Civilisations BBC 2

[Richard Tarleton]

You've lost me there, Lats!

[Lat-Literal]

You've lost me there, Lats!

Well, it is the instinct of "we were worse" in the past but few Christians would be occupied with that sort of perspective. So it comes mainly from an atheist position - one which sees Christians as not really being "we" but "them". That is a "them" that is perceived as "against us". All I am saying is that if you tie that perspective specifically to a comparative grading of the atrocities of ISIS, there is more likelihood of finding out ultimately whether ISIS is for us or against us more than Christianity would be. History isn't fact. It is about an angle. The angle chosen was right for these times. I do accept that slavery is slightly different. All non elites who feel that they should apologise simply exhibit the undeserved guilt of our class.

[jean]

Well, it is the instinct of "we were worse" in the past but few Christians would be occupied with that sort of perspective. So it comes mainly from an atheist position...

Not at all! There are Christians and Christians, you know.

The ones I'm talking about are the Puritans on the one hand, and the Catholic Christians whose art they destroyed after the Reformation on the other.

The word iconoclasm itself dates from the conflicts much earlier in the Orthodox church, once again Christian against Christian.

All of them - and the Muslim iconoclasts as well - ultimately take their inspiration from the Old Testament.

[Lat-Literal]

Not at all! There are Christians and Christians, you know.

The ones I'm talking about are the Puritans on the one hand, and the Catholic Christians whose art they destroyed after the Reformation on the other.

The word iconoclasm itself dates from the conflicts much earlier in the Orthodox church, once again Christian against Christian.

All of them - and the Muslim iconoclasts as well - ultimately take their inspiration from the Old Testament.

Ok, well, I accept that this is your perspective and that's fine. Thank you for the clarification. The one I have outlined would be closer to many. It would be ably assisted by the direction favoured by people like Will Gompertz. That was the one I initially flagged up here as fearing would be chosen, having listened to the radio programme. By way of note, the BBC's arts correspondent has only the slightest of backgrounds in history and he doesn't even have a university degree. We could have easily had Simon Schama in Scotland commenting on the impacts of reformation on art. However, that would have been Eurocentric as is much of this Christian debate. As it is, the overlooking in some places of the Christian role could well be interpreted as a clear indication of how the series is designed to look beyond the west. Balance in a truly international remit may require a dilution of western faults as well as strengths.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

....episode 1....poor....no better than the sort of first introduction one might get in a Art Foundation class....huge leap to Petra a real misleading mistake....

Interesting - I suppose, as most people don't have/haven't had access to Art Foundation classes it's aimed at that wider audience? I haven't formally studied Art History since 1979, so my enjoyment and enthusiasm came from information that I didn't know and reminders of stuff I did. Was there any Kleinian "getting facts wrong" and "giving misleading information" in the programme, 8thOb?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Not at all! There are Christians and Christians, you know.
The ones I'm talking about are the Puritans on the one hand, and the Catholic Christians whose art they destroyed after the Reformation on the other.
The word iconoclasm itself dates from the conflicts much earlier in the Orthodox church, once again Christian against Christian.
All of them - and the Muslim iconoclasts as well - ultimately take their inspiration from the Old Testament.

This is all very true - and I'd be astonished if such matters weren't covered in later programmes. But the point of presenting ISIS vandalism at the very start of the series was to give a graphic illustration of how cultural artefacts centuries old could be easily destroyed in a matter of seconds - aimed at the general audience, it used recent images familiar to that audience to show that this sort of thing is going on today - not something that stopped a long time ago, The film footage - proudly made and publicised by the destroyers themselves - brings the violence of the iconoclasm (and the fragility of the artefacts and therefore of culture/civilisation itself) immediately and shockingly into the home. There isn't film footage of Cromwell's followers in the act of destroying religious artworks - and that was all "a long time ago; we do things differently now". This footage made unavoidably clear that "Oh yes we do"!

There is, I feel, cause for complaint that no mention was made of recent Western Governments' decades-long underfunding of Arts and Education, which is as corrosive a form of iconoclasm as any - just more patient. But again, that would be difficult to illustrate with the immediacy that the footage shown possessed.

[Nick Armstrong]

my enjoyment and enthusiasm came from information that I didn't know and reminders of stuff I did.

Having now watched the first one, and part of the second, I'd agree with that - seeing things and places, accompanied by some useful information (dates especially).

