Someone on Ask.fm suggested that I take the time to watch the famous documentary series by Kenneth Clark on the development and artistic history of Western Civilization. I’d previously only seen segments of it. I’m not finished yet, but am halfway through.
Most of it’s easy to find on Youtube via this playlist, but the first episode can be rough to find thanks to a DMCA takedown from our friends at the BBC.
Thankfully, there’s a version of it buried in the search results (due to a shoddy text description) which I’ve linked to below for your convenience:
This reminds me of the good bits of taking an art history course, along with the pleasure of traveling around Europe (which I haven’t been able to do for a long time now). For those of you unfamiliar with this, it’s a series of films from 1968 in which the presenter goes about discussing the development of European civilization after the collapse of the Roman Empire.
The first episode in particular is worth watching for Clark’s articulated perspective (second-hand, I’m sure) that part of what makes civilization different is the motive force of feeling and belief in the essential goodness and excellence of that civilization. What also differentiates it from barbaric social forms is that the people actually believe in it enough to build rather permanent and beautiful structures. Barbarians roam, but civilized people settle. The artifacts that barbarians leave behind tend to be portable and durable — gem-encrusted talismans, jewelry, and statuettes. Civilized people leave behind fragile things, exquisite books, towering buildings, and heroic statuary.
Part of what makes modernity strange is that, although technology renders it super-capable in some ways, many of the things that we build lack permanence and beauty. The people are also enervated, with few honestly believing in the core spirit of that civilization. Sadness, depression, and madness emanate from a people sapped of meaning to their lives. When people can readily come to a satisfying answer about what their life is fundamentally for, they become far more animated, in a way that tends to leave indelible marks on history.
This series also leads inevitably to thoughts about the disposable nature of most contemporary artifacts and art. Our surroundings, buildings, and most of our possessions tend to lack both permanence and lasting purpose.
I found a set of used CDs….I’ve been working through it, I have one episode left. It’s outstanding as an overview, and I endorse the recommendation.
It’s interesting to me that the only American mention in the whole series is Jefferson’s Monticello (in the episode on the Age of Reason). It’s indicative of the relative mediocrity of American culture at its best. Oscar Wilde said that America passed from barbarism to decadence, skipping civilization.
Clark also says in (part 6 I think) that there is no distinctly Protestant architecture, and with some good reason.
The US did give the world the skyscraper, but unfortunately, I think that art peaked with the Chrysler Building. If the US had stayed on the tack set by the 1893 World Fair, maybe we would’ve gotten somewhere. Once we got to the 1930s everything was sort of terrible after that. For example, the Grand Central Terminal was completed in 1913. Don’t think there’s anything as impressive built after that.
No poets write about the glories of technology. Except maybe Carl Sandburg. Didn’t he write an Ode to a Skyscraper?
Ayn Rand was certainly a huge fan of skyscrapers, unadorned geometry, and Frank Gehry. Certainly no poet there. Socialist Realism did a lot of techno-glorification, but that only survives at kitsch to decorate the homes of Obama supporters.
It really does fit with the Roger Scruton book & video on beauty, which I highly recommend for those who haven’t seen them (thanks Henry for reviewing them).
Americans not only seem not to care about beauty, but they have, as Mencken caustically put it, a positiveLibido for the Ugly.
Kunstler’s Eyesore of the Month is must reading for those who hate our soul-killing landscape. He writes some good anti-ugliness polemics.
Yes he does. I also enjoyed “Geography of Nowhere.” Also, American ugliness seems to become worse as time goes on. Many industrial brick buildings from the middle of the century and earlier have a charm and scale to them, whereas everyone hates the shit from the 1970s.
I love this series! I would also highly recommend the James Burke documentaries (Connections, The Day The Universe Changed), The Story of English, and The Ascent of Man (Jacob Bronowski). These were all produced by the BBC and are quite wonderful to watch. I think they’re all on YouTube or at least they were a few years ago.
The only thing I’m not sure if I agree with you on is if civilization indeed has real permanence, or if decay is inevitable and our hopes for permanence are a sign of hubris. It always reminds me of this Shelley poem:
“I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: “Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
`My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!’
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away”
Eternity is central to Christianity, and with our civilization’s loss of faith you’d think the hope of eternity would be placed somewhere else. Nope, it’s cheap plastic junk all the way down. Maybe it’s that our society diverts people from thinking about death, so it doesn’t have to give us any answers about death.
I think it’s time for me to kill a guy, strip the flesh from his bones, and turn his head into a paperweight. Pretty sure that’s the tradition, right?
I guess the money ends up going to the BBC, which is bad, but doesn’t it say something when you speak with your money and actually buy the DVDs for this series? I did.
Yes, it does. The BBC is probably getting a cut of the ad revenue through TrueView on Youtube. If they aren’t, they just have to send an e-mail to someone at Google.
The BBC could also host the video on their site, which it seems that they used to, but it has been suspended or something.
Look for a used set on Amazon. The Beeb gets no additional money from that transaction.
I just watched the final episode, and Clark gets downright polemical at times, with a couple of laugh-out-loud moments (“I confess, I am a stick in the mud”). It’s not a pleasant episode at all, it’s so dissonant with the rest of the series, ominous and sinister. The artists have been replaced by engineers and scientists. No happy ending here!
Kenneth Clark’s comments on Rousseau were HILARIOUS!
Modern man (men and women) are like the bratty selfish 4th generation of super rich. Squandering their inheritance as fast as they can, as everyone stands around watching, anticipating each catastrophe.
Similarly the whole world is watching the West now, slowly but predictably falling off her perch built up over the last 1000 years or so.
They know it, but I’m not sure that we do.