:01:16. > :01:21.This week we have got the cultural highlights of 2011. We have got an
:01:21. > :01:25.Elizabethan inspired opera, an England-inspired album, and
:01:25. > :01:35.everything you may never have understood about science fiction.
:01:35. > :01:36.
:01:36. > :01:38.Coming up, David Attenborough celebrates his favourite artist. PJ
:01:38. > :01:48.Harvey reveals the inspiration behind her Mercury prize-winning
:01:48. > :01:56.
:01:57. > :02:06.album. Sue Perkins gets personal with humorist David Sedaris. All
:02:06. > :02:16.this, and Damon Albarn, on his Elizabethan Opera. Film critic Mark
:02:16. > :02:22.Kermode looks at his movies of the year. Plus, we go on a tour of this
:02:22. > :02:26.latest work. There I was at one of our finest new galleries, in
:02:26. > :02:30.our finest new galleries, in Wakefield. But first, a bit of arts
:02:30. > :02:33.evangelising from me. Earlier this year, Tate Britain put on an
:02:33. > :02:37.exhibition devoted to the watercolour. It is by far the most
:02:37. > :02:42.popular form of painting amount amateurs, and the thousands of
:02:42. > :02:48.visitors who flock to the show made it a big success. But for most art
:02:48. > :02:53.students, watercolour simply is not cool. I made it might mission to
:02:53. > :02:59.convert a group of young sceptics. Watercolour has long had something
:02:59. > :03:08.of an image problem. It is not very bold, not very provocative. It is a
:03:08. > :03:14.bit wishy-washy. I want to just start with a picture which I really
:03:14. > :03:19.like. This one was the 17th century, maybe 50 years after the death of
:03:19. > :03:24.Shakespeare. It is the world that he saw, that he knew, that he could
:03:24. > :03:30.travel into, and there it is, just caught like that. I enjoy looking
:03:30. > :03:40.at it, and I respect it, but it does not get me excited. I do not
:03:40. > :03:41.
:03:41. > :03:45.feel quite as romantic about it as you. What do you think of this?
:03:45. > :03:48.is definitely a lot more striking. It looks basically like someone has
:03:48. > :03:54.been shot, and they have gone up against the paper, and the last few
:03:54. > :04:00.moments have been recorded. I love that. It is not what he did. What
:04:00. > :04:07.he did was, he made a snowball, and rolled it through the grit, he
:04:07. > :04:14.wanted to preserve the residue, so he allowed this snowball that he
:04:14. > :04:23.had made it to melt. Now, and have picked these out, because these are
:04:23. > :04:29.two of my own favourite images in the whole show. It is like
:04:29. > :04:33.Photoshop Turner. That's a bit cruel. But Turner has a really
:04:33. > :04:38.screwed-up relationship with himself. He had all these ideas
:04:38. > :04:48.about what art should be. It is only sometimes that he gets away
:04:48. > :05:02.
:05:02. > :05:06.When I see these, I see the essence of what Turner realised. The baby
:05:06. > :05:09.reality isn't actually solid objects. But you could only do this
:05:09. > :05:14.in watercolour. There is none of this trying to get it to look
:05:14. > :05:22.realistic. It is just this kind of emotional approach, and it in that,
:05:22. > :05:26.I can personally read a lot more from it. There's Pollock in here,
:05:26. > :05:32.what go in here, the whole of modern painting - does it make you
:05:32. > :05:37.feel a bit more like using this medium yourselves? There's a fuel I
:05:37. > :05:42.would not mind trying to rip-off. Mission accomplished. My next pick
:05:42. > :05:45.from 2011 was an eclectic mix of the old and can you. The British
:05:46. > :05:51.museum has been described as the place where the world comes to meet
:05:51. > :06:01.the world. The 8 million objects it houses reflect every known facet of
:06:01. > :06:01.
:06:01. > :06:05.the entire history of the world's civilisation. For his latest
:06:05. > :06:10.installation, Grayson Perry has done his own pick from the
:06:10. > :06:14.selection, to be shown alongside some works of his own. I wanted the
:06:14. > :06:20.audience to be confronted by these three things, almost as a test, in
:06:20. > :06:27.some ways - what is authenticity, where his Grace? What is fantasy?
:06:28. > :06:33.What is reality? What is art? There's three helmets here. That
:06:33. > :06:38.could be a Grayson Perry. But it is not, it is a Ghanaian ceremonial
:06:38. > :06:45.object. This one looks much older, it has just been in my back garden
:06:45. > :06:51.for 20 years. And this is a real helmet. This whole exhibition is
:06:51. > :06:55.trying to challenge the idea that there is meaning, there is a
:06:55. > :07:01.definite way things should be interpreted. On the tapestry, the
:07:01. > :07:06.British museum is seen as a kind of multi-faith have them. There it is,
:07:06. > :07:11.with all the different names of the afterlife. This is a Map of the
:07:11. > :07:16.British museum. I like it because a lot of your work is a self-
:07:16. > :07:21.conscious archaeological slice of what now is. This one I made in
:07:21. > :07:24.February this year. I literally decided what I was going to put on
:07:24. > :07:29.it the night before I came to decorate it. I did not have any
:07:29. > :07:32.plan, I just watched the TV and read the newspapers. The people in
:07:32. > :07:41.the museum were very interested in this, because as a museum object,
:07:41. > :07:46.it is very potent, because it speaks about a moment in history.
:07:46. > :07:51.Sitting at the centre of the display is another new piece of
:07:51. > :07:57.work by Grayson Perry, entitled The Tomb Of The Unknown Craftsman, an
:07:57. > :08:00.elaborate, richly decorated cast- iron coffee machine. Everything
:08:00. > :08:10.hanging and build on to this is a cost of an object from the British
:08:10. > :08:10.
:08:10. > :08:15.museum. So there is a famous silver dish, the flood tablet, bits of
:08:15. > :08:25.medieval crucifixes, Egyptian figurines, and right in the centre
:08:25. > :08:29.
:08:29. > :08:36.of it is a flint tool. This flint axe head in his 250,000 years old.
:08:36. > :08:41.It is the organ of generation. From that, all art, this whole museum,
:08:41. > :08:47.everything in it, all the civilisation's in it... Yes, and
:08:47. > :08:51.most of them are anonymous, and this is the monument to that.
