Style Wars

When director Tony Silver and co-producer Henry Chalfant delivered the broadcast version of their prize-winning film to PBS in 1983, the world received its first full immersion in the phenomenon that had taken over New York City. The urban landscape was physically transformed by graffiti artists who invented a new visual language to express both their individuality, and the voice of their community. In STYLE WARS, New York's ramshackle subway system is their public playground, battleground, and spectacular artistic canvas. As MC's, DJ's and B-boys rock the city with new sounds and new moves, we see street corner breakdance battles turn into performance art.

The Genius of Mozart

An enlightening and enveloping reconstruction of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's (1756--1791) life. Masterfully written and directed, every aspect of the film has been given thorough thought in order to ensure an accurate historical reconstruction. Inspirational performances from the main actors and actresses foster captivation, while regular narrative interjections from the popular composer and conductor Charles Hazlewood brings an insightful, educational dimension. The story begins with the composer's father Leopold with whom Mozart conducted a passionate and tortured correspondence. It is Leopold who knows Mozart's secrets. And there is another voice: that of the music itself. Music is the key to unlocking the emotions of Mozart, starting in this film with the great piano works. Without this key, how can we ever understand the emotions that gave birth to some of the most beautiful sounds the world has ever heard? The first great phase of Mozart's brief life was that of the travelling child prodigy - gifted as a performer and writer of music - who grew into the genius who, working within the restrictions of his time, began to rewrite the musical rules. But there was another facet to Mozart - the adult thinker aware of the bigger picture, passionately attached to the progressive values of the Enlightenment - impressively well-read, a speaker of most European languages (even a little English), an Austrian Catholic, a Freemason and above all a composer at the height of his formidable powers, determined to succeed in the most difficult and lucrative area of all - Opera.

Leonardo Da Vinci

This is the story of one of the greatest minds in history. An artist, scientist, engineer, visionary and all-round genius, Leonardo Da Vinci (1452--1519) was arguably the main figure of the Renaissance. Over three gripping episodes, this docudrama from the BBC reconstructs the life of Leonardo from early boyhood to death. Each episode is infused with brilliant academic commentary and includes the building and testing of some of Leonardo's inventions, including his tank, hang glider, underwater suit, and parachute. Did these amazing concepts work as Leonardo intended?

The Genius of Beethoven

A powerful, moving and accurate docudrama based on the life of Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827). Paul Rhys's masterful portrayal of Beethoven is particularly noteworthy, doing well to vividly convey the isolation and despair Beethoven experienced throughout his life, while insightful narration from the popular conductor, composer and presenter Charles Hazlewood does well to add a sophisticated educational dimension to the series. Beethoven was the grandson of a musician of Flemish origin who was also named Ludwig van Beethoven (1712–1773). The elder Ludwig was employed as a bass singer at the court of the Elector of Cologne, rising to become Kapellmeister (music director). He had one son, Johann van Beethoven (1740–1792), who worked as a tenor in the same musical establishment, also giving lessons on piano and violin to supplement his income. Johann married Maria Magdalena Keverich in 1767; she was the daughter of Johann Heinrich Keverich, who had been the head chef at the court of the Archbishopric of Trier. House of birth, Bonn, Bonngasse 20, now the Beethoven-Haus museum. Beethoven was born of this marriage in Bonn, probably on 16 December 1770, and baptized the next day. Children of that era were usually baptized the day after birth, but there is no documentary evidence that this occurred in Beethoven's case.

Impressionism: Revenge of the Nice

Matthew Collings has a wonderfully simple and funny way of making you understand the when, where, why and how of important is art so this programme will get your head around impressionism in a couple of hours. Matthew Collings will reappraise the Impressionists. The four stars are Courbet, Manet, Monet and Cezanne. In two hours their stories and their art will intertwine. Matt will unpack the principles of Impressionism - the strength of color, the flatness, the patterning and the way in which ordinary life is pictured with startling truth - and argue that this is the best thing that has ever happened in modern art. He will also show that although the contemporary art world seemingly despises Impressionism it is only because of Impressionism that the avant-garde came to be.

