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The Story of the Royal Collection

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media: Arts

Art historian Andrew Graham-Dixon explores the history of the Royal Collection.

Andrew Graham-Dixon

Caroline de Guitaut

Sophie Gordon

Kathryn Jones

Kajal Meghani

Rosie Razzall

Jonathan Marsden

undefined HRH The Prince of Wales

Judith Winnan

Sebastian Barfield

Stuart Davies

Natasha Martin

Kate Horvath

J Ruth Stevens

Sam Haines

Blair Wallace

Jon Ramsey

The Story of the Royal Collection: Episode Seven

The Story of the Royal Collection - Episode Seven

Episode Seven

BBC World News - The Story of the Royal Collection, Episode Seven

Art ciritic Andrew Graham-Dixon explores how royal collecting has changed.

Art critic Andrew Graham-Dixon finds out how royal collecting has changed since the days of Queen Victoria.


In this programme Art critic Andrew Graham-Dixon finds out how royal collecting has changed since the days of Queen Victoria. This is a story of the British monarchy's remarkable survival, while elsewhere the crown heads of Europe crumbled in the face of world wars and revolutions. But it is also an age when women took charge of royal collecting; from Victoria to Elizabeth II, queens and queen consorts have used art to steady the ship of monarchy during this uncertain age. It's one of the curiosities of the Royal Collection that as the monarchy's power diminished, so too did the objects they collected. Gone were epic canvases, instead came objects of exquisite, delicate and intimate beauty. Andrew marvels at a selection of the royal family's collection of Faberge jewellery - one of the greatest in the world - that includes the Mosaic Egg from 1914. So taken were Edward VII and his wife Queen Alexandria with the works of Peter Carl Faberge, that the jeweller opened a London shop to service the demands of royal clientele. And then there's Queen Mary's Dolls' House - presented to George V's queen to thank her for her steadfastness during the first world war, the Dolls' House is an astonishing artistic collaboration by over 1,500 people and companies, replete with books containing new stories by authors like Arthur Conan Doyle, tiny champagne bottles filled with real champagne and even mini shotguns that can be broken, loaded and fired. More than just a dolls' house, this is a three-dimensional archive of a vanished artistic age.

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