:08:51. > :08:58.exhibition also spreads beyond the walls of his allocated space. He
:08:58. > :09:01.has created a special menu for the restaurant, called A teddy bear's
:09:01. > :09:05.picnic. I like the way that the exhibition continues into the
:09:05. > :09:10.restaurant. When I proposed an exhibition here, I wanted the
:09:10. > :09:15.entire context, I wanted the gift shop, the marketing department, and
:09:15. > :09:19.the tea menu, everything. Talk me through it, come on. We have got
:09:19. > :09:24.Marmite sandwiches, because this was a big thing in my childhood,
:09:24. > :09:29.Marmite on toast. This is the posh version of it, I suppose. You have
:09:29. > :09:34.got chocolate motorbikes and they teddy bears. But is this the work
:09:34. > :09:37.of art? No! It is part of the fun of coming to a museum like the
:09:38. > :09:42.of coming to a museum like the British museum. It is part of the
:09:42. > :09:51.ritual of it. If this is a multi- faith cathedral, this is kind of
:09:51. > :09:54.the food for holy days. Well, it is very tasty! And Grayson Perry's The
:09:54. > :09:58.Tomb Of The Unknown Craftsman continues at the British museum
:09:58. > :10:03.until 19th February. Hundreds of thousands of people flocked to
:10:03. > :10:11.Edinburgh in August, while earlier, in July, the third Manchester
:10:11. > :10:15.International Festival featured a host of thought-provoking premieres,
:10:15. > :10:25.including the latest creative odyssey from Damon Albarn. Michael
:10:25. > :10:27.
:10:27. > :10:29.History is full of forgotten men - brilliant, strange, complex men,
:10:29. > :10:33.whose influence has resonated through our culture, in ways that
:10:33. > :10:43.may have become obscured. One such man was the Elizabethan thinker and
:10:43. > :10:44.
:10:44. > :10:47.John Dee is a shadowy, obscure figure at the heart of the English
:10:47. > :10:51.Renaissance. Elizabeth I called him Her Philosopher, and he was the
:10:51. > :10:54.inspiration for Shakespeare's Prospero and Marlow's Faust. A
:10:54. > :10:58.cryptographer and a spy, whose code name was 007, he has also been
:10:58. > :11:01.caught the first English think tank. He's the man who came up with the
:11:01. > :11:03.idea of the British Empire, the idea that England could become a
:11:03. > :11:12.maritime power which could challenge Spain's domination of the
:11:12. > :11:16.New World. Dee lived in an age when the line between science and
:11:16. > :11:23.sorcery was blurred. Mathematics, like magic, was still considered to
:11:23. > :11:26.be an uncanny art, the work of the devil. I caught up with Damon
:11:26. > :11:35.Albarn between performances and asked what attracted him to the
:11:35. > :11:39.#Just everything about him was just really elegant, and I'm a great fan.
:11:39. > :11:42.Did you see a lot of threads between his time and our time, was
:11:42. > :11:46.there a resonance? Yes, the two Elizabeths was uneasy starting
:11:46. > :11:53.point. The melancholy score features the BBC Philharmonic
:11:53. > :11:57.Orchestra, and a mixture of African and English musicians. They all
:11:57. > :12:00.come from a very different sound world. I mean, all of those
:12:00. > :12:03.instruments sound amazing together, with no amplification, and it is
:12:03. > :12:13.really nice just to leave the amplified world, although I could
:12:13. > :12:18.
:12:18. > :12:28.# People of the rose, the nightingale... And Dr Dee will be
:12:28. > :12:35.
:12:35. > :12:41.restaged as part of next year's Now, at the Edinburgh Festival, we
:12:41. > :12:48.were in the capable hands of Sue Perkins, who met with the best-
:12:48. > :12:52.selling writer from America, David Sedaris. Was the reason for the
:12:52. > :12:56.mortuary? I was living in New York, and a magazine asked me if I wanted
:12:56. > :13:01.to write for them. They said I could do whatever I wanted. I
:13:01. > :13:05.always wanted to see a lot of dead people, but you cannot just walk in.
:13:05. > :13:15.I guess the most famous job you had was when you started off as a
:13:15. > :13:22.
:13:22. > :13:28.department store elf. And I'm Small and merry, so they hired me.
:13:28. > :13:33.you have to wear hat? Well, I had an outfit, and I did it for two
:13:33. > :13:40.years. Was it financial necessity, or was it you thinking, I'm home
:13:40. > :13:49.now, I'm with my people?! That's great. No-one loves Christmas more
:13:49. > :13:53.than me, but I did not actually feel like... I'm home now. You're
:13:53. > :13:57.constantly writing a diary through all of this, and you do not know
:13:57. > :14:02.that fame and success are coming, you're doing it because you need to
:14:02. > :14:06.write at this time in your life? think so. I started writing when I
:14:06. > :14:13.turned 20. I think I just exhausted every other way of trying to get
:14:13. > :14:18.attention. Everyone's worried that the food in Beijing will be
:14:18. > :14:28.different from America. It is more real, they said, meaning, it turned
:14:28. > :14:38.
:14:38. > :14:42.out, that I could dislike it more authentically. We went to meet Tony
:14:42. > :14:47.Cragg. What are we looking at? are looking at some commercial
:14:47. > :14:57.vessels. This is a detergent bottle, a shampoo bottle. And you have
:14:57. > :15:00.
:15:00. > :15:05.extended it? Yes, and this one here, You are transforming it into
:15:05. > :15:10.something magnificent, different, very unexpected. The moment you are
:15:10. > :15:14.not bound by utilitarianism the have casualry of form is free for
:15:14. > :15:17.you. You don't have to be practical and economic with it. Suddenly
:15:17. > :15:22.things happen, the thing grows up into space and becomes something
:15:22. > :15:31.that you and nobody else has ever seen before, and have to struggle
:15:31. > :15:37.with it. What's this piece called? Red Figure. This is part of the
:15:37. > :15:42.Rational Being series? It is. seems that you are playing are
:15:42. > :15:46.futurism? No, futurism wanted to have the illusion of movement. I
:15:46. > :15:50.don't think that's what I want - I want energy. Even though it is an
:15:50. > :15:55.object, it doesn't have any energy, you are creating the illusion of
:15:55. > :16:00.energy. Of course it has energy. Only because you imbued it as a
:16:00. > :16:08.sculptor. No, no, no. That's a real strength to keep that, to keep that
:16:08. > :16:13.volume out there. That is energy. When people say "statue" - static.
