1 00:00:02,960 --> 00:00:06,480 There are many places where you can come face-to-face 2 00:00:06,480 --> 00:00:08,440 with the ancient world, 3 00:00:08,440 --> 00:00:13,640 but I have to say, this is hard to beat. 4 00:00:22,040 --> 00:00:27,560 This colossal stone head is almost 3,000 years old. 5 00:00:27,560 --> 00:00:29,840 It was made by the Olmec, 6 00:00:29,840 --> 00:00:33,040 the earliest civilisation in Central America. 7 00:00:37,000 --> 00:00:39,560 It really is big. 8 00:00:39,560 --> 00:00:42,720 His eyeballs are more than a foot across 9 00:00:42,720 --> 00:00:46,600 and he weighs in at almost 20 tonnes. 10 00:00:46,600 --> 00:00:50,200 Between his lips, you can just about glimpse his teeth. 11 00:00:51,400 --> 00:00:54,720 And his irises are traced out on his eyes, 12 00:00:54,720 --> 00:00:58,000 and he has a furled, slightly frumpy brow. 13 00:00:59,040 --> 00:01:02,800 It's hard not to feel just a little bit moved 14 00:01:02,800 --> 00:01:04,960 by this close encounter 15 00:01:04,960 --> 00:01:08,760 with the image of a person from the distant past. 16 00:01:11,280 --> 00:01:14,680 Since it was unearthed in 1939, 17 00:01:14,680 --> 00:01:17,440 this head has been a real puzzle. 18 00:01:18,720 --> 00:01:20,520 Who does it depict? 19 00:01:20,520 --> 00:01:22,480 Why was it made? 20 00:01:22,480 --> 00:01:25,600 And why just a head? 21 00:01:25,600 --> 00:01:29,320 The Olmec left us very few clues. 22 00:01:29,320 --> 00:01:33,800 But what they did give us is a powerful, in-your-face reminder 23 00:01:33,800 --> 00:01:39,720 that, no matter where in the world, when civilisations first made art, 24 00:01:39,720 --> 00:01:43,000 they made it about us. 25 00:01:46,880 --> 00:01:49,960 I want to explore why that is. 26 00:01:49,960 --> 00:01:53,000 What were those early people doing this for? 27 00:01:54,760 --> 00:01:58,120 What part did images of the body play 28 00:01:58,120 --> 00:02:02,000 in the societies which first created them? 29 00:02:02,000 --> 00:02:05,800 I'm not just going to be concentrating on the artists - 30 00:02:05,800 --> 00:02:07,720 I want to take a different approach. 31 00:02:09,240 --> 00:02:13,760 I'll be trying to see these bodies through the eyes of the people 32 00:02:13,760 --> 00:02:19,840 who lived with them, used them, and looked at them. 33 00:02:19,840 --> 00:02:21,800 And that's not all. 34 00:02:24,080 --> 00:02:30,600 I want to show how one particular way of representing the human body - 35 00:02:30,600 --> 00:02:34,680 one that goes all the way back to ancient Greece - 36 00:02:34,680 --> 00:02:39,200 became more influential than any other, 37 00:02:39,200 --> 00:02:42,880 coming to shape our Western ways of seeing. 38 00:02:44,640 --> 00:02:47,200 And returning in the end to the Olmec, 39 00:02:47,200 --> 00:02:53,800 we'll see how the way we look can confuse and even distort 40 00:02:53,800 --> 00:02:58,400 our understanding of civilisations beyond our own. 41 00:03:40,880 --> 00:03:45,240 Can we ever look through the eyes of people in the distant past? 42 00:03:46,280 --> 00:03:50,440 It's hard, but just occasionally we get the chance. 43 00:03:52,560 --> 00:03:54,800 It was some 2,000 years ago 44 00:03:54,800 --> 00:03:58,680 when the Roman Emperor Hadrian arrived in Thebes 45 00:03:58,680 --> 00:04:00,520 with his entourage. 46 00:04:02,200 --> 00:04:07,160 He'd come for a look-see around the fringes of his empire, 47 00:04:07,160 --> 00:04:10,720 and to take in the wonders of ancient Egypt, 48 00:04:10,720 --> 00:04:13,680 already thousands of years old. 49 00:04:16,080 --> 00:04:20,000 Hadrian was by far the most committed traveller 50 00:04:20,000 --> 00:04:21,840 of all the Roman emperors. 51 00:04:21,840 --> 00:04:23,880 He seems to have got everywhere. 52 00:04:23,880 --> 00:04:26,840 And on this occasion, he wanted to visit 53 00:04:26,840 --> 00:04:31,320 perhaps the most famous heritage site in Egypt, 54 00:04:31,320 --> 00:04:36,200 perhaps the greatest five-star tourist attraction 55 00:04:36,200 --> 00:04:38,600 of the whole of the ancient world. 56 00:04:40,640 --> 00:04:44,360 It wasn't the great pyramids he longed to see, 57 00:04:44,360 --> 00:04:46,720 but these colossal statues. 58 00:04:48,240 --> 00:04:51,000 Made around 1300 BC, 59 00:04:51,000 --> 00:04:55,760 they were originally statues of the Egyptian pharaoh Amenhotep, 60 00:04:55,760 --> 00:04:57,920 marking his tomb. 61 00:04:57,920 --> 00:05:02,120 But over time, their meaning had changed. 62 00:05:02,120 --> 00:05:04,000 And by Hadrian's day, 63 00:05:04,000 --> 00:05:10,680 they were thought to depict a mythical African king, Memnon. 64 00:05:10,680 --> 00:05:13,080 And what had made them such a draw 65 00:05:13,080 --> 00:05:17,400 was that one of the statues could do things no other statues could. 66 00:05:19,240 --> 00:05:22,400 If you were lucky and came early in the morning, 67 00:05:22,400 --> 00:05:26,400 believe it or not, he could sing. 68 00:05:26,400 --> 00:05:31,040 It was a bit like a lyre with a broken string. 69 00:05:31,040 --> 00:05:33,000 And even in its prime, 70 00:05:33,000 --> 00:05:36,800 it couldn't be relied upon to make a sound every day. 71 00:05:36,800 --> 00:05:39,800 It was taken as a very good omen if it did. 72 00:05:41,840 --> 00:05:46,040 What's amazing is that Hadrian's encounter is recorded 73 00:05:46,040 --> 00:05:48,640 thanks to a piece of vandalism. 74 00:05:48,640 --> 00:05:52,800 For ancient tourists, part of the fun was to have their reactions 75 00:05:52,800 --> 00:05:55,320 carved onto the statue's leg. 76 00:05:55,320 --> 00:06:00,800 In Hadrian's party, the vandal was a lady-in-waiting, Julia Balbilla, 77 00:06:00,800 --> 00:06:04,480 who recorded her impressions in Greek verse. 78 00:06:05,880 --> 00:06:09,720 I've waited half my life to be up here, 79 00:06:09,720 --> 00:06:12,800 searching out Balbilla's poetry. 80 00:06:14,320 --> 00:06:16,760 Here is one of the things she wrote, 81 00:06:16,760 --> 00:06:20,160 and in some ways this is the beginning of her diary 82 00:06:20,160 --> 00:06:22,560 of the Memnon experience, 83 00:06:22,560 --> 00:06:26,480 because on this occasion she says that they got here really early 84 00:06:26,480 --> 00:06:28,520 but didn't hear anything. 85 00:06:28,520 --> 00:06:30,480 But there's another one. 86 00:06:30,480 --> 00:06:34,040 It's got Julia Balbilla's name written at the top 87 00:06:34,040 --> 00:06:36,840 and this is a bit more triumphalist 88 00:06:36,840 --> 00:06:41,200 cos here she says her Lord Hadrian actually heard Memnon. 89 00:06:42,720 --> 00:06:45,840 The truth is, it's not great poetry, 90 00:06:45,840 --> 00:06:49,880 but the verses do give us that kind of first-hand glimpse 91 00:06:49,880 --> 00:06:52,720 of what it felt like to be here. 92 00:06:52,720 --> 00:06:55,480 And there's something touching about being able to 93 00:06:55,480 --> 00:06:59,520 tread in the footsteps of Hadrian's party, 94 00:06:59,520 --> 00:07:02,000 to share their gaze, 95 00:07:02,000 --> 00:07:04,800 even if we can't actually hear the singing. 96 00:07:07,400 --> 00:07:12,000 Nobody knows exactly how the sound was made or why it stopped 97 00:07:12,000 --> 00:07:14,520 because the statue is completely silent now. 98 00:07:15,840 --> 00:07:18,920 But one thing I think is clear - 99 00:07:18,920 --> 00:07:22,760 the story of Memnon's statue is a great example 100 00:07:22,760 --> 00:07:26,640 of how images of the human body operate in the world. 