0:00:10 > 0:00:13This may look like an ordinary door in Florence.
0:00:13 > 0:00:15BELL RINGS But it isn't.
0:00:17 > 0:00:21The man who lived here invented the Renaissance.
0:00:23 > 0:00:26There he is. Giorgio Vasari.
0:00:27 > 0:00:30The one with the interested cherub looking on.
0:00:33 > 0:00:36Vasari was a painter, and as you can see,
0:00:36 > 0:00:39not a particularly good one.
0:00:39 > 0:00:43His work lacked elegance and grace.
0:00:43 > 0:00:45In a word, it was clunky.
0:00:50 > 0:00:54He was actually born just down the road from here in Arezzo.
0:00:54 > 0:00:59But when he was in his teens, very impressionable,
0:00:59 > 0:01:02he came here to Florence and wheedled his way into
0:01:02 > 0:01:08the company of the city's greatest artist, the divine Michelangelo.
0:01:12 > 0:01:19For the rest of his career, Vasari remained a Michelangelo groupie.
0:01:20 > 0:01:24It shows in his painting
0:01:24 > 0:01:27and more importantly for us,
0:01:27 > 0:01:29it shows in his writing.
0:01:37 > 0:01:41In 1550, Vasari published a book,
0:01:41 > 0:01:43a very special book,
0:01:43 > 0:01:48because it turned out to be the most influential art book ever written.
0:01:55 > 0:02:02It was called The Lives Of The Most Eminent Painters, Sculptors And Architects,
0:02:02 > 0:02:07though these days we usually shorten that to The Lives Of The Artists.
0:02:10 > 0:02:12As the first book of its kind,
0:02:12 > 0:02:17Vasari's Lives set the agenda for all the art books that followed.
0:02:20 > 0:02:23Inside, it was packed with biographies
0:02:23 > 0:02:25of the artists that Vasari admired.
0:02:27 > 0:02:31And in the preface, for the first time in art,
0:02:31 > 0:02:36Vasari uses the term "rinascita",
0:02:36 > 0:02:39to describe what was going on around him.
0:02:39 > 0:02:44"Rinascita" is Italian for "rebirth".
0:02:44 > 0:02:48Or, as we call it now, Renaissance.
0:02:49 > 0:02:52What Vasari says in his famous preface is that
0:02:52 > 0:02:58under the ancient Greeks and Romans,
0:02:58 > 0:03:00civilisation reached its greatest height
0:03:00 > 0:03:02and the arts achieved perfection.
0:03:05 > 0:03:13Then along came the barbarians who destroyed everything
0:03:13 > 0:03:16and the arts fell into ruin.
0:03:16 > 0:03:20Until we get to Vasari's own times,
0:03:20 > 0:03:25roughly between about 1400 and 1600 -
0:03:25 > 0:03:28the dates are a little vague -
0:03:28 > 0:03:33when there's this great "rinascita", this Renaissance.
0:03:36 > 0:03:39And civilisation returns to Italy.
0:03:41 > 0:03:46It's a rousing tale of cultural triumph.
0:03:46 > 0:03:49Unfortunately, it's just not true.
0:03:51 > 0:03:57Civilisation wasn't completely lost for a millennium and a half
0:03:57 > 0:04:02and it wasn't reborn suddenly in Renaissance Italy.
0:04:05 > 0:04:10Vasari's Renaissance is the creation of a jingoistic Florentine,
0:04:10 > 0:04:13who's cheering on his own team
0:04:13 > 0:04:16in the great football match of civilisation.
0:04:16 > 0:04:20But if the momentous rebirth didn't happen,
0:04:20 > 0:04:21what did?
0:05:12 > 0:05:15This is Padua,
0:05:15 > 0:05:18and that is the famous Equestrian Statue
0:05:18 > 0:05:21of the mercenary Gattamelata by Donatello.