:16:13. > :16:20.They have the idea of stasis, of rigidity, of a frozen moment, and
:16:20. > :16:24.that is not the point. The history of sculpture in the last 100 years
:16:24. > :16:32.fantastic dynamic, developing, you should never see the material as
:16:32. > :16:42.being something static. formidable Mr Crag has lost none of
:16:42. > :16:42.
:16:43. > :16:46.his energy. The exhibition is a timely reminder of his importance.
:16:46. > :16:51.Next up, even before PJ Harvey won the Mercury Prize for her album,
:16:51. > :16:53.Let England Shake, there was no doubt it was one of the year's
:16:54. > :16:56.outstanding releases. The only person to win the Mercury Prize
:16:56. > :16:59.twice, Harvey spoke to Miranda Sawyer about the challenges of
:16:59. > :17:01.creating a work that bristles with questions of war, nationhood and
:17:01. > :17:03.blood. # This is love, this is love that
:17:04. > :17:06.I'm feeling. # This is love, love, love that I'm
:17:06. > :17:09.feeling #. PJ Harvey is an artist who never
:17:09. > :17:11.stands still. Each of her albums is self contained with its own
:17:11. > :17:15.particular atmosphere. And she herself takes on many personas for
:17:15. > :17:20.the sake of her music. So let's start from the beginning. Where did
:17:20. > :17:24.the idea for this LP come from? of the markers that I kept in the
:17:24. > :17:30.forefront of my mind when I was writing, and one of the instigators
:17:30. > :17:33.of the whole project, was when I began to think. There there are
:17:33. > :17:37.officially appointed war artists and poets. There are people who are
:17:37. > :17:41.always on the front line of whatever conflict zone there is. I
:17:41. > :17:47.began to wonder what the song equivalent was. Where was the
:17:47. > :17:51.officially appointed songwriter? Can I be that? Obviously there
:17:51. > :17:57.isn't a post of such, so in some ways in my mind I appointed myself
:17:57. > :18:00.in that position. # Goddamn Europeans.
:18:00. > :18:09.# Take me back to beautiful England # And the great and filthiness of
:18:09. > :18:19.ages. # And battered books and fog
:18:19. > :18:24.rolling down behind the mountains. # On the graveyards and Dead Sea
:18:24. > :18:31.captains. # Let me walk through the stinking
:18:31. > :18:34.alleys. # To the music of drunken beatings.
:18:34. > :18:44.# Past the Thames river glistening # Like gold hastily sold for
:18:44. > :18:45.
:18:45. > :18:48.nothing. # Nothing. #
:18:48. > :18:51.You started with the lyrics and you can read the lyrics entirely
:18:51. > :18:54.separately and they are like poems. The way that I write has changed
:18:54. > :18:57.very gradually, but it has changed, in that I concentrate pretty much
:18:57. > :19:00.solely on words for great periods of time. And some of those words
:19:00. > :19:03.remain as poems and some become short prose. It has really become
:19:03. > :19:07.my starting point that the words have to work. I wanted the melody
:19:07. > :19:10.to be so simple that it could be sung from one person to another,
:19:10. > :19:13.that it could be remembered straight away. It is that simple.
:19:13. > :19:16.That harks back to how music begins. And the tradition of storytelling.
:19:16. > :19:19.Folk music was often very simple, because it is just passed on from
:19:19. > :19:29.one generation to another. Everyone remembers it. It was never written
:19:29. > :19:38.
:19:38. > :19:44.down. # Let me watch my former river.
:19:44. > :19:47.# Moon rise and turn silver. # The sky move, the ocean shimmer.
:19:47. > :19:57.# The head shake, the last living rose quiver
:19:57. > :20:09.
:20:09. > :20:12.I feel like I've just begun. That's the strongest feeling. I felt that
:20:12. > :20:16.with this record in particular I have uncovered a new way of writing
:20:16. > :20:26.that's just the beginning for me. I feel like I've got so much yet to
:20:26. > :20:43.
:20:43. > :20:50.He's a modest looking fellow of 82 but Frank Gehry has changed the way
:20:50. > :20:57.we think about architecture. The latest building, the New World
:20:57. > :21:02.Symphony Hall opened in January. We travelled to Miami to meet Frank
:21:02. > :21:07.Gehry. Once a candy-coloured wonderland for the rich and famous
:21:07. > :21:12.Miami Beach is looking, well, a bit tired. But it is here that
:21:12. > :21:17.architect Frank Gehry is launching his latest ambitious world, the New
:21:17. > :21:21.World Centre. But for a Frank Gehry building isn't this one a bit
:21:22. > :21:29.square? Once you are inside it all becomes clear. Here are the great
:21:29. > :21:35.Frank Gehryesque sheaths of plaster, its cardboard forms. I managed to
:21:35. > :21:41.get some time with him amid the hustle and bustle of the press
:21:41. > :21:49.opening. It turned out to be difficult to drag Frank from the
:21:50. > :21:54.music to talk architecture. What kind of relationship do you
:21:54. > :21:58.have with classical music? I went in just now and heard the music and
:21:58. > :22:02.it almost made me cry, it was so beautiful. Just the few notes, it
:22:02. > :22:08.is a moment of truth. When the audience comes in and sits down and
:22:08. > :22:16.the conductor raises the baton and you hear the first sounds. You know
:22:16. > :22:21.right then, click or clock or clunk. And it happens pretty quick. Have
:22:21. > :22:28.you ever felt clunk? Clunk for me is every connection, collision. I
:22:28. > :22:33.wish I had done that better. I wish I had done this. So I go through
:22:33. > :22:36.holy hell. The New World Symphony is all about making classical music
:22:37. > :22:41.accessible to all and every concert will be smil townously projected
:22:41. > :22:46.outside for the whole of Miami to enjoy. But some of the hi-tech
:22:46. > :22:50.equipment wouldn't look out of place in a builder's yard. There's
:22:50. > :22:58.a degree of rough and readiness which of course was very prevalent
:22:58. > :23:05.in your architecture in the '70s and into the '80s. That is in my
:23:05. > :23:10.DNA, and hate to do with my leftie- leaning proclivities. I don't like
:23:10. > :23:15.the idea of spending a lot of money on marble. I've never been able to
:23:15. > :23:20.do rich guy's houses. Not even my own. Being different was never
:23:20. > :23:23.something that Frank Gehry had a problem with. The loose LA school
:23:23. > :23:29.of architecture that Frank Gehry accidentally founded was always
:23:29. > :23:36.more about having fun than they wereising. That is so stupid-
:23:36. > :23:44.looking it's great. It is so stupid-looking? Isn't it? It's
:23:44. > :23:50.just... Do you think you've been misunderstood as an architect?