101 00:07:26,640 --> 00:07:32,040 Not just as passive objects to be admired or wondered at, 102 00:07:32,040 --> 00:07:37,560 but as players, as part of an interactive, two-way relationship. 103 00:07:37,560 --> 00:07:42,480 Singing might be a rarity, but images often do something. 104 00:07:43,640 --> 00:07:48,280 Even more, the story is a reminder that the history of art 105 00:07:48,280 --> 00:07:51,240 isn't just the history of artists, 106 00:07:51,240 --> 00:07:55,000 of the men and women who painted and sculpted - 107 00:07:55,000 --> 00:07:59,480 it's also the history of the men and women like Julia Balbilla 108 00:07:59,480 --> 00:08:02,480 who looked, who interpreted what they saw, 109 00:08:02,480 --> 00:08:05,680 and of the changing ways in which they did so. 110 00:08:05,680 --> 00:08:09,280 If we want to understand images of the body, 111 00:08:09,280 --> 00:08:12,000 I think we've really got to put those viewers 112 00:08:12,000 --> 00:08:14,480 back into the picture of art. 113 00:08:17,240 --> 00:08:21,560 And one of the best places to do that is ancient Greece - 114 00:08:21,560 --> 00:08:27,200 in particular, the city of Athens from around 700 BC. 115 00:08:28,560 --> 00:08:32,000 Never much more than a small town in our terms, 116 00:08:32,000 --> 00:08:35,920 it was a place where you could find people of different classes 117 00:08:35,920 --> 00:08:41,520 and backgrounds cheek by jowl in a grand experiment in urban living. 118 00:08:43,200 --> 00:08:47,600 And one of the most distinctive things about Athenian culture 119 00:08:47,600 --> 00:08:52,320 was an intense focus on the youthful, athletic body. 120 00:08:55,000 --> 00:08:59,840 This body was a symbol of political and moral virtue. 121 00:08:59,840 --> 00:09:05,840 And Athens became a whole city of images devoted to the human form. 122 00:09:08,560 --> 00:09:12,120 Greek art almost never means landscape. 123 00:09:12,120 --> 00:09:15,320 It almost never means still life. 124 00:09:15,320 --> 00:09:18,880 Greek art means statues and drawings, 125 00:09:18,880 --> 00:09:23,200 paintings and models of human beings. 126 00:09:23,200 --> 00:09:26,360 These images were everywhere. 127 00:09:26,360 --> 00:09:30,160 They were out in the world playing their part. 128 00:09:30,160 --> 00:09:34,280 Imagine the public plazas and the shady sanctuaries 129 00:09:34,280 --> 00:09:38,960 full of people in stone as well as people in flesh and blood. 130 00:09:42,040 --> 00:09:46,440 We begin to get the point of all this if we look at the art form 131 00:09:46,440 --> 00:09:49,240 that contained more bodies than any other. 132 00:09:51,320 --> 00:09:54,600 The red and black of Athenian ceramics. 133 00:09:58,680 --> 00:10:02,200 These are some of the finest examples we have. 134 00:10:05,280 --> 00:10:08,200 Made from around 600 BC, 135 00:10:08,200 --> 00:10:10,640 they were produced in luscious colours 136 00:10:10,640 --> 00:10:14,360 using an intricate process of multiple firings. 137 00:10:17,400 --> 00:10:20,440 They were turned out in their millions. 138 00:10:20,440 --> 00:10:24,920 And with almost every surface displaying pictures of people, 139 00:10:24,920 --> 00:10:30,120 it was pottery that made the human image ubiquitous across Athens. 140 00:10:32,280 --> 00:10:35,840 These are two of my very favourite Greek pots. 141 00:10:35,840 --> 00:10:38,760 This is ordinary crockery, 142 00:10:38,760 --> 00:10:40,920 it's everyday homeware, 143 00:10:40,920 --> 00:10:44,200 the kind of thing you might have found on the kitchen shelf 144 00:10:44,200 --> 00:10:47,160 in an Athenian house. 145 00:10:47,160 --> 00:10:50,920 The larger of the two is a rich man's wine cooler 146 00:10:50,920 --> 00:10:53,840 to be brought out at his drinking parties. 147 00:10:53,840 --> 00:10:57,200 The smaller one is an ordinary water jug. 148 00:10:57,200 --> 00:11:02,280 But the images on both are much more than just pleasing decorations. 149 00:11:03,800 --> 00:11:09,040 These images are telling the Athenians how to be Athenians. 150 00:11:10,360 --> 00:11:13,600 This one here is, in a sense, a template 151 00:11:13,600 --> 00:11:15,760 for being an Athenian wife. 152 00:11:15,760 --> 00:11:17,080 There she is. 153 00:11:17,080 --> 00:11:20,240 She's sitting down, she's being handed her baby 154 00:11:20,240 --> 00:11:22,200 by a servant girl 155 00:11:22,200 --> 00:11:26,400 and, at her feet, she's got a wool basket. 156 00:11:26,400 --> 00:11:29,800 That about sums up the answer to the question, 157 00:11:29,800 --> 00:11:33,120 what were Athenian wives for? 158 00:11:33,120 --> 00:11:36,320 They were for making babies and making wool. 159 00:11:38,080 --> 00:11:40,160 This one is a bit different 160 00:11:40,160 --> 00:11:44,720 because it's covered with mythical creatures called satyrs 161 00:11:44,720 --> 00:11:48,720 who are half human and half animal, 162 00:11:48,720 --> 00:11:53,840 and they're all over this getting absolutely plastered. 163 00:11:53,840 --> 00:11:58,760 They're balancing goblets in very silly places 164 00:11:58,760 --> 00:12:04,880 and this one here is having wine poured straight into his mouth 165 00:12:04,880 --> 00:12:06,960 from an animal skin. 166 00:12:06,960 --> 00:12:08,560 It's kind of the equivalent 167 00:12:08,560 --> 00:12:11,400 of drinking whisky straight from the bottle. 168 00:12:12,520 --> 00:12:17,360 Now, what was that doing on the drinking party table? 169 00:12:18,400 --> 00:12:25,920 If this pot was telling Athenian women how to be women, 170 00:12:25,920 --> 00:12:30,400 this one was raising more difficult questions 171 00:12:30,400 --> 00:12:34,080 about where the boundary really lies 172 00:12:34,080 --> 00:12:37,200 between the human and the animal, 173 00:12:37,200 --> 00:12:41,240 about how much wine you have to consume 174 00:12:41,240 --> 00:12:44,720 before you really do turn into a beast. 175 00:12:46,720 --> 00:12:50,320 These aren't government health warnings in our sense, 176 00:12:50,320 --> 00:12:55,280 but the images are one way in which the Athenians paraded 177 00:12:55,280 --> 00:12:58,440 their idea of what civilisation was, 178 00:12:58,440 --> 00:13:02,800 defining themselves against the barbarians beyond the city. 179 00:13:03,880 --> 00:13:07,280 And it's a version of civilisation that's a long way 180 00:13:07,280 --> 00:13:11,400 from the lofty ideas of Greek culture we're often pedalled. 181 00:13:12,360 --> 00:13:16,600 It's deeply gendered and rigidly hierarchical, 182 00:13:16,600 --> 00:13:19,960 and it explicitly derides all those 183 00:13:19,960 --> 00:13:24,760 who have faces or bodies or habits that somehow don't fit - 184 00:13:24,760 --> 00:13:28,400 from barbarous foreigners to the old and ugly, 185 00:13:28,400 --> 00:13:30,880 the fat and the flabby. 186 00:13:30,880 --> 00:13:33,400 But, like it or not, 187 00:13:33,400 --> 00:13:37,800 what we are seeing here are visual images 188 00:13:37,800 --> 00:13:43,080 constructing one idea of a civilised human being. 189 00:13:45,760 --> 00:13:49,880 Of course, the human body can do many different things 190 00:13:49,880 --> 00:13:52,360 and so can its images. 