Culture

Civilizations

Survey the history of art, from antiquity to the present, on a global scale. Civilizations reveals the role art and creative imagination have played in forging humanity, and introduce viewers to works of beauty, ingenuity and illumination across cultures. Liev Schreiber narrates.

What Is Art Good For?

52m 50s

Explore art in the age of revolution, war and profound scientific change and consider the question: Should art create a separate realm, a place of escape, or should it plunge into the chaos, transforming the way we see and live in the world?

Episodes

  • What Is Art Good For?: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    What Is Art Good For?

    S1 E9 - 52m 50s

    Explore art in the age of revolution, war and profound scientific change and consider the question: Should art create a separate realm, a place of escape, or should it plunge into the chaos, transforming the way we see and live in the world?

  • The Cult of Progress: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    The Cult of Progress

    S1 E8 - 53m 18s

    Examine the rise and fall of “progress” as an ideology, and see how the “civilizing” project that arose from Enlightenment ideas was fraught with contradictions that troubled European artists in different ways.

  • Color and Light: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    Color and Light

    S1 E7 - 52m 44s

    Explore the story of light and color in art - both in the search for greater realism and spiritual ecstasy. Journey from Gothic cathedrals and Indian courtly painting to modern art.

  • Paradise on Earth: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    Paradise on Earth

    S1 E6 - 53m

    Explore one of humanity’s deepest artistic urges: the depiction of nature. But landscape painting is seldom a straightforward portrayal of observed nature; it's a projection of dreams, idylls, escapes and refuges—the elusive paradise on earth.

  • Renaissances: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    Renaissances

    S1 E5 - 53m 20s

    Travel east and west to explore the connections and rivalries between Renaissance Italy and the Islamic empires that experienced their own cultural flowering in the 15th and 16th centuries. Both spheres were open to influences flowing both ways.

  • Encounters: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    Encounters

    S1 E4 - 53m 30s

    See how advances in seafaring and a thirst for trade and exploration sent human beings around the planet. Distant and disparate cultures met for the first time, and art became the great interface by which civilizations understood each other.

  • God and Art: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    God and Art

    S1 E3 - 53m 20s

    Trace the relationship between religion and art, which has inspired some of the most ingenious, affecting, majestic and breathtaking works of art ever made. Yet beneath great works of religious art often lie conflict, intrigue and divine mysteries.

  • How Do We Look?: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    How Do We Look?

    S1 E2 - 53m 20s

    Explore the many functions of the human image in art. Portraits, paintings and sculptures, both life-size and colossal, perform a role—assuaging loss, expressing strength, inspiring fear—and were instrumental in depicting the human body today.

  • The Second Moment of Creation: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    The Second Moment of Creation

    S1 E1 - 53m

    Examine the formative role of art and the creative imagination in the forging of humanity itself. Images and artifacts found in Africa, Asia, Europe, Australia and South America testify to the urge to develop civilizations. Liev Schreiber narrates.

Extras + Features

  • Encounters: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    Episode 4 Preview | Encounters

    S1 E4 - 30s

    See how advances in seafaring and a thirst for trade and exploration sent human beings around the planet. Distant and disparate cultures met for the first time, and art became the great interface by which civilizations understood each other.

  • Montezuma and Cortes: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    Montezuma and Cortes

    S1 E4 - 4m 8s

    As the Spanish met the Aztecs in Central America, the riches intended to buy off the Spanish only intensified their lust for gold and conquest.

  • God and Art: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    Episode 3 Preview | God and Art

    S1 E3 - 30s

    Trace the relationship between religion and art, which has inspired some of the most ingenious, affecting, majestic and breathtaking works of art ever made. Yet beneath great works of religious art often lie conflict, intrigue and divine mysteries.

  • New Forms of Spirituality: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    New Forms of Spirituality

    S1 E3 - 4m 5s

    Today, especially in the West, art has found new ways to engage with our spiritual impulses, even when the audience is often secular.

  • The Lion Man: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    The Lion Man

    S1 E3 - 1m 40s

    One of the oldest objects of an imaginary being ever discovered, it was carved over hundreds of painstaking hours.

  • The Day of the Dead: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    The Day of the Dead

    S1 E3 - 1m 42s

    The Conquistadors attempted to eradicate all traces of indigenous Mexican culture and religion. But some glimmers of its past artistic and creative impulses remained.

  • The Sacred Mountain: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    The Sacred Mountain

    S1 E3 - 2m 58s

    One of the most spectacular places where the symbolism of the sacred mountain has been turned into a work of art is found deep in the jungle interior of Cambodia.

  • The Most Enduring Art Form: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    The Most Enduring Art Form

    S1 E2 - 1m 39s

    Our compulsion to create images of ourselves is one of the most intimate and defining statements on who we think we are.

  • Recording Social Norms: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    Recording Social Norms

    S1 E2 - 38s

    Though it may have been an unintended consequence, Athenian vase painters recorded and then re-enforced ideas of what wives were meant to do.

  • How Do We Look?: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    Episode 2 Preview | How Do We Look?

    S1 E2 - 30s

    Explore the many functions of the human image in art. Portraits, paintings and sculptures, both life-size and colossal, perform a role—assuaging loss, expressing strength, inspiring fear—and were instrumental in depicting the human body today.

WETA Passport

Stream tens of thousands of hours of your PBS and local favorites with WETA Passport whenever and wherever you want. Catch up on a single episode or binge-watch full seasons before they air on TV.