:23:50. > :23:54.Everybody thinks they are misunderstood, don't we all? I
:23:54. > :24:00.don't go into it is art and all that stuff. For me it is a service
:24:00. > :24:05.business. I get a budget. I get a site, a client. There is no excuse
:24:05. > :24:15.for the banality. I'm much more critical than any critic, any
:24:15. > :24:16.
:24:16. > :24:22.British critic could be. For the audience it's incredible. It feels
:24:22. > :24:32.a bit like being inside. Right in there. Oh, my God. It sounds like
:24:32. > :24:32.
:24:32. > :24:36.you like it. I love it! I want to go back. On this side of the Pond
:24:36. > :24:40.British architectural visionary David Chipperfield unveiled his
:24:40. > :24:45.latest building in May. The Hepworth Wakefield is devoted to
:24:45. > :24:49.the work of Barbara Hepworth and her contemporaries. This is bold,
:24:49. > :24:52.modern architecture which feels in complete harmony with the artist's
:24:52. > :24:58.work. The centrepiece of the gallery is the Hepworth family gift
:24:58. > :25:03.- a collection of 44 full-sized working models in plaster and an
:25:03. > :25:08.min yum made in preparation for the finished originals in bronze. Those
:25:08. > :25:12.prototypes allow us for the first time to get a greater understanding
:25:12. > :25:16.of how Hepworth worked with her material. I like this display of
:25:16. > :25:20.Hepworth's tools. You get a wonderful sense of just how tactile
:25:20. > :25:23.Hepworth's engagement with her material was, and I really like
:25:23. > :25:31.this little circular cheese grate Kerr. She used that to roughton
:25:31. > :25:36.surface of the plaster too. She was also a great improviser. The tools
:25:36. > :25:42.have become intensely personal to one. The most precious extension of
:25:42. > :25:46.one's sight and touch. The big question raised by this
:25:46. > :25:53.display, indeed by the whole existence of the Hepworth Wakefield
:25:53. > :25:57.is, why did the artist decide she wanted to preserve these models.
:25:57. > :26:01.After all, she didn't need to. The finished sculpture that was made
:26:01. > :26:05.from this exists, it is in the world. But it is a very different
:26:05. > :26:09.thing. It's a large, dark green weathered bronze. This is something
:26:09. > :26:12.much more fragile. I think Hepworth, whose life was not entirely
:26:12. > :26:17.straightforward, whose life was in many ways quite a troubled one. She
:26:17. > :26:25.recognised that the emotions at the heart of her work were indeed
:26:25. > :26:30.fragile. And vulnerable things. But the Hepworth Wakefield isn't
:26:30. > :26:33.just about this collection of models and a new gallery space. It
:26:33. > :26:40.is about bringing the artist back to her roots, to the countryside
:26:40. > :26:46.that first inspired her. All my early memories are of forms and
:26:46. > :26:53.shapes and textures. I remember moving through the landscape with
:26:53. > :26:58.my father in his car. And the hills were sculptures. The roads defined
:26:58. > :27:05.the forms. Sometimes I think your earliest experiences leave with
:27:05. > :27:09.deepest and the strongest traces. Looking at these extraordinary rock
:27:09. > :27:13.formations, thrust out of the soil, it is hard not to think that
:27:13. > :27:16.Hepworth did indeed carry the memory of these sculpture-like
:27:17. > :27:23.forms with her throughout her life. I think this really is, as she
:27:23. > :27:29.herself said, where it all began. Now, science fiction was as strong
:27:29. > :27:34.as ever on this year's best seller lists, but this most popular of
:27:34. > :27:40.contemporary genres res possibly the most misunderstood. The British
:27:40. > :27:45.Library decided something had to be done, so created one of the what
:27:45. > :27:51.turned out to be one of the most exciting exhibitions. Subtitled
:27:51. > :27:55.science fiction but not as you know it, it presents a series of world,
:27:55. > :27:59.parallel world, even the end of the world, drawing on literary history
:27:59. > :28:07.and asking, what is science fiction? The collection has been
:28:07. > :28:13.assembled with painstaking care and gives an overvuef the genre through
:28:13. > :28:17.beautifully preserved illustrations and film clips. It throws together
:28:17. > :28:20.rare and contemporary literature which contains surprise. It has
:28:20. > :28:25.been called the fields of literature left between the gaps of
:28:26. > :28:29.all the other fields of literature. They are taking a wide ecumenical
:28:29. > :28:33.notion of what SF is. This is something remarkable. This is
:28:33. > :28:39.arguably the first work of science fiction in English. It was written
:28:39. > :28:48.in the 1620s, published in 1638 by the Bishop of Hereford. It is
:28:48. > :28:52.called The Man In The Moon. It tells of travelling to the Moon
:28:52. > :28:57.with a harness powered by geese or swans. It was written when the idea
:28:57. > :29:00.of space travel was not invented. You are legal flying to the Moon.
:29:00. > :29:07.And it is written by a Bishop, who didn't find it her et cal to look
:29:07. > :29:17.up at the skies and think of something other than the heavens,
:29:17. > :29:19.
:29:19. > :29:21.unthinkable before the time of Galileo.
:29:22. > :29:27.Here's something you might not expect to see in a science fibs
:29:27. > :29:31.exhibition. This is an advert from the 1890s for Bovril. If you wonder
:29:31. > :29:37.where Bovril got its name from, it is from The Coming Race, the
:29:37. > :29:42.original manuscript is next to it. In this novel they get their
:29:42. > :29:48.extraordinary energy from a strange substance called Vril. Some
:29:48. > :29:58.marketing whizz decided to put together Vril with bovine and
:29:58. > :30:04.overnight created the first science The figure who looms large over
:30:04. > :30:07.this exhibition is H G Wells. Here, we have a copy of War Of the Worlds,
:30:07. > :30:12.which brilliantly illustrates what science fiction can do at its best.
