Civilization: A Personal View by Lord Clark (1969) [ReUp]

Stars: Kenneth Clark, Nicholas Blake, William Devlin

Civilisation—in full, Civilisation: A Personal View by Kenneth Clark—is a television documentary series outlining the history of Western art, architecture and philosophy since the Dark Ages. The series was produced by the BBC and aired in 1969 on BBC2. Both the television scripts and the accompanying book version were written by art historian Kenneth Clark (1903–1983), who also presented the series. The series is considered to be a landmark in British Television's broadcasting of the visual arts.

Episodes:
1. The Skin of Our Teeth. In this the first episode Clark - travelling from Byzantine Ravenna to the Celtic Hebrides, from the Norway of the Vikings to Charlemagne's chapel at Aachen - tells his story of the Dark Ages, the six centuries following the collapse of the Roman Empire.
2. The Great Thaw. Clark tells of the sudden reawakening of European civilisation in the 12th century. He traces it from its first manifestations in the Cluny Abbey to the Basilica of St Denis and finally to its high point, the building of Chartres cathedral.
3. Romance and Reality. Beginning at a castle in the Loire and then traveling through the hills of Tuscany and Umbria to the cathedral baptistry at Pisa, Clark examines both the aspirations and achievements of the later Middle Ages in France and Italy.
4. Man: The Measure of all Things. Visiting Florence, Clark argues that European thought gained a new impetus from its rediscovery of its classical past. He also visits the palaces at Urbino and Mantua and other centres of (Renaissance) civilisation.
5. The Hero as Artist. (List of Renaissance figures) Here Clark takes the viewer back to 16th century Papal Rome–noting the convergence of Christianity and antiquity. He discusses Michelangelo, Raphael, and Leonardo da Vinci; the courtyards of the Vatican; the rooms decorated for the Pope by Raphael; and the Sistine Chapel.
6. Protest and Communication. Clark takes the viewer back to the Reformation–to the Germany of Albrecht Duerer and Martin Luther and the world of the humanists Erasmus, Montaigne, and Shakespeare.
7. Grandeur and Obedience. Again in the Rome of Michelangelo and Bernini, Clark tells of the Catholic Church's fight against the Protestant north–the Counter-Reformation– and the Church's new splendour symbolised by the glory of St. Peter’s.
8. The Light of Experience. Clark tells of new worlds in space and in a drop of water–worlds that the telescope and microscope revealed–and the new realism in the Dutch paintings of Rembrandt and others artists that took the observation of human character to a higher stage of development.
9. The Pursuit of Happiness. Clark talks of the harmonious flow and complex symmetries of the works of Bach, Handel, Haydn, and Mozart and the reflection of their music in the architecture of the Rococo churches and palaces of Bavaria.
10. The Smile of Reason. Clark discusses the Age of Enlightenment, tracing it from the polite conversations of the elegant Parisian salons of the 18th century to subsequent revolutionary politics, the great European palaces of Blenheim and Versailles, and finally Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello.
11. The Worship of Nature. Belief in the divinity of nature, Clark argues, usurped Christianity’s position as the chief creative force in Western civilisation and ushered in the Romantic movement. Clark visits Tintern Abbey and the Alps and discusses the landscape paintings of Turner and Constable.
12. The Fallacies of Hope. Clark argues that the French Revolution led to the dictatorship of Napoleon and the dreary bureaucracies of the 19th century, and he traces the disillusionment of the artists of Romanticism–from Beethoven's music to Byron's poetry, Delacroix's paintings, and Rodin's sculpture.
13. Heroic Materialism. Clark concludes the series with a discussion of the materialism and humanitarianism of the 19th and 20th centuries. He visits the industrial landscape of 19th century England and the skyscrapers of 20th century New York. He argues that the achievements of the engineers and scientists—such as Brunel and Rutherford—have been matched by those of the great reformers like Wilberforce and Shaftsbury.

Extras:
- Sir David Attenborough remembers the making of Civilisation
- Photo gallery. Behind-the-scenes

Thanks to original uploader