Infamy

Infamy is an intense journey into the dangerous lives and obsessed minds of six of America’s most prolific graffiti artists. Directed by acclaimed filmmaker Doug Pray (Hype and Scratch) who teamed up with writer, publisher, and graffiti guru Roger Gastman, the movie takes you deep into the world of street legends Saber, Toomer, Jase, Claw, Earsnot, and Enem. With brutal honesty, humor and charisma, these artists reveal why they are so willing to risk everything to spray paint their cities with "tags," “throwups,” and full-color murals. You'll also meet Joe "THE GRAFFITI GUERRILLA" Connolly, a notorious "buffer" who paints out graffiti on his neighborhood’s walls with a vengeance matched only by those who vandalized them. From the streets of the South Bronx to the solitude of a San Francisco tunnel, from high atop a Hollywood billboard to North Philadelphia for a lesson in "Philly-style tags," from the Mexican border to a Cleveland train yard, Infamy doesn't analyze or glorify graffiti... it takes you there and brings it to life.

James Bond: The True Story

Author Ian Fleming wanted his suave secret agent to be the ultimate spy – but who provided the inspiration for Bond? This film reveals Fleming’s wartime service in naval intelligence and profiles two men who could have supplied the basis for Bond’s character. On February 17th 1952, Ian Fleming sat down at his typewriter in Jamaica to write the spy story to end all spy stories. The central character of this story would become one of the world’s best-known and best-loved fictional creations: James Bond. Fleming would go on to write 12 novels featuring his super spy – each one an exciting blend of intrigue, escapism, sex and violence. Bond’s popularity leaped when US president John F Kennedy declared himself a fan of the book "From Russia with Love", but it was the start of the film series in 1961 that truly assured 007’s place in the big time. It is estimated that half the population of the world has seen a James Bond film, while Fleming’s books have sold over 100 million copies. But is James Bond purely a fairytale? Can a 43-year-old former journalist with a liking for scrambled eggs, cigarettes and vodka martinis simply conjure up a fictitious character that has stood the test of time, without having some foundation in reality? Fleming’s wartime career in naval intelligence saw him become intimately acquainted with the ways of the secret service, and he embarked on numerous top-secret missions to the US, France, Spain and North Africa. The events that occurred during this little-known period of Fleming’s life informed and influenced every aspect of Bond: his world, his women and his adventures. Henry Chancellor, author of a book on Bond, believes Fleming "may have written fiction, but 95% of it was based on fact that had been filtered through the prism of his imagination and then polished up a bit".

This Is Modern Art

This Is Modern Art was a series written and presented by the English art critic Matthew Collings. The series won several awards including a BAFTA. It became popular both because of its sometimes jokey and sometimes thoughtful explanations of the work and attitude of a new wave of artists that had recently been publicized in the British mass media, and because of its author's witty and irreverent, though clearly highly informed, commentary style. Collings went on to create several more TV series and programmes for Channel 4, including Impressionism: Revenge of The Nice, and This Is Civilisation. Focuses on the current state of modern art, and looks back at Picasso, Jackson Pollock and Andy Warhol to see how they changed the definition of art. Reveals the ways modern art attempts to shock the audience. Investigates on whether the once accepted view of art as merely a thing of beauty prevails today, examining the works of various artists.

The Genius of Design

Documentary series exploring the history of design. The first episode of this new series tells the fascinating story of the birth of industrial design. Alongside the celebrated names, from Wedgwood to William Morris, it also explores the work of the anonymous designers responsible for prosaic but classic designs for cast-iron cooking pots to sheep shears - harbingers of a breed of industrially produced objects culminating in the Model T Ford. Includes interviews with legendary designer Dieter Rams and J Mays, Ford Motors' global head of design. In the crisis-stricken decades of the 1920s and 1930s, with the world at the tipping point between two global wars, design suggested dramatically different ideas about the shape of things to come, from the radical futurism of the Bauhaus to the British love affair with mock-Tudor architecture and the three-piece suite. The Genius of Design examines the Second World War through the prism of the rival war machines designed and built in Germany, Britain, the USSR and the USA, with each casting a fascinating sidelight on the ideological priorities of the nations and regimes which produced them. The story of design enters the 50s and 60s, when a revolutionary new material called plastic combined with the miracles of electronic miniaturization to allow designers to offer post-war consumers something new: liberation. Picking up the story of design from the drab days of the late 70s, the final episode tracks the explosion of wild creativity that defined the 'designer decades' of the 80s and early 90s. By addressing wants rather than needs and allying themselves to the blatant consumerism of 'retail culture' designers emerged from the backrooms to claim a starring role in the shaping of modern life.