:30:12. > :30:17.The story on the service is about Martians invading earth, but
:30:17. > :30:20.scratch the surface, and you find lots of levels, including the fear
:30:20. > :30:24.of invasion, and other things. There is an ongoing debate about
:30:24. > :30:29.whether or not science fiction is taken seriously or smear that -
:30:29. > :30:33.does it matter? I think it does matter, and I think exhibitions
:30:33. > :30:37.like this are important. I think science fiction is a very proud
:30:37. > :30:41.part of the literary heritage, and I want to have my cake and eat it,
:30:41. > :30:51.I want it to be taken seriously, but I also want to be having a
:30:51. > :30:52.
:30:52. > :30:58.party in the gutter. March saw the launch of the First World Book
:30:58. > :31:02.night. And we were there to record its birth. The idea was to get
:31:02. > :31:06.people with this is for one particular book to have free copies
:31:07. > :31:09.of it to hand out. It is about sharing the pleasure of reading
:31:10. > :31:17.through word of mouth. By the end of it, a million books are given
:31:17. > :31:25.away. Thank you so much. What does weeding mean to you? You do not
:31:25. > :31:31.need companions, you can make your own. You can travel. You can go
:31:31. > :31:36.anywhere you like in this world. All in the mind. Yes. Next year's
:31:36. > :31:40.event will be held on 23rd April. If you would like to sign up to be
:31:40. > :31:49.a book giver, you can find more information at this website. Have
:31:49. > :31:54.you read this one? I haven't, no. The Spy who came in from the Cold.
:31:54. > :32:03.But the one I wanted a! There you go. I will enjoy that, thank you.
:32:03. > :32:13.It is a great pleasure. Now, as we gear up for the Olympic Games, we
:32:13. > :32:14.
:32:14. > :32:17.went to meet a cycle geographer, whose latest book dismisses recent
:32:17. > :32:22.London developments as grand folly on the part of New Labour. People
:32:22. > :32:26.will be surprised, an Olympic bid comes through, an area is about to
:32:26. > :32:30.be regenerated and have billions of pounds pumped into it, and your
:32:30. > :32:35.response as a resident was to see this as a disaster. I do not see
:32:35. > :32:39.this as a genuine regeneration. Genuine regenerations are organic,
:32:39. > :32:42.they happen from the ground up, they are not imposed. You're
:32:42. > :32:47.walking between perimeter fences on concrete and Tarmac, and holding
:32:47. > :32:55.this up as a highway into the future. And this, as a Space
:32:55. > :32:59.Station. So, this is a corporate folly, as you see it? This is a
:32:59. > :33:05.grand folly, a grand sleight-of- hand, an enormously boastful and
:33:05. > :33:10.extravagant thing to do, for what amounts to a fortnight's sports day.
:33:10. > :33:15.I set off down the sewage outfall to Stratford. We had been promised
:33:15. > :33:22.an Olympic Tester, a procession of the torch through London. The
:33:22. > :33:27.elevated footpath is accessible as it passes beneath the A102. Here is
:33:27. > :33:31.the fault line, where the virtual collides with the actual, a world
:33:32. > :33:36.war to pillar-box, half-built apartment blocks, a Lock Keeper's
:33:36. > :33:41.Cottage, converted into the centre of a breakfast-time television show,
:33:41. > :33:48.pylons being disassembled and cables buried. A patch of wild wood
:33:48. > :33:52.is tamed with screaming chainsaws. Concrete producing tunes cough and
:33:53. > :33:57.spew. Are you not romanticising what was here, and painting a very
:33:57. > :34:03.negative picture of what actually is kind of an extraordinary moment
:34:03. > :34:07.of change? As a writer, I'm relishing the whole of it. I'm
:34:07. > :34:11.relishing the difficulties, the dangers, the monstrosity of it, is
:34:12. > :34:17.terrific for a writer. It gives enormous energy. From humble
:34:17. > :34:21.beginnings to fame, fortune and a tragically early death, the
:34:21. > :34:25.celebrity car crash life of an and Nicole Smith was the surprising
:34:25. > :34:29.inspiration for an ambitious new production at the Mall Opera House.
:34:29. > :34:35.She was a Playboy model whose life was routinely played out in front
:34:35. > :34:45.of the cameras. We went to see what happens when high art and tabloid
:34:45. > :34:49.
:34:49. > :34:54.trash collide. She was married to a Texas oil billionaire. She has
:34:54. > :34:58.inherited �62 million from her husband. In a way, her story is a
:34:58. > :35:02.parable for our times and our celebrity obsessed culture. But
:35:02. > :35:07.only four years after her death, should her life be used to
:35:07. > :35:12.entertain an audience yet again? Is it in any way morally questionable
:35:12. > :35:17.to be making her life and death into art so soon? I don't think so,
:35:17. > :35:21.but maybe I'm a morally questionable person. We do not
:35:21. > :35:22.trash it, we are very sympathetic. The piece is dedicated to her,
:35:22. > :35:27.The piece is dedicated to her, we're not taking the mickey. People
:35:27. > :35:37.think that we are trashing her, but that was hopeful, because we are
:35:37. > :35:37.
:35:37. > :35:47.doing something which is a bit deeper than that.
:35:47. > :35:54.
:35:54. > :35:59.# Blow you all a kiss. If she had a different name, and it was set in
:35:59. > :36:03.the 19th century, exactly the same, a woman trying to get money out of
:36:03. > :36:08.an old, rich person's family, living with her lawyer, you would
:36:08. > :36:14.not bat an eyelid. # She comes from the school of hard
:36:14. > :36:19.knocks, she's old school. # Come to think of it, no school!
:36:19. > :36:23.It is just a great story, it is begging to be done as a musical.
:36:23. > :36:28.could hear music. For me, the basic thing is that I found the whole
:36:28. > :36:31.story, her life, suggested music to me, there has got to be a reason
:36:31. > :36:41.why people sing. And I could see a lot of reasons why those characters
:36:41. > :36:50.
:36:50. > :36:54.could sing. But what is it like to become Anna Nicole-Smith? This was
:36:54. > :36:58.the soprano who took up the challenge. She did all of these
:36:58. > :37:04.things, decisions, in her life, which were wrong. I feel for her.