But I didn't particularly get anything from the comment/narrative/speculation that accompanied the information - and as often with BBC documentaries, the benefit gained was through gritted ears as the whole thing proceeded on a carpet of generic and clichéd musak. That whole 'house style' for programmes of this sort really does keep me from getting immersed.

To that extent I have some sympathy with the thrust of Gompertz's review, e.g.

"Next comes the elevator pitch for the whole series delivered by our presenter with movie trailer-type hyperbole: "We are the art-making animal and this is what we've made!"....Music swells, titles roll, and we're off....

These are patchwork programmes with rambling narratives that promise much but deliver little in way of fresh insight or surprising connections."

I didn't mind the patchwork element, like leafing through a coffee-table book of amazing things. But yes, not much more than that.

.

PS I didn't mind Simon S's hands though - didn't notice them! I thought he was less mannered than in some of his earlier series, a welcome change. And what was it with his waistline, Richard Tarleton?

[teamsaint]

Speculation dressed as fact absolutely ruins programmes like this for me, not that I have this one yet.

I can understand why people might want to do it, but it is a literal turn off . And a completely unnecessary one.

[jean]

And what was it with his waistline, Richard Tarleton?

If I may answer that...it's just not there, is it? Just a perfectly spherical little pot belly.

Someone should tell him to get some new shirts.

[Nick Armstrong]

If I may answer that...it's just not there, is it? Just a perfectly spherical little pot belly.

Someone should tell him to get some new shirts.

[teamsaint]

i dont think you can tell Simon Schama what to do.

[Lat-Literal]

The unmanaged hands. The patchwork style. The trailer-type hyperbole:

"I could go on for hours but I won't......you can read the book".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oov9eGk7S38

Oh:

And the unnecessary music.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vT9Y6ezsJr4

Key descriptive words/cliches - fabulous, fabulous (again), fantastic, changed everything, not just the story of art but the story of our lives, that's pretty clever, taking the piss.

Key moment of drama: him, acting out in a funny-funny way, reading a book and not understanding it.

That is him only in terms of "being the uneducated viewer of the programme" (except it is he who hails from the comedy fringe).

Key exhibit: a urinal.

Elsewhere: Key comment on television - "Strictly Come Dancing is the "new gold standard'"".

Key charity - Kids Company, now disgraced and defunct.

Key qualifications for arts correspondent - None : No A'levels. At 47, he'd never presented and he needed three months training.

He is, though, second cousin to the personal finance correspondent to BBC News.

No ta.

[Richard Tarleton]

If I may answer that...it's just not there, is it? Just a perfectly spherical little pot belly.

Someone should tell him to get some new shirts.

One might say it's wrong to pass remarks - but, as the late great AA Gill was wont to say, television is a very lookist medium.... He got into all sorts of trouble over Mary Beard

[Belgrove]

The three presenters will be talking about the programme on R4's Start the Week at 9.00am and repeated this evening

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09tc4fy

[eighthobstruction]

Interesting - I suppose, as most people don't have/haven't had access to Art Foundation classes it's aimed at that wider audience? I haven't formally studied Art History since 1979, so my enjoyment and enthusiasm came from information that I didn't know and reminders of stuff I did. Was there any Kleinian "getting facts wrong" and "giving misleading information" in the programme, 8thOb?

No wrong facts ormisleading....I'm really saying (in brief because it takes too long for me to hold concepts and get them into readable text) is that the eps1 could have been so much more by lingering on the early natural state of humans (given the vast anthropological finds since the 60's and here I mean not only in artefacts , but research into HOW mankind made lets say a reeded musical instrument initially while eating, sucking and blowing to get marrow from a bone). It's all Why with SS. Of course it was interesting [that really detailed broache/medalion; made of amber was it?....astonishing]....Also as the first episode I believe if you are not going to linger, then you must have a much more broad strokes, linking then and now. Maybe they didn't have enough money to go to see Aboriginal Art in Australia. as well as S American Art. Seems they are going to devote 8 of 9 programmes to Art/Civilisation of the last 2000yrs without a good foundation of the the previous 5000/50,000yrs. Progs seem to be following Clarkes as just a remake. Still it will be interesting if annoying Sharma being a great annoyance to me (and there I give you my Achillies foot of clay) .The idea of civilisation is much more than a linear museum. Eps1 missed a chance to be ground breaking and enlightening. Sharma on R4 Start the Week....welll what did I expect; annoying to me...interesting ref Social Media open reaction....good lets hope it really does 'launch a thousand ships'....