The Legend of Leigh Bowery

The Legend of Leigh Bowery is an in-depth and revealing tribute to an outrageous and outlandish artist. Whether he was making headdresses out of toilet seats, or giving birth to a full-grown woman in a nightclub, Bowery defined London's culture of outrage and influenced a generation of artists and designers on both sides of the Atlantic. He was also the muse and model for preeminent British painter Lucian Freud. Features appearances by Boy George, Damian Hirst, Bella Freud, Michael Clark, Rifat Ozbek and many others. He designed costumes and performed with the enfante terrible of British dance Michael Clark, designed one of a kind outrageous costumes and creations for himself, ran one of the most outrageous clubs of 1980s London club scene Taboo (later immortalized in Boy George's Broadway musical).

Ai Weiwei: Without Fear or Favour

Arts documentary, first broadcast before Ai Weiwei's arrest by the Chinese authorities in April 2011, and his subsequent release after being detained for 11 weeks. Architect, photographer, curator and blogger, Ai Weiwei is China's most famous and politically outspoken contemporary artist. Alan Yentob explores the story of Ai Weiwei's life and art, and reveals how this most courageous and determined of artists continues to fight for artistic freedom of expression while living under the restrictive shadows of authoritarian rule.

Darling! The Pieter-Dirk Uys Story

Controversial South African political satirist Pieter-Dirk Uys allows writer/director Julian Shaw into his previously off-limits inner world. The result is a startling document of Pieter's work educating school children about their country's greatest threat, HIV/AIDS, and an unforgettable portrait of the power of individual will. Entertainer, female impersonator, political satirist and sex educator: Peter-Dirk Uys is a man of many faces. A hero to thousands of South African children — and friend to Bishop Desmond Tutu and Nelson Mandela — he is also somewhat of an enigma. Believing that he can help to prevent South Africa’s teenagers from joining the ranks of the estimated 5.5 million citizens with the virus, Uys travels the country wowing students of all backgrounds, flagrantly raising the most taboo subjects. Shaw was so taken by the man that he took it upon himself to make a film about a fearless man with a mission — and a mandate.

A World of Art: The Metropolitan Museum of Art

What makes a masterpiece? In this visually stunning high definition production, A World of Art, the magnificence of America's premier art museum lights up the screen. One of the architectural glories of New York, the Met stretches 1000 feet along Fifth Avenue. Inside is a dazzling three dimensional encyclopedia of world art, radiating 5,000 years of artistic history. Founded in 1870, the Metropolitan Museum of Art was built on the shoulders of capitalism: J.P. Morgan, Havemeyer, Lehman, Rockefeller, and Annenberg are just a few of the names behind the Met's collections. Met is the largest art museum in the United States with among the most significant art collections. Its permanent collection contains more than two million works, divided among nineteen curatorial departments. The main building, located on the eastern edge of Central Park along Manhattan's Museum Mile, is by area one of the world's largest art galleries. Represented in the permanent collection are works of art from classical antiquity and Ancient Egypt, paintings and sculptures from nearly all the European masters, and an extensive collection of American and modern art. The Met also maintains extensive holdings of African, Asian, Oceanic, Byzantine, and Islamic art. The museum is also home to encyclopedic collections of musical instruments, costumes and accessories, and antique weapons and armor from around the world. Several notable interiors, ranging from 1st-century Rome through modern American design, are permanently installed in the Met's galleries.

John Lasseter: A Day in a Life

This is a day in the life of the Hawaiian shirt-obsessed godfather of Pixar who revolutionized the animation industry. John Alan Lasseter is an American animator, film director and the chief creative officer at Pixar and Walt Disney Animation Studios. He is also currently the Principal Creative Advisor for Walt Disney Imagineering. Lasseter's first job was with The Walt Disney Company, where he became an animator. Next, he joined Lucasfilm, where he worked on the then-groundbreaking use of CGI animation. After the Graphics Group of the Computer Division of Lucasfilm was sold to Steve Jobs and became Pixar in 1986, Lasseter oversaw all of Pixar's films and associated projects as executive producer.

The History of Grand Theft Auto

An in depth look into the conception, development, and continued growth of the industry's biggest open world action series, Grand Theft Auto. Today, Rockstar Games is a world renowned brand and a household name for millions of gamers. But the massive franchise that continues to change and impact the industry had very small beginnings. Grand Theft Auto, officially abbreviated to GTA, is a video game series primarily developed by Rockstar North (formerly DMA Design) and published by Rockstar Games. The name of the series is derived from grand theft auto, a term referring to motor vehicle theft. The series has won multiple awards, and is named as one of the most universally acclaimed gaming franchises, with Grand Theft Auto III and IV considered as two of the most revolutionary and critically acclaimed video games of all time.