:37:04. > :37:07.It feels like she had no help, she was so lonely, in a way. People
:37:07. > :37:17.around her were not there for her benefit, they were there to exploit
:37:17. > :37:20.
:37:20. > :37:24.her, in a way. Now, here on the culture show, we
:37:24. > :37:29.like to get different perspectives on things, so we often have guest
:37:29. > :37:33.presenters. This year, one of my cultural highlights was a Sir David
:37:33. > :37:43.Attenborough's celebration of his favourite painter. In
:37:43. > :37:43.
:37:43. > :37:53.Attenborough's view, John Craxton was a neglected artist, but a new
:37:53. > :37:57.
:37:57. > :38:01.exhibition set out to change all of 60 years ago, I had just got out of
:38:01. > :38:05.the Navy, I had got a degree in natural sciences, and I was in my
:38:05. > :38:09.first job - looking after the illustrations for a publisher. And
:38:09. > :38:12.I picked up this book, The Poet's Eye. Initially it interested me
:38:12. > :38:15.because the illustrations were quite new, they were done by the
:38:15. > :38:18.artist, drawing directly onto the plate that was going to reproduce
:38:18. > :38:23.it, auto-lithographs, they were called. But when I started to look
:38:23. > :38:29.at them - what pictures they were! - I wondered who on earth the
:38:29. > :38:31.artist was. Well, his name was John Craxton. He was brought up in a
:38:31. > :38:41.Bohemian, musical family, and was free-spirited, adventurous and a
:38:41. > :38:51.It was these haunted, undeniably melancholic pictures that led some
:38:51. > :38:52.
:38:52. > :39:02.critics to call him a neo-romantic, a label he did not like. But then,
:39:02. > :39:04.as far as the fashionable art world Now, a new exhibition at Tate
:39:04. > :39:14.Britain, the first major show in London since 1967, reveals what
:39:14. > :39:14.
:39:14. > :39:24.happened to him. And here's the explanation. In 1946, he went to
:39:24. > :39:26.
:39:26. > :39:31.Greece. Two years later, he painted this. Gone is that melancholy young
:39:31. > :39:41.man - all is music and sparkle and sunshine, delight. Fascinated by
:39:41. > :39:41.
:39:41. > :39:43.the qualities of the Mediterranean light, his painting was transformed.
:39:43. > :39:53.The landscapes become more complex, more spectacularly daring in their
:39:53. > :39:55.
:39:55. > :40:03.However, these bright, scintillating pictures were thought
:40:03. > :40:06.to be too playful and decorative for British tastes at that time.
:40:06. > :40:14.Dispirited by the poor reviews for his 1967 retrospective, for long
:40:14. > :40:17.periods afterwards, John rarely exhibited at all. In his later
:40:17. > :40:27.years, he divided his time between his life in Crete and his studio
:40:27. > :40:30.here in London. It was over 30 years after I first saw those
:40:30. > :40:38.pictures in a book by John Craxton that I got to know him, and even
:40:38. > :40:45.went out to stay with him in Crete. He was a man with a huge enjoyment
:40:45. > :40:49.of life. He loved riding across Europe on his Tiger motorcycle. He
:40:49. > :40:53.loved parties, whether they were at the embassy or down by the quayside.
:40:53. > :40:56.One of the great pleasures of life was to be taken by him to the
:40:56. > :41:02.harbourside restaurant and eat a meal of seafood which even I, whose
:41:02. > :41:12.supposed to know about these things, found difficult to identify. Life,
:41:12. > :41:17.
:41:17. > :41:22.said John, is more important than There was another must-see
:41:22. > :41:32.exhibition over at Tate Modern. Alan Yentob met its star, the
:41:32. > :41:32.
:41:32. > :41:36.influential German artist, Gerhard Richter. Gerhard Richter's career
:41:36. > :41:42.spanned five decades, and he has proved something of an artistic
:41:42. > :41:47.chameleon. This show has been curated by the director of the Tate.
:41:47. > :41:52.It gives a sense of the scope, intensity and virtuosity of his
:41:52. > :42:02.work. Was there ever a time when you thought that painting and art
:42:02. > :42:03.
:42:03. > :42:11.was not for you? A time when you had had enough? Enough of painting?
:42:11. > :42:18.No. Gerhard Richter was born in Dresden, and grew up in Nazi
:42:18. > :42:23.Germany, an experience which would infuse his early work. He became
:42:23. > :42:33.one of the first artists of his generation to reflect on Germany's
:42:33. > :42:33.
:42:33. > :42:41.national socialist past. An early series of paintings depicts family
:42:41. > :42:46.members, who had been recruits, as well as victims, of the Nazi party.
:42:46. > :42:55.Again and again, you often go back to pictures of your family. Why is
:42:55. > :43:00.that? They are the people I have most to do with. They are the
:43:00. > :43:05.closest. When I first saw your pictures, I could not believe that
:43:05. > :43:12.the same person had been able to paint all these different images.
:43:13. > :43:17.Nowadays, it is easy to paint. it? Yes, much easier than before,
:43:17. > :43:22.because they have photographs. did you blow the photographs, why
:43:22. > :43:32.not give us nice photographs? like the surface, and of course,
:43:32. > :43:42.
:43:42. > :43:46.Our next guest interviewer travelled to Italy to meet up with
:43:46. > :43:51.the creator of one of the most audacious art works of the year.
:43:51. > :43:55.You might not instantly recognise it as a art. A gigantic super-yacht,
:43:55. > :44:01.like this one, is going to be available to buy in London. As a
:44:01. > :44:06.luxury yacht, it is yours for 65 million euros. As a lot work, it is
:44:06. > :44:16.a handsome 75 million. That is a mock-up of 10 million euros. We're
:44:16. > :44:28.
:44:28. > :44:34.So, this art work - what do I get for the extra 10 million? What do I
:44:34. > :44:41.get that makes it an art work? get my name in chrome letters, I
:44:41. > :44:45.give my name to this boat. And of course, you get an art work, a
:44:45. > :44:49.different thing than it was before, it is not just a boat, it is an art
:44:49. > :44:54.work. So the only addition you have made physically is the labelling?
:44:55. > :45:04.Yes. You decided not to make any other s 30 decisions or any extra
:45:05. > :45:06.