191 00:13:52,360 --> 00:13:55,080 And the Athenians exploited that range, 192 00:13:55,080 --> 00:13:58,680 creating other bodies for very different purposes. 193 00:14:02,040 --> 00:14:05,920 This is one of the most gorgeous memorial statues 194 00:14:05,920 --> 00:14:08,320 ever to have been found in ancient Greece. 195 00:14:10,040 --> 00:14:12,680 Her name is Phrasikleia 196 00:14:12,680 --> 00:14:16,680 and that means something like "aware of her own renown". 197 00:14:19,760 --> 00:14:24,560 Phrasikleia was carved in marble around 550 BC, 198 00:14:24,560 --> 00:14:27,680 and was only rediscovered in 1972. 199 00:14:30,320 --> 00:14:33,400 She has a wonderfully patterned dress, 200 00:14:33,400 --> 00:14:37,200 clothed for eternity in her finest. 201 00:14:37,200 --> 00:14:41,160 And the traces of red pigment are a useful reminder 202 00:14:41,160 --> 00:14:45,440 that most Greek sculpture was richly, even gaudily, painted. 203 00:14:46,680 --> 00:14:49,000 And she wears that smile - 204 00:14:49,000 --> 00:14:53,840 that sign of life so common in early Greek sculpture. 205 00:14:55,680 --> 00:15:02,280 What I like about her so much is the way that she engages us as viewers. 206 00:15:02,280 --> 00:15:04,160 She's looking straight ahead 207 00:15:04,160 --> 00:15:07,680 and she's challenging us to look back at her. 208 00:15:07,680 --> 00:15:10,560 She's got a flower in her hand - 209 00:15:10,560 --> 00:15:13,680 it's not quite clear whether it's for her 210 00:15:13,680 --> 00:15:16,360 or she's about to give it to us. 211 00:15:16,360 --> 00:15:21,600 And in the inscription, she actually almost speaks to us. 212 00:15:21,600 --> 00:15:26,080 It says that it is the tomb sculpture of Phrasikleia 213 00:15:26,080 --> 00:15:29,560 and then, as if in her own voice, it says, 214 00:15:29,560 --> 00:15:33,480 "And I shall always be called a maiden 215 00:15:33,480 --> 00:15:40,040 "because I got that name from the gods, instead of marriage." 216 00:15:40,040 --> 00:15:44,040 That is, she died before her wedding day. 217 00:15:44,040 --> 00:15:49,200 But what's great about it is the encounter it sets up, 218 00:15:49,200 --> 00:15:52,360 and it's the encounter that, if we try hard, 219 00:15:52,360 --> 00:15:54,600 I think we can still enjoy. 220 00:15:57,360 --> 00:16:02,080 Phrasikleia faces death in the most forthright way, 221 00:16:02,080 --> 00:16:05,040 resolutely refusing to be forgotten. 222 00:16:07,680 --> 00:16:13,600 But can an image of a person ever fix time, 223 00:16:13,600 --> 00:16:16,800 suspended death, 224 00:16:16,800 --> 00:16:19,920 or even, for a moment, deny it? 225 00:16:26,520 --> 00:16:31,960 That's what these vivid faces from Roman Egypt appear to do. 226 00:16:35,040 --> 00:16:39,400 Though 2,000 years have passed since these people died, 227 00:16:39,400 --> 00:16:42,960 it feels like they're still with us. 228 00:16:42,960 --> 00:16:45,400 They looks like the kind of portraits 229 00:16:45,400 --> 00:16:47,520 that hang on gallery walls. 230 00:16:49,320 --> 00:16:51,480 And that's where we often see them. 231 00:16:53,160 --> 00:16:58,080 But these portraits actually belong on coffins. 232 00:17:01,520 --> 00:17:05,800 Few have remained intact, but this is one of them. 233 00:17:07,240 --> 00:17:10,320 It contains a man named Artemidorus, 234 00:17:10,320 --> 00:17:13,880 and his extravagant sarcophagus portrays 235 00:17:13,880 --> 00:17:16,200 a cosmopolitan way of death. 236 00:17:19,360 --> 00:17:22,480 His mummy is a wonderful amalgam 237 00:17:22,480 --> 00:17:27,160 of the traditions of Egypt, of Greece and of Rome. 238 00:17:27,160 --> 00:17:32,240 On the casing, you can see typically Egyptian scenes - 239 00:17:32,240 --> 00:17:35,760 there's a mummy being laid out on a couch, 240 00:17:35,760 --> 00:17:39,920 and those strange animal-headed Egyptian gods. 241 00:17:41,400 --> 00:17:43,960 His name is Greek. 242 00:17:43,960 --> 00:17:47,640 "Artemidorus, farewell," it says. 243 00:17:49,200 --> 00:17:54,280 His face is a quintessentially Roman portrait. 244 00:17:54,280 --> 00:17:59,200 Of course, other cultures before had represented the human face, 245 00:17:59,200 --> 00:18:03,320 but it was the Romans who made this kind of individual likeness 246 00:18:03,320 --> 00:18:04,640 very much their own. 247 00:18:05,960 --> 00:18:08,640 Modelled with light and shade, 248 00:18:08,640 --> 00:18:12,160 flesh layered in paint and wax, 249 00:18:12,160 --> 00:18:15,440 and a clever catch light in the eyes, 250 00:18:15,440 --> 00:18:19,360 these were the means by which Roman painters captured 251 00:18:19,360 --> 00:18:23,080 the infinite variety that we see in the human face. 252 00:18:25,000 --> 00:18:29,080 When Romans thought about where the impulse to portraiture came from - 253 00:18:29,080 --> 00:18:32,200 even the impulse to painting as a whole - 254 00:18:32,200 --> 00:18:34,960 they had a very vivid story to tell 255 00:18:34,960 --> 00:18:38,680 about a young woman who was the creative genius 256 00:18:38,680 --> 00:18:41,920 behind the very first portrait. 257 00:18:41,920 --> 00:18:45,760 Her lover was going away on a long journey 258 00:18:45,760 --> 00:18:49,000 and before he went, she got a lamp 259 00:18:49,000 --> 00:18:52,160 and she threw his shadow against a wall 260 00:18:52,160 --> 00:18:56,240 and traced round it to create a silhouette. 261 00:18:56,240 --> 00:18:59,920 She was trying not just to memorialise him, 262 00:18:59,920 --> 00:19:02,960 but to keep his presence in her world. 263 00:19:04,200 --> 00:19:07,080 I think there's something like that going on 264 00:19:07,080 --> 00:19:09,320 with the face of Artemidorus. 265 00:19:10,560 --> 00:19:12,240 Domestic ware and tear, 266 00:19:12,240 --> 00:19:15,360 even children's scribbles on some coffins, 267 00:19:15,360 --> 00:19:19,480 suggest that they weren't instantly confined to the grave. 268 00:19:19,480 --> 00:19:23,760 For a while, they may have stood in the land of the living, 269 00:19:23,760 --> 00:19:27,320 perhaps in the family home. 270 00:19:27,320 --> 00:19:31,680 These portraits, then, are not just memorials - 271 00:19:31,680 --> 00:19:35,120 they're attempts to keep the presence of the dead 272 00:19:35,120 --> 00:19:36,800 among the living 273 00:19:36,800 --> 00:19:41,320 and to blur the boundary between this world and the next. 274 00:19:44,520 --> 00:19:49,560 Painted faces and sculpted bodies always played vital roles 275 00:19:49,560 --> 00:19:53,840 in the lives of ancient people who lived with them and looked at them. 276 00:19:58,600 --> 00:20:02,440 But how do we make sense of those ancient statues 277 00:20:02,440 --> 00:20:05,880 that were not designed to be seen at all? 278 00:20:11,560 --> 00:20:16,920 China, as we know it, was born around 200 BC, 279 00:20:16,920 --> 00:20:20,680 united under its first emperor, Qin. 280 00:20:24,880 --> 00:20:27,520 Just as the Romans would do in the West, 281 00:20:27,520 --> 00:20:32,200 he standardised everything in his efforts to exert control. 282 00:20:35,320 --> 00:20:41,760 Currency, weights and measures, taxes, roads and transport. 283 00:20:41,760 --> 00:20:44,000 They were sweeping reforms 284 00:20:44,000 --> 00:20:48,480 and he left his mark on all aspects of Chinese life. 285 00:20:49,720 --> 00:20:54,880 But no Roman emperor would ever be buried on the same grand scale 286 00:20:54,880 --> 00:20:59,800 as Qin, or with so many bodies. 