Jim McVicker: A Way of Seeing

There are few communities in the United States more majestic than Kayenta. Located in southern Utah, Kayenta is distinguished by its glorious natural vistas. The clay-colored landscape, rolling prairies, and imposing red rock cliffs inspire a feeling of inner peace bordering on the spiritual. The sumptuously photographed documentary Kayenta tells the story of this developing desert dreamland and the people who populate it. When developer Terry Marten first happened upon the area in 1968, he was immediately taken by its heart-pounding beauty. He was soon taken by a wild notion. What would it be like to live there? For most, life in the desert is an illogical proposition. But armed with a skill for innovative design and a passion for nature, Marten worked to realize the area's untapped potential. The key was to imbue each home with the sense of having been birthed from the land itself. This translated into structures that were built low to the ground with exteriors colored in darkened earth tones. It required areas in the home that were cleverly shaded from the sun, and a reliance on solar energy. Marten constructed his first residence in the desert in 1982, and it set the template for all that was to come. Striking, but not gaudy or ostentatious, the building allowed for magnificent views of the surrounding vistas, and appeared as though it belonged in its natural environment. Today, his impractical decades-long dream has blossomed into a community of over 500 homes. The film introduces us to several of the residents, and discovers their motivations for choosing to live there. Each of them relishes the opportunity to escape from the chaos of city life. They find grace in the 360 degree views, the cradle that the mountains provide, and in the delicacies of light and shadow. Their spacious desert homes feel secluded and private, yet the sense of community among their fellow residents is strong. The breathtaking aesthetics attract a variety of artists to the area - all of whom interpret the environment through the filter of their own unique styles. With its appealing score and appreciation for the transformative magic of architecture, Kayenta is an intensely pleasurable and soothing experience.

What Makes Art Valuable?

What makes a piece of art worth tens of millions dollars at auction? A number of things, but not always the things you'd think. BBC's The World's Most Expensive Paintings chronicles the world's ten most valuable paintings, by way of journalist Alastair Sooke's guided tour of the collectors, locales, and Christie's and Sotheby's auction houses that link these great pieces of art together. One of the more intriguing phenomena touched on in the film is the concept of provenance, which is the added value a piece of art has above and beyond what it otherwise would be worth due to the prestige and/or wealth of its previous owners. A painting previously owned by David Rockefeller, an example covered in the lower half of the top ten list, can and does fetch considerably more than a comparable piece without the same ownership track record. Arne Glimcher, a renowned art dealer, states: The whole thing of art and money is ridiculous. The value of a painting at auction is not necessarily the value of a painting. It is the value of two people bidding against each other, because they really want the painting. The value of the works covered range from a "lowly" Rothko piece that sold for $72M, to a Picasso that had been whereabouts unknown for fifty years for $106.4M in 2010. Sooke strays from the focal point of the film - art and money - to shed some light on the world where these two things change hands in such mythical fashion. He takes us inside auction rooms at Sotheby's and similar houses and shows us the process that buyers, and more often their well-compensated art buying representatives, go through in acquiring this caliber of artwork. Christopher Burge, an auctioneer with one of the more impressive resumes in the business, tells many a story and takes us through the auctions from his perspective. Sooke even haphazardly conducts a "small" auction himself, flanked by Burge overseeing it. One of many insider stories from Burge tells of a Picasso that sold in 1990, amidst global financial duress, that somehow defied the fiscal apprehensions that otherwise dried up so many other markets.

