Simon Schama's History of Now
2022 · Documentary
In his most personal project to date, Simon Schama looks back at the dramatic history that has played out in his lifetime. Best known for writing history, he has lived a fair bit of it too. Born in 1945, on the night of the bombing of Dresden, Simon grew up as part of a generation determined to rebuild the world from the ashes of war. In this film, he reveals the stories of artists and writers who have been at the forefront of the fight for truth and democracy, often at great personal cost.
Episodes
1. Truth and Democracy60m · Simon opens the film with Picasso’s Guernica. Painted in 1937, in response to the bombing of a small town by the Nazis in the Spanish Civil War, no work of art has so powerfully captured the true horror of civilian bombings. Ever since, Picasso’s masterpiece has stood as a testament to the power of art to preserve the historical record and to speak truth to power.
2. Equality60m · Simon Schama explores the artists at the vanguard of the fight for equality in the decades after the Second World War. He revisits his childhood as a Jewish boy in Southend and his memories of seeing James Baldwin debate William Buckley at the Cambridge Union, explores the story behind Nina Simone's classic civil rights song Mississippi Goddam, and meets Coleman Woodson Junior, who was part of the historic Selma to Montgomery march in 1965.
3. The Price of Plenty60m · After the Second World War, there were deep divisions in America about how to move forward. Should it be a social democracy, in which a benevolent state would look after its most vulnerable citizens? Or should it put its faith in individual enterprise and the free market to provide plenty for all?
Simon Schama examines how the filmmaker Charlie Chaplin and author Ayn Rand created radically different visions of how this new postwar world should work, and how writers such as Rachel Carson drew attention to the damage being inflicted on the natural world. He talks to author Margaret Atwood about how Carson inspired her own work and to photographer Edward Burtynsky about his photographic projects to document haunting images of the pursuit of consumerism.More Like This
Big Sky, Big Dreams, Big Art: Made in the USA
2018
A history of American art with Waldemar Januszczak
More info →
The Art Mysteries with Waldemar Januszczak
2020 · ★ 7.3
Art historian Waldemar Januszczak uncovers the secret meanings hidden within some of the greatest paintings by Van Gogh, Gauguin, Cezanne and Seurat .
More info →
Baroque! From St Peter's to St Paul's
2009 · ★ 7.7
In this three-part documentary series Waldemar Januszczak discovers paintings, sculptures and architecture of the Baroque period. Starting from the square of Saint Peter's Basilica in Italy to St Paul's Cathedral in England.
More info →
The Face of Britain by Simon Schama
2015
Simon Schama explores the history of British portraiture, revealing the stories behind the most compelling images in British art and examining the ways portraiture is used to make a statement.
More info →
Lost Women Art
2021 · ★ 8
Women write art history – but in turn are systematically ignored by it. LOST WOMEN ART tells the story of the suppressed female avant-garde and by doing so introduces a new art history.
More info →
Renaissance: The Blood and the Beauty
2024 · ★ 5
The greatest art works of all time - born of war and bloodshed - as rival artists Michelangelo, Leonardo and Raphael compete to craft beauty from chaos. Starring Charles Dance.
More info →
Art of the Western World
★ 10
First broadcast on October 2, 1989, these 18 original 30-minute episodes provide a panorama of 2000 years of architecture, painting and sculpture, and studies the art masterpieces as reflections of the Western culture that produced them.
More info →
Sister Wendy's Story of Painting
1996 · ★ 8.5
Sister Wendy Beckett takes a journey through the history of art in this ten-part series.
More info →