287 00:20:59,800 --> 00:21:03,080 TV: It was just a mile away from the mound to the east 288 00:21:03,080 --> 00:21:06,080 that the Chinese made their historic discovery. 289 00:21:07,640 --> 00:21:13,120 It was 1974 when farmers in Shaanxi province discovered 290 00:21:13,120 --> 00:21:16,760 fragments of human forms buried in the earth. 291 00:21:18,720 --> 00:21:21,800 Scenes of mass archaeology followed, 292 00:21:21,800 --> 00:21:25,200 the finds assembled in an extraordinary display. 293 00:21:26,280 --> 00:21:29,680 It lies beneath this vast hangar-like structure. 294 00:21:33,520 --> 00:21:35,720 It would capture the world's attention 295 00:21:35,720 --> 00:21:38,680 as the most surprising archaeological find 296 00:21:38,680 --> 00:21:40,480 of the 20th century. 297 00:21:45,560 --> 00:21:49,280 It was, of course, the Terracotta Army. 298 00:22:00,760 --> 00:22:02,760 It's a menacing sight, 299 00:22:02,760 --> 00:22:07,080 this grey, ghostly remnant of an army, 300 00:22:07,080 --> 00:22:11,320 rows and rows of life-sized terracotta soldiers. 301 00:22:14,360 --> 00:22:18,400 These figures represent the Imperial Guard of the Emperor Qin. 302 00:22:19,800 --> 00:22:22,360 They were buried with him at his funeral 303 00:22:22,360 --> 00:22:25,320 and stand guard over his tomb. 304 00:22:27,920 --> 00:22:30,720 There were once more than 7,000 of them, 305 00:22:30,720 --> 00:22:33,480 but only a fraction have been excavated, 306 00:22:33,480 --> 00:22:39,160 and that alone gives an idea of the vast scale of this whole complex. 307 00:22:39,160 --> 00:22:45,040 This is quite simply the biggest tableau of sculpture 308 00:22:45,040 --> 00:22:49,080 made anywhere in the planet ever. 309 00:22:58,960 --> 00:23:03,520 Millions come here to be wowed by the sight of the army. 310 00:23:06,080 --> 00:23:10,880 But it's not just the scale that's impressive - it's the detail, too. 311 00:23:14,640 --> 00:23:20,080 Up close, you can see the individual plates and rivets of their armour. 312 00:23:24,000 --> 00:23:28,200 And their heads have been modelled so no two look alike. 313 00:23:33,000 --> 00:23:35,800 The contours of their faces differ, 314 00:23:35,800 --> 00:23:38,840 eyes and ears delicately worked. 315 00:23:42,640 --> 00:23:47,600 And a range of styles and textures have been used for the hair. 316 00:23:49,720 --> 00:23:53,640 But the individuality that we're at first so struck by 317 00:23:53,640 --> 00:23:56,520 isn't quite as simple as it seems. 318 00:23:56,520 --> 00:24:00,520 It's true that no two of these figures are quite alike 319 00:24:00,520 --> 00:24:05,040 but the differences between them that the craftsmen have introduced 320 00:24:05,040 --> 00:24:07,560 turn out to be rather formulaic. 321 00:24:07,560 --> 00:24:11,720 There's not much more than a handful of different eyebrow types 322 00:24:11,720 --> 00:24:14,960 or different moustache types, for example. 323 00:24:14,960 --> 00:24:20,040 They're a very standardised, institutionalised version 324 00:24:20,040 --> 00:24:21,760 of individuality. 325 00:24:21,760 --> 00:24:24,320 As one archaeologist has nicely put it - 326 00:24:24,320 --> 00:24:27,160 their faces are likenesses, 327 00:24:27,160 --> 00:24:30,640 but they are likenesses of no-one. 328 00:24:30,640 --> 00:24:35,680 They're not, in the terms of Western art history, true portraits. 329 00:24:38,320 --> 00:24:43,200 Some have admired this ancient form of artistic mass production, 330 00:24:43,200 --> 00:24:48,680 others feel it a perfect way of expressing a regimented army. 331 00:24:48,680 --> 00:24:50,920 Whatever you feel about them, 332 00:24:50,920 --> 00:24:56,520 they certainly raise all kinds of questions about what a likeness is. 333 00:24:59,600 --> 00:25:01,720 But one thing is for sure - 334 00:25:01,720 --> 00:25:05,080 in the scale and complexity of the tomb 335 00:25:05,080 --> 00:25:08,600 and even, I think, in the artistic detail 336 00:25:08,600 --> 00:25:11,960 that the Emperor, dead or alive, could command, 337 00:25:11,960 --> 00:25:16,280 there's a strong assertion of imperial power. 338 00:25:16,280 --> 00:25:19,760 And that's definitely the message of what happened 339 00:25:19,760 --> 00:25:23,040 just a few years after the Emperor's death. 340 00:25:23,040 --> 00:25:26,240 Because the famous Terracotta Army that we see 341 00:25:26,240 --> 00:25:28,880 were discovered in pieces, 342 00:25:28,880 --> 00:25:31,880 smashed and burnt by a rebel 343 00:25:31,880 --> 00:25:34,560 against the dynasty of the first Emperor 344 00:25:34,560 --> 00:25:38,080 who launched a direct attack on his tomb. 345 00:25:39,440 --> 00:25:45,200 There's something in that keen desire to destroy them 346 00:25:45,200 --> 00:25:50,360 that gives us our clearest sense of the power of these images. 347 00:25:53,240 --> 00:25:56,120 It was one thing to destroy the images 348 00:25:56,120 --> 00:26:00,120 of the Emperor's terracotta protectors, 349 00:26:00,120 --> 00:26:04,560 and so to nullify his power beyond the grave... 350 00:26:09,240 --> 00:26:12,360 ..but power in the here and now called for 351 00:26:12,360 --> 00:26:15,760 bodies of an entirely different order. 352 00:26:28,960 --> 00:26:33,080 This is the figure of Ramesses II, 353 00:26:33,080 --> 00:26:37,120 who ruled Egypt around 1200 BC. 354 00:26:37,120 --> 00:26:42,960 He was the pharaoh who invested more in his image than any other. 355 00:26:42,960 --> 00:26:46,440 And his figure is found all over Egypt. 356 00:26:47,680 --> 00:26:51,000 But by far the most imposing and memorable 357 00:26:51,000 --> 00:26:53,720 are these great colossal statues 358 00:26:53,720 --> 00:26:57,440 that stand guard at his temple in Thebes. 359 00:26:59,560 --> 00:27:04,480 The one thing you really get here is that size matters. 360 00:27:04,480 --> 00:27:07,640 These vast monumental figures 361 00:27:07,640 --> 00:27:10,400 with that nice hint that they'd be even bigger 362 00:27:10,400 --> 00:27:13,600 if they bothered to stand up for you, simply dominate. 363 00:27:13,600 --> 00:27:16,480 They take over your field of vision. 364 00:27:16,480 --> 00:27:19,920 It's an assertion of the power of the Pharaoh 365 00:27:19,920 --> 00:27:24,920 through his huge, superhuman enthroned body. 366 00:27:26,600 --> 00:27:31,560 However fragile that power might have been in real life, 367 00:27:31,560 --> 00:27:34,760 the modern world has comprehensively bought in 368 00:27:34,760 --> 00:27:38,200 to the monumentality of the Egyptian ruler. 369 00:27:39,760 --> 00:27:44,760 And it's impossible not to think that when people walked past here 370 00:27:44,760 --> 00:27:46,880 3,500 years ago 371 00:27:46,880 --> 00:27:52,000 that they, too, would have got what the message was intended to be. 372 00:27:54,480 --> 00:27:58,520 This kind of bombastic, bare-chested display 373 00:27:58,520 --> 00:28:02,120 fits the picture we have of autocrats today. 374 00:28:02,120 --> 00:28:04,640 Impressive though such images are, 375 00:28:04,640 --> 00:28:09,040 I'm sure some ancient Egyptians would have found them as vulgar 376 00:28:09,040 --> 00:28:11,400 or as irritating as we might. 