Rococo

[amateur51]

To me Waldemar's tics and excesses are as nothing compared to the true horror that is ... 'Whispering' Dan Cruickshank :shudderemoticon:

[jean]

I think you have been misled by the Start the Week feature into anticipating more music than the programme intends to include. Januszczak is very much a painting and visual arts bod. Any music heard in the programme will just be a mood setter.

Let's say hoping for rather than anticipating.

I recorded some of his Baroque series but have never got round to watching them. How was he with Baroque music?

He's not the only offender, of course. Even if we do get more appropriate music in visual art programmes, we're rarely told what it is.

[Richard Tarleton]

To me Waldemar's tics and excesses are as nothing compared to the true horror that is ... 'Whispering' Dan Cruickshank :shudderemoticon:

Quite! Some presenters, like the sainted David Attenborough, simply improve with age, like fine wines. Others like DC and many before him simply become ludicrous.

[Thropplenoggin]

Since Brian Sewell's infamous interview on BBC's factual television (http://www.theguardian.com/commentis...t-brian-sewell), I find myself turning off every time I see a young presenter with plenty of vim going into raptures inside a cathedral or on a Chinese fishing junk or what have you. BBC 4 is littered with such vapid 'docs'. Thin on well-researched material, but laden with slow panning shots of some gimp mooning up at a balustrade.

Why did my licence fee pay me for me to watch some twerp go into ecstasies over this or that relic/art work/landscape on location? Why do they need to be there? What does it bring to see them gawping in am-dram astonishment at something? I don't experience their wonder vicariously; I simply feel enraged at having paid for someone to go on a jolly somewhere exotic.

The solution for arm-waggling imbeciles on location is simple: voice overs giving us 'just the facts, ma'am'.

NB. There are exceptions, Attenborough being one of them; Sister Wendy another.

[teamsaint]

Since Brian Sewell's infamous interview on BBC's factual television (http://www.theguardian.com/commentis...t-brian-sewell), I find myself turning off every time I see a young presenter with plenty of vim going into raptures inside a cathedral or on a Chinese fishing junk or what have you. BBC 4 is littered with such vapid 'docs'. Thin on well-researched material, but laden with slow panning shots of some gimp mooning up at a balustrade.

Why did my licence fee pay me for me to watch some twerp go into ecstasies over this or that relic/art work/landscape on location? Why do they need to be there? What does it bring to see them gawping in am-dram astonishment at something? I don't experience their wonder vicariously; I simply feel enraged at having paid for someone to go on a jolly somewhere exotic.

The solution for arm-waggling imbeciles on location is simple: voice overs giving us 'just the facts, ma'am'.

NB. There are exceptions, Attenborough being one of them; Sister Wendy another.

and TBF, she deserves a trip out every so often.
Where does she broadcast now? She is great.

and get your write up of today's gig underway, since you have time on your hands, if you don't mind. Time yet to beat the evening papers on the first review !! Hurrah !!

[Thropplenoggin]

and TBF, she deserves a trip out every so often.
Where does she broadcast now? She is great.

She hasn't for a while. There was an exellent doc/interview with her on over Christmas.

[Honoured Guest]

Does anyone else fondly remember way back in 1980 when Waldemar Januszczak was a regular (maybe even weekly) guest on John Walters's new BBC Radio arts programme Walters' Weekly, broadcast on Saturday afternoons from 4.00 to 5.00? The two of them would walk around exhibitions together, with Waldy explaining and John responding to him and to the "ooh... art". Lovely show, lovely people - talking directly to their listeners. Plenty of time to fill as they wanted.

[jean]

I enjoyed this week's episode, though i could have done without Waldemar sprawling over a sofa in imitation of Boucher's Louise O'Murphy. Walking would have been preferable. At least he kept his clothes on.

One composer did get a mention - but only because he married Gainsborough's daughter. I can't remember his name.

[mercia]

he married Gainsborough's daughter

J C Fischer

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Christian_Fischer

[ did you follow that long explanation about the coded punctuation in the name Sans, Souci. ? ]

[ardcarp]

My ideal presenter of any sort of arts programme is an unseen one, i.e. a voice, as in the excellent Nupen films. One does not really need a person seen travelling from place to place and pointing at things when cameras are there to do the pointing. However, given that the Beeb feels that the only way to 'engage' [can't you just hear them using that word?] its audience is to have an eccentric cavorting, then maybe Waldemar is sufficiently wacky to be acceptable. I mean, he isn't a hunk with three-day designer stubble. He isn't (obviously) a mindless bimbo. He is a blob. But he is knowledgeable on his subject, and though his way of delivering slightly shocking one-liners makes him a sort of Jeremy Clarkson of The Arts, one feels he brings occasional new insights into familiar subjects.

You just have to get over the talking-backwards-over-his-shoulder thing.

I must admit that when he began talking about Neptune's testicles, I just wished we still had Sister Wendy doing her stuff. Now that would be engaging.

[MrGongGong]

It's interesting how many people don't seem to like television and want to make it into something else.

[Thropplenoggin]

It's interesting how many people don't seem to like television and want to make it into something else.

In what way? By having voice-overs instead of arm-wagglers? Go back a few years and this was the norm, before 'personality'/'celebrity'-driven docs became mandatory, like sending renowned zoologist Ross Kemp to look at polar bears.

[ardcarp]

It's interesting how many people don't seem to like television and want to make it into something else.

Such as?

[mercia]

this was Clark on Rococo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DhxgQsfPwIA

[Richard Tarleton]

In what way? By having voice-overs instead of arm-wagglers? Go back a few years and this was the norm, before 'personality'/'celebrity'-driven docs became mandatory, like sending renowned zoologist Ross Kemp to look at polar bears.

The fashion for sending celebs to look at wildlife may be recent, Throppers, but expert on-screen presenters are as old as wildlife broadcasting itself - Cousteau, Hans and Lotte Haas, Armand and Micaela Denis, Attenborough himself....voice-overs in wildlife broadcasting on the other hand are often by actors reading a script, usually Stephen Fry , with no particular understanding of what they're reading out. On-screen presenters are always going to be a matter of taste, Sister Wendy remains a mystery to me . I think Waldemar, A G-D etc are part of a great tradition going back to Kenneth Clark and possibly beyond......