:45:06. > :45:11.When I started to talk to the shipbuilders there was a wish to do
:45:11. > :45:17.something inside the boat, to make it Moriarty. But I had to explain
:45:17. > :45:23.carefully that it stays as this concept. If you are charging 10
:45:23. > :45:28.million for an artwork you are putting yourself up there with
:45:28. > :45:32.Picasso and the great Masters. not? It is quite a bombastic
:45:32. > :45:37.project that could irritate the general public I think. It might
:45:37. > :45:42.get a lot of criticism. For me the boat isn't the artwork - you doing
:45:42. > :45:52.it is the artwork. I see it as you trying to get away with selling a
:45:52. > :45:53.
:45:53. > :45:57.boat as an artwork. It is both at the same time. The aspect is needed
:45:57. > :46:02.as a sculpture. If you are struggling for Christmas ideas,
:46:02. > :46:08.Christian is still looking for a buyer.
:46:08. > :46:18.The most talked about cop series of the year was BBC Four's The Killing.
:46:18. > :46:18.
:46:18. > :46:22.We caught up with its star. She is a very aspirational character. In
:46:22. > :46:26.many respects she does things we would like to do but we don't have
:46:26. > :46:31.the nerve to do with it. Where do the roots of that character lie?
:46:31. > :46:35.an actor you are looking for a challenge. You are looking to
:46:35. > :46:40.always go somewhere you haven't been before. Up until that point I
:46:40. > :46:44.had always played very emotional characters, traditional feminine
:46:44. > :46:51.characters. Where I have been crying a lot and shouting a lot and
:46:51. > :46:55.feeling a lot, and communicating a lot. I remember saying at that very
:46:55. > :46:58.first might, I would like to play a person who is not able to
:46:58. > :47:08.communicate. When I was standing on the circuits especially in the
:47:08. > :47:29.
:47:29. > :47:38.beginning, I actually found it very, It is the writer's story, but this
:47:38. > :47:42.writer insists on writing as we go along. That means that we are
:47:42. > :47:47.shooting one episode at the same time and he is writing on the next
:47:47. > :47:52.episode as we shoot the first one. But it allows him to take a lot
:47:52. > :47:57.from the actors. If you add something as an actor, he will
:47:57. > :48:01.start writing in that direction, if he gets inspired. The one thrap is
:48:01. > :48:08.at the heart of that first series of The Killing is the relationship
:48:08. > :48:12.with the jumper. LAUGHTER When you see series that have
:48:12. > :48:18.female protagonists, they always have nice wardrobes. You've got a
:48:18. > :48:23.woman wearing the same jumper week after week after week for 20 weeks.
:48:23. > :48:27.The jumper becomes almost iconic. don't know what it is with that
:48:27. > :48:32.jumper but there've been times where I have felt that the jumper
:48:33. > :48:38.was wearing me more than I was wearing it! We knew we were looking
:48:38. > :48:43.for somebody not a cliche type of detective. Not a woman in a suit.
:48:43. > :48:51.So we had tonnes of clothes. I just spotted that jumper and I felt
:48:51. > :48:55.right away that that was it. Now, American movie makers Joel and
:48:55. > :49:02.Ethan Cohen released their 15th movie this year, a remake of the
:49:02. > :49:06.cowboy classic True Grit. The brothers based their remake not on
:49:06. > :49:15.the western with John Wayne but on a novel.
:49:15. > :49:18.Mark Kermode saw this film appreciation showdown. The western
:49:18. > :49:24.is a cornerstone of a great American narrative, in which the
:49:24. > :49:29.good get even and the bad are just plain ugly. It is perhaps the most
:49:29. > :49:35.quintessentially American genre, the western provides surprising
:49:35. > :49:42.challenges for Hollywood outsiders Joel and Ethan Cohen. From a final
:49:42. > :49:48.showdown on all things cowboy I met up with Christopher frailing. Hello
:49:48. > :49:55.Chris. Hi, Mark. Let's go see a film. Great idea. True grit is
:49:55. > :50:05.based on a 1968 nov ill, first made into a film by Henry Hathaway in
:50:05. > :50:10.1969, starring John Wayne and Kim dar by. Now 40 years on the Cohen
:50:10. > :50:19.brothers have made their own version of true grit. Tells the
:50:19. > :50:28.story of Matty Ross, who hires Rooster Cogburn to avenge her
:50:28. > :50:35.father's murder. Where's my money. Meet me here at o'clock tomorrow
:50:35. > :50:42.morning. Matt Damon joins them as the suave Texas ranger into the
:50:42. > :50:45.dangerous Indian territory. I just watched True Grit, which was
:50:45. > :50:50.very powerful. Do you think true grit is more than a Cohen brothers
:50:50. > :50:54.film than a western? Partly because the Cohen brothers make it their
:50:55. > :51:00.own so much. They have such a strong view of the world, a strong
:51:00. > :51:05.visual sense that they are dominating the material. It is like
:51:05. > :51:11.a costume drama. It is the equivalent of a Thackray adaptation
:51:11. > :51:17.or a Dickens adaptation. Who are they speaking to in this film? It
:51:17. > :51:23.is to the original True Grit and to the novel. It doesn't make it a
:51:23. > :51:27.western, even though it is set in the Wild West. There is none of
:51:27. > :51:37.that promise, turning the desert into the garden. No sense of
:51:37. > :51:37.
:51:37. > :51:42.promise at all. I've been drawn into a wild goose chase by a harpy
:51:42. > :51:45.in trousers and a nincompoop. film has been astonishingly
:51:45. > :51:51.successful. When I saw it I liked it very much but didn't think it
:51:51. > :51:55.would be a hit. I thought it would be a film liked by critics. Why has
:51:55. > :52:02.it achieved such success? Partly because tts view of a 14-year-old.
:52:03. > :52:07.Here is a voice you can identify with if you are in the demographic
:52:07. > :52:13.14 -20yofpltd everyone that heard of True Grit. It was so successful
:52:13. > :52:17.in the '60s. But on a deeper level the movie is about retribution.
:52:17. > :52:23.Somebody wants vengeance because her dad's been shot. Although she
:52:23. > :52:28.gets deflected on the journey, she gets there. This idea of
:52:28. > :52:35.retribution, who are the bad guys, sit clear cut or more economy Kayed,
:52:35. > :52:41.that's a clever way of chiming with what's on people's minds. Thank you
:52:41. > :52:44.and adios. Adios. Mark's second film pick is another
:52:44. > :52:46.film adaptation. We Need To Talk About Kevin
:52:46. > :52:49.revolves around Eva, a mother played with harrowing intensity by
:52:49. > :52:53.Tilda Swinton, who has a troubled relationship with her son, Kevin.