377 00:28:12,600 --> 00:28:17,120 But beyond the gates of the temple there's another set of statues 378 00:28:17,120 --> 00:28:20,720 whose power and purpose is harder to fathom. 379 00:28:23,320 --> 00:28:29,560 Deep inside, we're dominated by yet more vast images of Ramesses 380 00:28:29,560 --> 00:28:33,920 that can't be explained away as propaganda to the people. 381 00:28:36,000 --> 00:28:38,720 Only those closest to the king were allowed 382 00:28:38,720 --> 00:28:40,600 into this part of the temple. 383 00:28:42,680 --> 00:28:46,120 So what was the point of these towering statues? 384 00:28:48,320 --> 00:28:51,400 Some think they were aimed at powerful elites 385 00:28:51,400 --> 00:28:53,600 to remind them who was boss. 386 00:28:55,200 --> 00:28:59,520 Others think they were aimed at the all-seeing eye of the gods. 387 00:29:00,960 --> 00:29:04,000 I've got a different viewer in mind. 388 00:29:05,760 --> 00:29:09,600 And that's the pharaoh himself. 389 00:29:09,600 --> 00:29:16,080 Those of us with no inkling of power on a grand scale often forget 390 00:29:16,080 --> 00:29:23,480 how hard it must be to believe in oneself as monarch or autocrat. 391 00:29:23,480 --> 00:29:29,000 The person who really needs to be convinced that he is pre-eminent 392 00:29:29,000 --> 00:29:31,320 above the common herd 393 00:29:31,320 --> 00:29:37,240 is that ordinary human being who is masquerading as omnipotent ruler. 394 00:29:37,240 --> 00:29:40,680 That's why, as a basic rule of thumb, 395 00:29:40,680 --> 00:29:45,480 we find more pictures of kings and queens in all their finery 396 00:29:45,480 --> 00:29:50,080 in royal palaces than anywhere else in the world - 397 00:29:50,080 --> 00:29:53,000 and here in Egypt, too. 398 00:29:53,000 --> 00:29:56,040 Monumental images of pharaohs, 399 00:29:56,040 --> 00:30:01,280 commissioned by pharaohs themselves in vast numbers, 400 00:30:01,280 --> 00:30:05,440 played their part in convincing the pharaoh 401 00:30:05,440 --> 00:30:08,520 of his own pharaonic power. 402 00:30:11,920 --> 00:30:15,360 These sculptures help the name of Ramesses live on. 403 00:30:16,480 --> 00:30:20,040 But the style of this statuary would have a different 404 00:30:20,040 --> 00:30:22,360 and very extraordinary legacy. 405 00:30:24,440 --> 00:30:27,840 Almost certainly inspiring the earliest statues 406 00:30:27,840 --> 00:30:30,880 of the human form in Ancient Greece. 407 00:30:37,600 --> 00:30:40,240 We are now on the Greek island of Naxos. 408 00:30:42,200 --> 00:30:45,840 It's a place famed since ancient times for its marble. 409 00:30:50,880 --> 00:30:54,480 With a coarse grain and grey-blue tint, 410 00:30:54,480 --> 00:30:57,120 it was easy to quarry and easy to work. 411 00:31:07,480 --> 00:31:09,920 From way back, it was shipped off to make 412 00:31:09,920 --> 00:31:13,280 some of the earliest monumental Greek sculptures. 413 00:31:14,880 --> 00:31:19,280 They were large, rigid and stylised figures like this. 414 00:31:24,720 --> 00:31:29,560 And up in the hills of Naxos, there's a disused quarry 415 00:31:29,560 --> 00:31:32,600 where you can find one of those giant figures 416 00:31:32,600 --> 00:31:34,920 which never made it off the island. 417 00:31:38,840 --> 00:31:40,680 I've read lots about this. 418 00:31:42,040 --> 00:31:44,680 But I've never actually seen it. 419 00:31:47,000 --> 00:31:53,280 What it is, is a vast marble statue, 420 00:31:53,280 --> 00:31:56,840 half-finished, still in its quarry. 421 00:32:00,760 --> 00:32:08,000 This half-man, half-mountain was hewn out perhaps as early as 700 BC. 422 00:32:10,520 --> 00:32:13,000 As you can see, it was going to be 423 00:32:13,000 --> 00:32:16,320 one of those massive, static early Greek sculptures. 424 00:32:20,800 --> 00:32:22,080 Here are his feet. 425 00:32:24,240 --> 00:32:28,640 And I'm now walking up past his legs. 426 00:32:31,480 --> 00:32:37,880 This thing here, this must be his outstretched arm 427 00:32:37,880 --> 00:32:44,760 and then right up here, we come to his head. 428 00:32:44,760 --> 00:32:47,280 And by the looks of it, 429 00:32:47,280 --> 00:32:49,720 he was going to have a beard, and they have already 430 00:32:49,720 --> 00:32:52,600 roughed out the shape. 431 00:32:52,600 --> 00:32:57,920 LAUGHS: Makes me think that some men can be very stubborn. 432 00:32:57,920 --> 00:33:02,520 But this guy hasn't budged in 2,500 years. 433 00:33:04,440 --> 00:33:07,640 Quite why he's still here is a mystery. 434 00:33:07,640 --> 00:33:11,520 Something must have gone wrong but, whatever, this figure gives us 435 00:33:11,520 --> 00:33:16,320 a great view of how the Greek sculptors went about their work. 436 00:33:16,320 --> 00:33:20,160 They must have cut a trench out all the way round it 437 00:33:20,160 --> 00:33:22,800 in order to get to it to work, 438 00:33:22,800 --> 00:33:27,440 and you can see a rather neatly worked trench at the back. 439 00:33:28,760 --> 00:33:31,720 For me, it's just a wonderful illustration 440 00:33:31,720 --> 00:33:34,400 of the number of people 441 00:33:34,400 --> 00:33:38,000 that must have been involved in making a statue like this. 442 00:33:38,000 --> 00:33:40,040 And every one of these little pockmarks 443 00:33:40,040 --> 00:33:42,280 has been made by somebody's tool, 444 00:33:42,280 --> 00:33:48,480 with hundreds of men hacking away to get this statue like this. 445 00:33:55,000 --> 00:33:58,880 I find it a bit sort of weirdly surreal. 446 00:34:00,160 --> 00:34:03,520 But his feet make an extremely nice place to sit. 447 00:34:07,160 --> 00:34:10,040 Forever lying here in repose, 448 00:34:10,040 --> 00:34:11,560 he's a remnant of the style 449 00:34:11,560 --> 00:34:14,040 that the Greeks were soon to leave behind. 450 00:34:17,000 --> 00:34:19,600 Because shortly after he'd been abandoned, 451 00:34:19,600 --> 00:34:23,480 Greek sculptors developed an astonishing new style 452 00:34:23,480 --> 00:34:25,520 that was distinctly their own. 453 00:34:30,720 --> 00:34:32,280 There is a fundamental 454 00:34:32,280 --> 00:34:35,760 and universal paradox at the heart of the sculptors' art. 455 00:34:38,880 --> 00:34:41,600 The lived human body, 456 00:34:41,600 --> 00:34:43,520 its mobility, it's warmth, 457 00:34:43,520 --> 00:34:47,120 its changing character, has to be fixed... 458 00:34:48,440 --> 00:34:53,040 ..suspended in the cold and lifeless mass that is stone. 459 00:34:56,200 --> 00:34:58,880 It's always an artificial compromise. 460 00:35:03,440 --> 00:35:06,040 But the beginnings of the fifth century BC 461 00:35:06,040 --> 00:35:10,520 sees Greek sculpture spring almost to life. 462 00:35:12,280 --> 00:35:15,480 The rigid figures of the past give way 463 00:35:15,480 --> 00:35:17,800 to daring experiments in form... 464 00:35:20,800 --> 00:35:22,240 ..nuance and subtlety... 465 00:35:24,640 --> 00:35:26,600 ..movement and musculature. 466 00:35:28,920 --> 00:35:33,160 In under 200 years, Greek sculptors seemed to have developed 467 00:35:33,160 --> 00:35:38,960 the tricks and techniques to weave the illusion of a living human body. 468 00:35:40,320 --> 00:35:42,360 So radical was the change 469 00:35:42,360 --> 00:35:46,040 that it has been called the Greek Revolution. 