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Art of France: This Is The Modern World

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Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

Art of France: This is the Modern World

21/07/2018 GMT

This Is The Modern World

Art of France

BBC World News - Art of France, This Is The Modern World

Andrew Graham Dixon takes viewers on a stunning visual journey through French art history.

In the final episode of the series, France is changing at a helter-skelter pace and its angry young artists are reinventing how to paint.

In the final episode, Andrew begins with the impressionists. He plunges into one of the most wildly creative periods in the history of art, when France was changing at a rapid pace and angry young artists would reinvent how to paint, finding their muses in the bars, brothels and cabarets of belle epoque Paris and turning the world of art on its head. Monet, Degas and friends launched a febrile conversation about the role of painting in the modern world that would pave the way for just about every modern art movement of note, from the cubists to the Fauves, from the surrealists to the existentialists and from conceptual artists to the abstract expressionists.

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Andrew Graham-Dixon takes viewers on a stunning visual journey through seminal French works of art across the ages, revealing the history and character of a nation.

Andrew Graham-Dixon takes viewers on a stunning visual journey through seminal French works of art across the ages, revealing the history and character of a nation. From the art of absolute power in the 18th century through to modern philosophies reflected in the impressionistic movement, art and history are merged to enlightening effect. The series unlocks the connection between the unification of France and the art of absolute power, reflected in the resplendent Palace of Versailles.

With the French Revolution comes the cult of personality, expressed through artists such as Delacroix. And after the high of the revolution come crushing doubts and uncertainty, all reflected in the art of the time. The series concludes with a look at impressionism, a humanist movement that pushed French art in a bold new direction. Picasso, Corbusier and Sartre all reflect a county in crisis, at a time when France was struggling to decide which way to turn and what future to forge.


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