit as a coherent whole and works in many different media including film, text, sculpture and drawing.
8 • Behind the Artist • 2016 • Creativity
Alastair Sooke champions pop art as one of the most important art forms of the 20th century, peeling back pop's frothy, ironic surface to reveal an art style full of subversive wit and radical ideas. In charting its story, Alastair brings a fresh eye to the work of pop art superstars Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein and tracks down pop's pioneers, from American artists like James Rosenquist, Claes Oldenburg and Ed Ruscha to British godfathers Peter Blake and Allen Jones. Alastair also explores how pop's fascination with celebrity, advertising and the mass media was part of a global art movement, and he travels to China to discover how a new generation of artists are reinventing pop art's satirical, political edge for the 21st century.
2015 • Creativity
Mark begins with one of the most popular genres of all. They are sometimes sneered at by critics, but from the 1930s to the present day, many of our most beloved movies have been romantic comedies. From Bringing Up Baby and The Lady Eve by way of Annie Hall, When Harry Met Sally and Pretty Woman to Love, Actually (a particular Kermode favourite) - as well as recent hits such as The Big Sick and La La Land - Mark examines the cinematic tricks and techniques involved in creating a classic romcom. Mark celebrates old favourites, reveals hidden treasures and springs plenty of surprises. Examining films from Hollywood to Bollywood via other gems of world cinema, he reminds us how, much like love itself, the art of the romantic comedy is international.
Part 1 • Mark Kermode's Secrets of Cinema • 2018 • Creativity
Take a time trip to France in the 1960's-- student revolts! Pop Art! -- And meet Georges Pompidou, a bank director who became PM of France. His vision of modernizing France pushed the avant garde design of the Paris art and cultural center which is now home to the modern arts of France.
7 • Behind the Artist • 2016 • Creativity
This programme is the second in a series looking at four great modern artists: Warhol, Matisse, Picasso and Dali. Tracing the biography of this fascinating artist, and travelling through France, America and Russia, the programme explores some of the painter's greatest works. Sooke explains why Matisse's art is considered so great and also looks at how Matisse's brilliant use of colour and simplification of form continues to inspire illustrators, designers and of course artists today. Acknowledging the debt the famous couturier Yves St Laurent owed the painter, Sooke also talks to British designers Sir Paul Smith and Tricia Guild about their passion for Matisse, he travels to Utrecht to discover how even children's character Miffy the rabbit owes its origin to art, and reveals how logos and images as diverse as Apple's iPod advertising and even the 2012 olympic logo are inspired by the modern master.
S1E2 • Modern Masters • 2015 • Creativity