470 00:35:50,000 --> 00:35:52,520 The exact cause of this revolution 471 00:35:52,520 --> 00:35:55,080 is one of the great mysteries of the history of art. 472 00:35:56,520 --> 00:35:59,040 Some believe it was Greek democracy, 473 00:35:59,040 --> 00:36:01,840 of its new respect for the individual that launched it. 474 00:36:03,160 --> 00:36:06,600 Others, that Greek artists just got better. 475 00:36:08,120 --> 00:36:09,760 In truth, we don't know. 476 00:36:11,720 --> 00:36:15,800 But whatever the causes, over the next centuries, 477 00:36:15,800 --> 00:36:20,840 it was to have some truly astonishing artistic consequences. 478 00:36:43,000 --> 00:36:46,520 This is one of the places that the Greek Revolution leaves. 479 00:36:49,040 --> 00:36:52,560 It's impossible not to see this as an amazing work of art. 480 00:36:59,440 --> 00:37:04,640 Dating is hard, but my guess is that it was cast around 100 BC. 481 00:37:05,800 --> 00:37:08,600 Here, the hallmarks of the Greek Revolution 482 00:37:08,600 --> 00:37:11,080 are brought together and trained on the body 483 00:37:11,080 --> 00:37:12,920 of a battered and bruised boxer. 484 00:37:15,760 --> 00:37:20,960 Boxing was always an important part of the ancient athletic repertoire. 485 00:37:20,960 --> 00:37:24,560 And you can tell that he once had a fit body, 486 00:37:24,560 --> 00:37:26,880 but it's really suffered. 487 00:37:28,120 --> 00:37:32,320 What is equally striking is the loving care 488 00:37:32,320 --> 00:37:36,240 with which this wreck of a human being has been depicted. 489 00:37:37,600 --> 00:37:41,040 He's got a broken nose and cauliflower ears, 490 00:37:41,040 --> 00:37:44,760 flabby from where he has taken all those blows. 491 00:37:44,760 --> 00:37:49,600 And, in fact, he is still bleeding from fresh wounds. 492 00:37:49,600 --> 00:37:52,720 There, the blood is shown in copper 493 00:37:52,720 --> 00:37:56,880 and the bruises on his cheeks are brought out 494 00:37:56,880 --> 00:37:59,560 by the slightly different colour 495 00:37:59,560 --> 00:38:02,600 of a slightly different bronze alloy. 496 00:38:03,680 --> 00:38:06,040 It's almost as if the bronze 497 00:38:06,040 --> 00:38:09,080 has become the man's skin. 498 00:38:12,040 --> 00:38:14,640 What makes the boxer so impressive 499 00:38:14,640 --> 00:38:17,800 isn't just the extraordinary technique. 500 00:38:17,800 --> 00:38:20,080 It's the point the piece is making. 501 00:38:21,360 --> 00:38:24,560 The artist has used the descriptive powers 502 00:38:24,560 --> 00:38:28,800 of this version of realism to launch a devastating attack 503 00:38:28,800 --> 00:38:33,760 on the body culture that obsessed the Ancient Greeks. 504 00:38:33,760 --> 00:38:37,960 He introduces a very different type of character 505 00:38:37,960 --> 00:38:43,520 from those early, youthful, well-toned athletes. 506 00:38:43,520 --> 00:38:46,760 Not just in the wounds and the scars, 507 00:38:46,760 --> 00:38:48,640 but in the emotional collapse. 508 00:38:52,240 --> 00:38:55,840 In a world in which there was something of a cult 509 00:38:55,840 --> 00:38:59,280 of youthful athletic prowess, 510 00:38:59,280 --> 00:39:03,640 all those telling realistic details add up to a reminder 511 00:39:03,640 --> 00:39:09,840 that the body beautiful was not so very far from the body brutalised. 512 00:39:11,240 --> 00:39:13,640 This work of art is prodding 513 00:39:13,640 --> 00:39:16,800 at the awkward underbelly of Greek culture. 514 00:39:19,240 --> 00:39:23,240 It's the incisive brilliance of sculptures like The Boxer 515 00:39:23,240 --> 00:39:26,280 that gives the impression that the Greek Revolution 516 00:39:26,280 --> 00:39:30,320 was an unalloyed triumph of artistic achievement. 517 00:39:32,400 --> 00:39:36,600 But there is another way of looking at the Greek Revolution, 518 00:39:36,600 --> 00:39:39,960 and at its losses as well as its gains. 519 00:39:43,880 --> 00:39:46,920 Remember Phrasikleia, who died unmarried? 520 00:39:47,920 --> 00:39:51,240 She was made long before that revolutionary change. 521 00:39:54,240 --> 00:39:57,360 What I love is her elegance and simplicity. 522 00:39:58,400 --> 00:40:03,520 The way she reaches out, offering a gift, or meeting us eye-to-eye. 523 00:40:07,480 --> 00:40:13,080 That directness is exactly what gets lost in the Greek Revolution. 524 00:40:13,080 --> 00:40:17,160 Later sculptures may be more supple than Phrasikleia, 525 00:40:17,160 --> 00:40:21,320 they may seem to move more adventurously, 526 00:40:21,320 --> 00:40:24,760 but they don't engage us in the same way. 527 00:40:24,760 --> 00:40:27,760 In fact, if you try to look them in the eye, 528 00:40:27,760 --> 00:40:31,800 many of them coyly avoid your gaze. 529 00:40:31,800 --> 00:40:37,200 And many of them, like The Boxer, seem lost in their own world. 530 00:40:38,280 --> 00:40:41,520 It's almost as if the involved viewer 531 00:40:41,520 --> 00:40:44,960 has become an admiring voyeur, 532 00:40:44,960 --> 00:40:51,000 and we are one step on the way to sculpture becoming an art object. 533 00:40:52,240 --> 00:40:57,440 Phrasikleia is determinedly resisting being an art object, 534 00:40:57,440 --> 00:41:00,320 and one thing she is not is coy. 535 00:41:03,600 --> 00:41:07,080 But the problems of the Greek Revolution don't stop here. 536 00:41:17,840 --> 00:41:20,160 Just a few hundred years after Phrasikleia, 537 00:41:20,160 --> 00:41:24,200 this is what female sculptures in the Greek world had become. 538 00:41:30,880 --> 00:41:34,440 This sculpture exposes some of the dangers 539 00:41:34,440 --> 00:41:36,440 in the pursuit of realism, 540 00:41:36,440 --> 00:41:42,160 and that blurry and perilous boundary between artefact and flesh. 541 00:41:46,520 --> 00:41:51,640 This notorious body belongs to the Greek goddess Aphrodite. 542 00:41:51,640 --> 00:41:54,280 It is a Roman version of a ground-breaking 543 00:41:54,280 --> 00:41:57,080 statue by the sculptor Praxiteles 544 00:41:57,080 --> 00:41:59,200 in the fourth century BC. 545 00:42:00,880 --> 00:42:03,880 In the ancient world, this was celebrated 546 00:42:03,880 --> 00:42:07,240 as a milestone in classical art 547 00:42:07,240 --> 00:42:11,280 because it was the first naked statue of a woman. 548 00:42:13,880 --> 00:42:16,600 Today, it's difficult to see beyond 549 00:42:16,600 --> 00:42:19,360 the ubiquity of images like this 550 00:42:19,360 --> 00:42:22,720 and recapture just how daring and dangerous 551 00:42:22,720 --> 00:42:25,160 it would have been for the ancient Greeks. 552 00:42:28,080 --> 00:42:31,960 This sculpture broke through social conventions. 553 00:42:33,680 --> 00:42:36,280 It wasn't just that up to this point 554 00:42:36,280 --> 00:42:39,040 female statues had been clothed. 555 00:42:39,040 --> 00:42:43,000 In some parts of the Greek world, real-life women - 556 00:42:43,000 --> 00:42:46,960 at least among the upper-class - went around veiled. 557 00:42:47,960 --> 00:42:51,960 But, in fact, it wasn't just the nakedness - 558 00:42:51,960 --> 00:42:57,760 this Aphrodite broke the mould in a decidedly erotic way. 559 00:43:02,960 --> 00:43:04,800 Just look at her hands. 560 00:43:04,800 --> 00:43:08,440 Are they modestly trying to cover herself up? 561 00:43:09,560 --> 00:43:12,040 Are they pointing us in the direction 562 00:43:12,040 --> 00:43:13,400 of what we want to see most? 563 00:43:15,040 --> 00:43:17,960 Or are they simply a tease? 