Atari: Game Over

How do you go from the fastest growing company in the history of the United States to a debt-infested and dissolved empire in less than a decade? With the release of Pong in the late 1970's, Atari established a firm grasp on the video game market, and practically monopolized the industry by releasing one influential best-selling title after another. They epitomized the American success story through innovation, hard work and by producing a series of stellar cutting-edge products that appealed to the masses. But by the mid-1980's, the video game behemoth was no more. What went wrong? The wildly entertaining new documentary Atari: Game Over has a theory, and it's one that's shared by countless video game geeks all over the world. Anticipating a massive reception to Steven Spielberg's blockbuster film E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial prior to its initial release, Atari programmer Howard Warshaw was commissioned to create a video game tie-in within five weeks. The project represented a mammoth task for Warshaw, and an investment of tens of millions of dollars for the company. The game's eventual release was met with a deafening thud, and its failure to ignite the marketplace has long been cited as the beginning of the end for Atari. Whether warranted or not, this history has spawned an urban legend of sorts for gamers over the years, a scenario made even more delicious with the rumor that Atari dumped hundreds of video games in a New Mexico landfill upon going out of business, including many returned cartridges of the ill-fated E.T. title. Atari: Game Over splits its attention between the story of the company itself, as told by those who lived through its meteoric rise and fall, and an ambitious excavation of the landfill where a valuable piece of nerd history is thought to be buried. The film's tone is one of warm and playful nostalgia, but it's also characterized by an undercurrent of melancholy. For the spectators who stand on the sidelines of the landfill and await word on whether the precious loot has been uncovered, the excavation represents more than just the demise of a beloved company; it seems to mark an end to the innocence of their adolescence.

Kayenta

There are few communities in the United States more majestic than Kayenta. Located in southern Utah, Kayenta is distinguished by its glorious natural vistas. The clay-colored landscape, rolling prairies, and imposing red rock cliffs inspire a feeling of inner peace bordering on the spiritual. The sumptuously photographed documentary Kayenta tells the story of this developing desert dreamland and the people who populate it. When developer Terry Marten first happened upon the area in 1968, he was immediately taken by its heart-pounding beauty. He was soon taken by a wild notion. What would it be like to live there? For most, life in the desert is an illogical proposition. But armed with a skill for innovative design and a passion for nature, Marten worked to realize the area's untapped potential. The key was to imbue each home with the sense of having been birthed from the land itself. This translated into structures that were built low to the ground with exteriors colored in darkened earth tones. It required areas in the home that were cleverly shaded from the sun, and a reliance on solar energy. Marten constructed his first residence in the desert in 1982, and it set the template for all that was to come. Striking, but not gaudy or ostentatious, the building allowed for magnificent views of the surrounding vistas, and appeared as though it belonged in its natural environment. Today, his impractical decades-long dream has blossomed into a community of over 500 homes. The film introduces us to several of the residents, and discovers their motivations for choosing to live there. Each of them relishes the opportunity to escape from the chaos of city life. They find grace in the 360 degree views, the cradle that the mountains provide, and in the delicacies of light and shadow. Their spacious desert homes feel secluded and private, yet the sense of community among their fellow residents is strong. The breathtaking aesthetics attract a variety of artists to the area - all of whom interpret the environment through the filter of their own unique styles. With its appealing score and appreciation for the transformative magic of architecture, Kayenta is an intensely pleasurable and soothing experience.

Les Barbares de la culture

Is art dead, or is its definition merely evolving? In Cultural Barbarians, an intriguing episode of the acclaimed VPRO Backlight series, we witness a collective of modern-day artists as they grapple with this question, and search for means of creative expression that transcend paint on a canvas or a carefully crafted phrase in a book. Art's ability to reflect our world has been challenged in the face of shortened attention spans and the widening divide between the rich and the poor. The top tier works are often viewed as investments, and not profound expressions meant for display. The super wealthy can purchase a Picasso for tens of millions of dollars only to shutter it within secluded steel vaults. Meanwhile, for the general public, the great works of art throughout history seem less relevant to their daily existence than ever before. Citizens of the world aren't often encouraged to interact with these works or given the tools to uncover personal meaning within them. Can art truly sustain itself in a culture that is increasingly drawn to the flash of celebrity, the artificial facade of glamour and the next disposable trend? In this face of the conundrum, a new generation of artists is trying a different approach. The architectural collective Assemble Is just one such example featured in the film. In 2015, this group of young artists won the prestigious Turner prize for their plans to refurbish living quarters in an underprivileged district of Liverpool. By moving from the sanctified halls of museum galleries to common everyday living spaces, Assemble has successfully challenged the purpose of art in the modern world. Additional subjects in the film, including author Alessandro Baricco, philosopher Timothy Morton, and several noted visual artists, express a need to embrace the new digital age, more proactively reflect global ills such as climate change, and work to expand art's relevancy through works of social engagement and activism. Critics and other detractors will continue to debate whether these efforts are truly representative of creative artistic expression. Regardless, Cultural Barbarians makes it clear that art is alive and well, and that it’s still capable of changing the world.