0:05:21 > 0:05:27Now, this was made in around 1450 and according to Vasari,
0:05:27 > 0:05:32this was the first great equestrian statue of the Renaissance,
0:05:32 > 0:05:36the first time a Renaissance artist matched
0:05:36 > 0:05:39the achievements of the ancients.
0:05:39 > 0:05:40But was it?
0:05:44 > 0:05:49If we head north from Padua, out of Italy,
0:05:49 > 0:05:55a long way north into the land of the barbarians,
0:05:55 > 0:06:00or as we call them today, the Germans,
0:06:00 > 0:06:05we'll find a different storyline being enacted.
0:06:08 > 0:06:13The Germans, poor mites, they barely get a mention in Vasari.
0:06:17 > 0:06:23But in the real world, their artistic achievements were huge.
0:06:28 > 0:06:33This stone fellow here is called the Bamberg Horseman.
0:06:35 > 0:06:41He's life-sized and he was made here in Germany in around 1220.
0:06:43 > 0:06:46So that's two and a half centuries or so
0:06:46 > 0:06:48before Donatello's Gattamelata
0:06:51 > 0:06:55The Bamberg Horseman isn't mentioned in Vasari,
0:06:55 > 0:06:58and when you do come across him in books,
0:06:58 > 0:07:02he's invariably dismissed as a piece of Gothic art,
0:07:02 > 0:07:05something backward or primitive.
0:07:05 > 0:07:07But that's not what I see up there.
0:07:10 > 0:07:14I see a remarkable piece of equestrian carving.
0:07:16 > 0:07:18Look at the detail of the cloth, the hair,
0:07:21 > 0:07:24the musculature of the horse.
0:07:28 > 0:07:31This isn't some impossible bronze beast ridden by
0:07:31 > 0:07:34an impossible bronze warrior.
0:07:34 > 0:07:37This is something more modest, less heroic.
0:07:38 > 0:07:43And real horses, ridden by real people, have proportions like these.
0:07:46 > 0:07:51The fact is, when Vasari ignored the North in his story
0:07:51 > 0:07:57of the Renaissance, he ignored some of the key developments in art.
0:07:59 > 0:08:05So in this series, yes, we'll be looking at Leonardo da Vinci.
0:08:07 > 0:08:10And at Vasari's divine Michelangelo.
0:08:12 > 0:08:15And at Botticelli and his Venuses.
0:08:17 > 0:08:24All Vasari's Italian favourites will be looked at, but not yet.
0:08:24 > 0:08:26Not before their time.
0:08:27 > 0:08:32First, we need to catch up with the furious progress
0:08:32 > 0:08:37that was being made in this bubbling cauldron
0:08:37 > 0:08:40of Renaissance creativity...
0:08:40 > 0:08:42Bruges.
0:08:42 > 0:08:44BELLS CHIME
0:08:47 > 0:08:49Ah, Bruges!
0:08:49 > 0:08:53These days, it's so pretty and well-preserved.
0:08:53 > 0:08:57It's hard to imagine what a frantic, cutting-edge,
0:08:57 > 0:09:00Wild West of a town this was
0:09:00 > 0:09:03in the early days of the Renaissance.
0:09:07 > 0:09:11If you're ever in the Stadt Bibliothek in Berlin,
0:09:11 > 0:09:17ask to see the manuscript of Anthony of Burgundy
0:09:17 > 0:09:21and open it on Folio 244.
0:09:21 > 0:09:24WATER SPLASHES, WOMEN GIGGLE
0:09:24 > 0:09:28It shows you what went on in the bathhouses in Bruges
0:09:28 > 0:09:33in around 1400 when the businessmen were in town.
0:09:35 > 0:09:37On the right, the baths.
0:09:39 > 0:09:41On the left, the beds.
0:09:41 > 0:09:44WOMAN CHUCKLES COQUETTISHLY
0:09:44 > 0:09:46WATER SPLASHES
0:09:47 > 0:09:49All those fellows in the bathhouses,
0:09:49 > 0:09:55the travelling businessmen, were trading in cloth, fabrics.