564 00:43:20,160 --> 00:43:21,920 Whatever the answer, 565 00:43:21,920 --> 00:43:27,200 Praxiteles has established that edgy relationship 566 00:43:27,200 --> 00:43:29,640 between a statue of a woman 567 00:43:29,640 --> 00:43:31,520 and an assumed male viewer 568 00:43:31,520 --> 00:43:33,920 that has never been lost 569 00:43:33,920 --> 00:43:35,800 from the history of European art. 570 00:43:37,800 --> 00:43:41,920 But that difficult boundary between statue and flesh 571 00:43:41,920 --> 00:43:44,240 was understood by the Greeks themselves. 572 00:43:45,280 --> 00:43:49,360 They told a tale that shows how they, too, knew of the perils 573 00:43:49,360 --> 00:43:52,600 they faced in creating what they saw 574 00:43:52,600 --> 00:43:55,280 as realistic images of the human body. 575 00:43:56,560 --> 00:44:01,760 One night, it was said, a young man became so aroused by this statue, 576 00:44:01,760 --> 00:44:07,480 he forced himself upon it, leaving a stain of lust on her thigh. 577 00:44:07,480 --> 00:44:12,200 He later threw himself over a cliff to his death, in shame. 578 00:44:15,920 --> 00:44:20,240 That story of the stain not only shows 579 00:44:20,240 --> 00:44:24,480 how a female statue can drive a man mad, 580 00:44:24,480 --> 00:44:29,360 but also how art can act as an alibi 581 00:44:29,360 --> 00:44:32,920 for what was - let's face it - rape. 582 00:44:32,920 --> 00:44:36,760 Don't forget - Aphrodite never consented. 583 00:44:40,520 --> 00:44:41,760 But however troubling 584 00:44:41,760 --> 00:44:44,480 the Greek Revolution was in its own time, 585 00:44:44,480 --> 00:44:48,600 there's a deeper legacy that reaches the modern age. 586 00:44:48,600 --> 00:44:50,800 One to which we are often blind. 587 00:44:59,280 --> 00:45:04,480 Inherited by Ancient Rome, rekindled in the European Renaissance, 588 00:45:04,480 --> 00:45:08,800 faith in the Greek version of realism persisted through time. 589 00:45:18,440 --> 00:45:22,080 And as the reverence for the classical style grew, 590 00:45:22,080 --> 00:45:25,160 it would be invested with even greater meaning. 591 00:45:27,200 --> 00:45:32,080 Not just as a model for figurative art to aspire to, 592 00:45:32,080 --> 00:45:37,280 but nothing less than a barometer of civilisation itself. 593 00:45:42,240 --> 00:45:44,800 To understand the forces at work, 594 00:45:44,800 --> 00:45:48,200 you have to follow in the footsteps of the classical bodies 595 00:45:48,200 --> 00:45:51,960 that left their original habitat of Greece and Rome... 596 00:45:56,240 --> 00:45:58,160 ..and by the 18th century 597 00:45:58,160 --> 00:46:03,000 had found themselves in distinctly foreign worlds, 598 00:46:03,000 --> 00:46:06,360 adorning the mansions and palaces of Northern Europe. 599 00:46:13,960 --> 00:46:17,320 Syon House was once the fashionable country house 600 00:46:17,320 --> 00:46:20,240 of the first Duke and Duchess of Northumberland. 601 00:46:25,800 --> 00:46:29,640 In the mid-1700s, they transformed the house 602 00:46:29,640 --> 00:46:34,040 into a vivid and imagined expression of the classical world. 603 00:46:39,400 --> 00:46:43,240 Here, we're in the company of ancient bodies - 604 00:46:43,240 --> 00:46:46,040 both originals and imitations. 605 00:46:49,320 --> 00:46:52,320 And it can seem an oppressive space 606 00:46:52,320 --> 00:46:54,200 in which no other way 607 00:46:54,200 --> 00:46:57,160 of representing the human form is permitted. 608 00:47:02,240 --> 00:47:05,280 The climactic set piece of the house 609 00:47:05,280 --> 00:47:07,160 is in a central hall 610 00:47:07,160 --> 00:47:11,000 where two great masterpieces of ancient sculpture face off. 611 00:47:13,960 --> 00:47:16,080 At one end, the Dying Gaul... 612 00:47:18,200 --> 00:47:21,520 ..a figure who is said to embody the ancient virtue 613 00:47:21,520 --> 00:47:24,040 of nobility in defeat. 614 00:47:29,160 --> 00:47:30,760 But in this room, 615 00:47:30,760 --> 00:47:34,080 he is forever overshadowed by what stands opposite. 616 00:47:44,680 --> 00:47:49,240 By far the most important sculpture in the entire house is this one. 617 00:47:51,200 --> 00:47:53,400 It's a replica of a classical work 618 00:47:53,400 --> 00:47:56,920 originally made perhaps around 300 BC. 619 00:47:58,240 --> 00:48:01,520 In the 18th century, it would achieve 620 00:48:01,520 --> 00:48:07,120 unparalleled fame as the greatest sculpture ever made. 621 00:48:07,120 --> 00:48:09,960 He is known as the Apollo Belvedere. 622 00:48:13,880 --> 00:48:17,720 The Apollo takes his name from the Belvedere Sculpture Court 623 00:48:17,720 --> 00:48:21,520 in the Vatican, where, since the early 16th century, 624 00:48:21,520 --> 00:48:23,360 he stood on display. 625 00:48:24,720 --> 00:48:28,880 Lovely as he is, that is probably where he would have stayed, 626 00:48:28,880 --> 00:48:34,440 one sculpture among many, had it not been for the international fame 627 00:48:34,440 --> 00:48:39,520 given to him by one man - Johann Joachim Winckelmann. 628 00:48:42,960 --> 00:48:45,480 "This was quite simply", he wrote, 629 00:48:45,480 --> 00:48:48,000 "the most sublime statue of antiquity 630 00:48:48,000 --> 00:48:50,040 "to have escaped destruction. 631 00:48:51,720 --> 00:48:55,360 "An eternal spring time," he went on, 632 00:48:55,360 --> 00:49:00,360 "clothes the alluring virility of his mature years 633 00:49:00,360 --> 00:49:03,440 "with a pleasing youth 634 00:49:03,440 --> 00:49:09,000 "and plays with soft tenderness upon the lofty structure of his limbs." 635 00:49:10,480 --> 00:49:13,600 "How is it possible," he asked, "to describe it?" 636 00:49:17,360 --> 00:49:20,880 Winckelmann had worked his way up as librarian 637 00:49:20,880 --> 00:49:25,760 and right-hand man to some of the biggest art collectors of the day, 638 00:49:25,760 --> 00:49:28,920 and, finally, he had become Director of Antiquities 639 00:49:28,920 --> 00:49:30,600 at the Vatican itself, 640 00:49:30,600 --> 00:49:34,400 and the author of some of the most important books on art history ever. 641 00:49:35,600 --> 00:49:39,080 Winckelmann was a man who had enthused over 642 00:49:39,080 --> 00:49:42,640 any number of Greco-Roman bodies, 643 00:49:42,640 --> 00:49:45,920 but the Apollo Belvedere really tipped him over the edge. 644 00:49:53,160 --> 00:49:56,000 But Winckelmann offered more than words of adoration. 645 00:50:00,440 --> 00:50:03,280 He would devise a brand-new theory 646 00:50:03,280 --> 00:50:06,560 that would leave an awkward and lasting legacy. 647 00:50:09,600 --> 00:50:11,480 In the library at Syon is the book 648 00:50:11,480 --> 00:50:15,000 in which Winckelmann first laid out his theories. 649 00:50:18,000 --> 00:50:21,200 Originally published in 1764, 650 00:50:21,200 --> 00:50:25,200 it was in these pages that the Apollo was elevated 651 00:50:25,200 --> 00:50:28,240 above a mere artwork to stand 652 00:50:28,240 --> 00:50:32,040 as the ultimate symbol of civilisation itself. 653 00:50:37,480 --> 00:50:40,720 This is Winckelmann's most influential book, 654 00:50:40,720 --> 00:50:44,160 History Of The Art Of The Ancient World, 655 00:50:44,160 --> 00:50:46,880 and on the front page, there is, in fact, 656 00:50:46,880 --> 00:50:51,520 a lovely drawing which includes the Apollo Belvedere. 