:52:53. > :52:56.When he reaches 15, Kevin commits a terrible act and Eva is left to
:52:56. > :53:01.deal with the horrendous consequences. As his mother, is she
:53:01. > :53:05.to blame? We Need To Talk About Kevin has the same unsettling tone
:53:05. > :53:10.as Lionel Shriver's novel. It's a perverse love story which tackles a
:53:10. > :53:14.taboo subject - a mother who doesn't love her child. The film
:53:14. > :53:17.marks a welcome return for Scottish director Lynne Ramsay. Emerging in
:53:17. > :53:20.the late 1990s, the dark and lyrical style of her early films
:53:20. > :53:27.marked her out as one of Britain's most visionary directors, but this
:53:27. > :53:31.is only her third feature in 12 years. What is it about the story
:53:31. > :53:40.of We Need To Talk About Kevin that you wanted to address? I mean, why
:53:40. > :53:44.that story? I just thought it was very compelling. Some women do not
:53:44. > :53:47.feel that instant bond. It was like a dirty secret. It was like, "Oh,
:53:47. > :53:50.have you read that novel?" There are feelings that people can relate
:53:50. > :53:58.to but it is hard to talk about. How was your relationship with
:53:58. > :54:01.Tilda Swinton on this? Obviously she is the centrepiece of the film
:54:01. > :54:04.and, as you said, it is not a role that everyone would take, because
:54:04. > :54:09.it is profoundly unsympathetic and also taboo, because she is the
:54:09. > :54:12.mother who doesn't love the child. Tilda Swinton is a very bold person.
:54:12. > :54:15.She's brave and she's so intimidating and exotic. So the
:54:15. > :54:18.thing about this was making her more normal, in a way. Making her
:54:18. > :54:21.more, you know, your average mother, albeit this is a very extreme
:54:21. > :54:29.situation. But that was a challenge in itself - how to make Tilda
:54:29. > :54:32.Swinton dowdy. Newcomer Ezra Miller plays the part of the teenage Kevin.
:54:32. > :54:35.You had a drink of water. Hey, Kev. Listen, buddy, it's easy to
:54:35. > :54:45.misunderstand something when you hear it out of context. Why would I
:54:45. > :54:51.
:54:51. > :54:55.not know the context? I am the context. He's got a kind of
:54:55. > :55:00.sexuality as well, a kind of creepy slinkiness. I put him through the
:55:00. > :55:04.mill and I had him back six or seven times. But when he walked in
:55:04. > :55:08.the room, he sucked up so many presence. He was so confident. And
:55:08. > :55:18.so intelligent. I felt that Kevin really was smart. Ezra Miller is
:55:18. > :55:19.
:55:19. > :55:26.probably the smartest boy I ever met. It's intimidating actually.
:55:26. > :55:36.But our Mark didn't just confine himself to movie theatres this year.
:55:36. > :55:41.I'm sure they don't sell popcorn there.
:55:41. > :55:51.I'm here at Tate Modern because the new Turbine Hall commission is for
:55:51. > :55:51.
:55:51. > :55:57.the first time a film. Well, how to begin to describe it. It's like
:55:57. > :56:02.celluloid as architecture, a huge celluloid strip, like the monolith
:56:02. > :56:08.from 2001. The first thing you notice is cinema is usually
:56:08. > :56:16.landscape, but in this has been turned on its side to make it
:56:16. > :56:21.portrait. And how big it is! It was a radical change for me. Of course,
:56:21. > :56:26.I will to work intuitively and my first impression was that whatever
:56:26. > :56:30.I had to do had to be portrait like the space. It became about trying
:56:30. > :56:34.to make that possible within the medium, within the film. The hall
:56:34. > :56:39.is trying to find the shape of the installation. As far as the content
:56:39. > :56:44.is concerned, you've talked in the past about filming a lot to find a
:56:44. > :56:49.little. How did you choose the images? It came about when he the
:56:49. > :56:54.portrait format but I didn't know it was a portrait of what. I
:56:54. > :56:58.started to pick out my port trait format post cards, waterfalls and
:56:58. > :57:02.steps. And then he them up. At a certain point I realised it was a
:57:02. > :57:08.portrait of the film itself. So once I had that and then a bit
:57:08. > :57:12.later it was a portrait of the Turbine Hall. It was a combination
:57:12. > :57:16.of this place. It is only ever going to be for this place. And
:57:16. > :57:21.then with the sprocket holes, I just suddenly realised it was a
:57:21. > :57:26.strip of film. It was very simple. It was that revelation.
:57:26. > :57:32.One of the concerns of this installation and your work is
:57:32. > :57:35.general is the difference between film and digital imaging. Celluloid
:57:35. > :57:38.is fast becoming obsolete. This is something about which you are
:57:39. > :57:43.passionate. What's important about celluloid? Well, film is an
:57:43. > :57:47.entirely different medium from digital. For some reason there is
:57:47. > :57:53.an assumption that digital can take over from film, but it can't. They
:57:53. > :57:59.are totally different mediums the two should be allowed to coexist.
:57:59. > :58:03.We wouldn't get rid of oil painting and replace it with acrylic, or
:58:03. > :58:08.whatever metaphor. The Turbine Hall is a huge platform. He to make this
:58:08. > :58:12.project about fighting for the medium that we are just about to.
:58:12. > :58:19.We've had this for 100 years. We won't be able to see our history of
:58:19. > :58:25.Do something quickly Hope you enjoy this look back at this year. Before
:58:25. > :58:32.we go we leave you with a track from one of 2011's most charming
:58:32. > :58:42.albums. This is Noah And The Whale. We'll be back in February. Until
:58:42. > :58:53.
:58:53. > :58:59.then we wish you a very merry # Pressed up to a window
:58:59. > :59:06.# On the other side of town # His breath on the glass
:59:06. > :59:13.# And then his fingers # Circles the streetlights
:59:13. > :59:21.# The only signal note there's people out there in the black
:59:21. > :59:25.# He is in the town he grew up with # Will he ever come back? His heart
:59:25. > :59:30.is pumping blood # On his lip as perfect smile