Art of Germany

- Season 1

(2010)

Andrew Graham-Dixon begins his exploration of German art by looking at the rich and often neglected art of the German middle ages and Renaissance. He visits the towering cathedral of Cologne, a place which encapsulates the varied and often contradictory character of German art. In Munch he gets to grips with the earliest paintings of the Northern Renaissance, the woodcuts of Albrecht Durer and the cosmic visions of the painter Albrecht Altdorfer. Andrew also embarks on a tour of the Bavarian countryside, discovering some of the little-known treasures of German ...

Andrew Graham-Dixon looks at how artists were at the forefront of Germany's drive to become a single nation during the 19th century. He visits the coastal town Greifswald, the birthplace of influential landscape artist Caspar David Friedrich, and explores the art of the Prussian state, which spearheaded the unification of Germany in 1871. The episode ends with the outbreak of the World War I and the attempts of artists Franz Marc and Otto Dix to rationalise its catastrophic experiences.

Andrew Graham-Dixon concludes his exploration of German art by investigating the dark and difficult times of the 20th century. Dominating the landscape is the figure of Adolf Hitler - failed artist, would-be architect and obsessed with the aesthetics of his 1,000-year Reich. In a series of extraordinary building projects and exhibitions, Hitler waged a propaganda war against every kind of modern art as a prelude to unleashing total war on the whole of Europe.