657 00:50:51,520 --> 00:50:55,720 And what he did that no-one had systematically done before 658 00:50:55,720 --> 00:51:00,240 was to say that the best art 659 00:51:00,240 --> 00:51:05,120 was made at the time of the best politics. 660 00:51:05,120 --> 00:51:08,360 It was almost as if he was wanting to argue 661 00:51:08,360 --> 00:51:11,240 that you could track the history, 662 00:51:11,240 --> 00:51:14,600 the rise and fall of civilisation 663 00:51:14,600 --> 00:51:17,440 through the rise and fall 664 00:51:17,440 --> 00:51:19,520 of the representation of the human body. 665 00:51:21,240 --> 00:51:23,840 Winckelmann's views would seduce 666 00:51:23,840 --> 00:51:26,880 even our most esteemed art historians. 667 00:51:29,600 --> 00:51:32,600 KENNETH CLARK: This is the figure of the most admired 668 00:51:32,600 --> 00:51:34,560 piece of sculpture in the world. 669 00:51:35,560 --> 00:51:39,920 The Apollo surely embodies a higher state of civilisation. 670 00:51:41,400 --> 00:51:43,880 For more than 200 years, 671 00:51:43,880 --> 00:51:46,120 Greek sculpture was regarded 672 00:51:46,120 --> 00:51:51,480 as a beacon of a superior Western civilisation. 673 00:51:51,480 --> 00:51:56,440 The northern imagination takes shape in an image of fear and darkness. 674 00:51:58,080 --> 00:52:00,240 The Hellenistic imagination 675 00:52:00,240 --> 00:52:03,720 in an image of harmonised proportion and human reason. 676 00:52:06,120 --> 00:52:10,120 But for me, Winckelmann's legacy goes even further. 677 00:52:11,600 --> 00:52:13,760 The inheritance of Winckelmann 678 00:52:13,760 --> 00:52:19,320 has been a distorting and sometimes divisive lens, 679 00:52:19,320 --> 00:52:22,680 deeply affecting the way people in the West 680 00:52:22,680 --> 00:52:25,400 have encountered and judged 681 00:52:25,400 --> 00:52:28,960 the art of other very different civilisations. 682 00:52:30,960 --> 00:52:32,680 I think Winckelmann 683 00:52:32,680 --> 00:52:36,040 has caught us in a narrow way of seeing 684 00:52:36,040 --> 00:52:39,760 that's difficult to perceive, much harder to escape. 685 00:52:45,240 --> 00:52:50,600 But there is a place we can pin down the legacy of Winckelmann. 686 00:52:50,600 --> 00:52:54,560 It is back where we started, with the art of the Olmec. 687 00:53:01,120 --> 00:53:03,080 It was 1964, 688 00:53:03,080 --> 00:53:07,200 and Mexico was investing in a new national identity 689 00:53:07,200 --> 00:53:11,160 that asserted the glories of its ancient past, 690 00:53:11,160 --> 00:53:14,200 and central to the project was art. 691 00:53:19,680 --> 00:53:22,160 A new museum was purpose-built 692 00:53:22,160 --> 00:53:24,960 to showcase the depth of Mexican history... 693 00:53:27,600 --> 00:53:30,880 ..and the treasures of its great civilisations 694 00:53:30,880 --> 00:53:32,920 laid out for all to see. 695 00:53:34,400 --> 00:53:36,520 Of vital importance 696 00:53:36,520 --> 00:53:41,120 was the celebration of Mexico's earliest civilisation - 697 00:53:41,120 --> 00:53:42,280 the Olmec. 698 00:53:44,560 --> 00:53:47,600 Along with this and other colossal heads 699 00:53:47,600 --> 00:53:50,960 was an array of extraordinary Olmec bodies. 700 00:53:55,280 --> 00:53:57,760 This gathering of stone figurines 701 00:53:57,760 --> 00:53:59,880 was found exactly as you see them. 702 00:54:04,960 --> 00:54:08,280 Whether religious symbolism or ancient vanity, 703 00:54:08,280 --> 00:54:11,720 this clay figure clasps a mirror to its chest. 704 00:54:16,360 --> 00:54:18,240 And what looks like a baby 705 00:54:18,240 --> 00:54:22,000 was one of hundreds known from Olmec cemeteries. 706 00:54:26,880 --> 00:54:31,480 But star of the show was a brand-new acquisition. 707 00:54:37,240 --> 00:54:41,320 It was the statue known as The Olmec Wrestler. 708 00:54:42,760 --> 00:54:45,560 Its display of anatomical detail 709 00:54:45,560 --> 00:54:47,600 and Greek-style proportion 710 00:54:47,600 --> 00:54:51,560 made it one of a kind in Olmec art. 711 00:54:56,800 --> 00:55:00,080 Held as proof that the Olmec Civilisation 712 00:55:00,080 --> 00:55:04,880 was every bit as sophisticated as any in the classical world, 713 00:55:04,880 --> 00:55:07,760 he quickly became a poster boy. 714 00:55:07,760 --> 00:55:12,680 Not just for the Olmec, but for all of ancient Mexico. 715 00:55:17,240 --> 00:55:22,320 And it is with The Wrestler that we see the impact of Winckelmann 716 00:55:22,320 --> 00:55:27,680 and his version of classical form on our Western way of seeing. 717 00:55:35,040 --> 00:55:40,160 What appeals to us about him are those shades of Greco-Roman art 718 00:55:40,160 --> 00:55:42,280 that seem to fit with our own expectations 719 00:55:42,280 --> 00:55:44,760 of artistic achievement - 720 00:55:44,760 --> 00:55:47,000 the expressive twist of the body, 721 00:55:47,000 --> 00:55:50,320 the apparently naturalistic muscles 722 00:55:50,320 --> 00:55:53,200 and strikingly realistic face. 723 00:55:53,200 --> 00:55:55,880 There's even the name that he's been given 724 00:55:55,880 --> 00:55:58,400 with its echo of classical Greek sport. 725 00:55:59,800 --> 00:56:03,840 If this is the work of an outstanding Olmec sculptor, 726 00:56:03,840 --> 00:56:10,320 it's one who, by chance, got later Western tastes spot-on. 727 00:56:12,320 --> 00:56:16,680 But so perfectly does he measure up to Western ideals, 728 00:56:16,680 --> 00:56:21,720 that some now believe that he is, in fact, a fake - 729 00:56:21,720 --> 00:56:26,320 the work of someone who understood the all pervasive allure 730 00:56:26,320 --> 00:56:29,080 of the classical style. 731 00:56:29,080 --> 00:56:32,760 If true, it shows how Winckelmann's legacy 732 00:56:32,760 --> 00:56:35,960 can cloud our appreciation of other cultures, 733 00:56:35,960 --> 00:56:39,160 even taint our understanding of the past. 734 00:56:40,920 --> 00:56:42,640 But, real or fake, 735 00:56:42,640 --> 00:56:47,760 The Olmec Wrestler shows that ancient images of human figures 736 00:56:47,760 --> 00:56:52,680 can tell us much about the past, and even more about ourselves. 737 00:56:54,680 --> 00:56:57,880 When we admire The Olmec Wrestler, 738 00:56:57,880 --> 00:57:01,240 we are also facing our own assumptions 739 00:57:01,240 --> 00:57:05,720 about what makes a satisfying image of a human being. 740 00:57:07,120 --> 00:57:09,360 But it does more than that. 741 00:57:09,360 --> 00:57:14,400 Because it always shifts the focus onto us as viewers 742 00:57:14,400 --> 00:57:15,840 and onto our own prejudices. 743 00:57:17,600 --> 00:57:22,040 So in a way, The Wrestler is an acute reminder 744 00:57:22,040 --> 00:57:26,000 of one fundamental truth of the art of the body - 745 00:57:26,000 --> 00:57:29,640 that it's not just about how people in the past 746 00:57:29,640 --> 00:57:33,600 chose to represent themselves or what they looked like. 747 00:57:33,600 --> 00:57:37,000 It is also about how we look. 748 00:57:41,200 --> 00:57:44,360 The Open University has produced a free poster 749 00:57:44,360 --> 00:57:47,280 that explores the history of different civilisations 750 00:57:47,280 --> 00:57:48,680 through artefacts. 751 00:57:50,000 --> 00:57:52,800 To order your free copy, please call... 752 00:57:58,240 --> 00:58:00,280 Or go to the address on screen 753 00:58:00,280 --> 00:58:02,880 and follow the links for The Open University.