0:09:55 > 0:09:58That's what made the city rich.
0:09:58 > 0:10:02And they were doing it here, in the Cloth Hall in Bruges.
0:10:06 > 0:10:11At its peak, there'd be 400 stalls crammed into here,
0:10:11 > 0:10:14selling cloth from around the world.
0:10:15 > 0:10:20And if you want to know what these fabulous fabrics looked like,
0:10:20 > 0:10:25it's all recorded in spectacular close-up
0:10:25 > 0:10:27in the art of Renaissance Flanders.
0:10:30 > 0:10:32So all these merchants in here
0:10:32 > 0:10:39were from Spain, Poland, Russia, England and one of them, an Italian,
0:10:39 > 0:10:41we know very well,
0:10:41 > 0:10:45because his face is one of the most memorable in Renaissance art.
0:10:48 > 0:10:53Ah, yes. The Arnolfini Marriage, by Jan van Eyck.
0:10:55 > 0:11:00And there's Giovanni Arnolfini himself, wealthy cloth merchant
0:11:00 > 0:11:08from Lucca, pledging his fidelity to the lovely Mrs Arnolfini.
0:11:10 > 0:11:11Exactly what they're pledging
0:11:11 > 0:11:15has been the subject of much controversy,
0:11:15 > 0:11:17to which I'm not going to add here.
0:11:17 > 0:11:23What I want to discuss is something much more important -
0:11:23 > 0:11:25what the Arnolfinis are wearing.
0:11:28 > 0:11:31Let's start with Mrs Arnolfini.
0:11:31 > 0:11:35Now, she's wearing a bulky green dress
0:11:35 > 0:11:40that's made from a Bruges speciality, wool.
0:11:42 > 0:11:44Like this outfit, here.
0:11:45 > 0:11:49Now, this wool was mostly imported from England,
0:11:49 > 0:11:52then woven here by the famous Flemish weavers.
0:11:54 > 0:11:57In the painting, the dress looks rather bulky.
0:11:57 > 0:11:59That's because it's lined with fur.
0:12:01 > 0:12:03If you look carefully at the edges,
0:12:03 > 0:12:06you'll see this white fur poking out.
0:12:07 > 0:12:10Now, that is actually the fur...
0:12:13 > 0:12:15..of one of these,
0:12:15 > 0:12:16a red squirrel.
0:12:16 > 0:12:20And not just any bit of the fur, but this bit here.
0:12:21 > 0:12:24The white bit, the purest bit,
0:12:24 > 0:12:26what they used to call minever.
0:12:29 > 0:12:33It would have taken around 2,000 squirrels
0:12:33 > 0:12:36to line Mrs Arnolfini's dress.
0:12:38 > 0:12:43So when you look at her again, at the National Gallery in London,
0:12:43 > 0:12:50try to forget she's actually wearing 2,000 dead squirrels.
0:12:53 > 0:12:57As for her headdress, which looks so complicated, that's just a piece
0:12:57 > 0:13:03of white linen, like this, which has been folded over five times
0:13:03 > 0:13:09and is then worn on the head like so, kept in place with pins.
0:13:11 > 0:13:13So that's Mrs Arnolfini.
0:13:13 > 0:13:16But what about him? Well, he's wearing...
0:13:18 > 0:13:21..these. Pine martens,
0:13:21 > 0:13:26imported from the forests of Poland and Russia, hugely expensive,
0:13:26 > 0:13:30the second most expensive fur after sable,
0:13:30 > 0:13:35and Arnolfini's tunic would have required about 100 of these.
0:13:35 > 0:13:39So that's a lot of money, right there.
0:13:40 > 0:13:46On top of the fur, there's this dark purple velvet
0:13:46 > 0:13:50that's probably imported from Lucca, Arnolfini's home town,
0:13:50 > 0:13:52where the best velvet was made.
0:13:54 > 0:13:59But the most interesting thing he's wearing, I think, is his hat.
0:13:59 > 0:14:02That huge, wobbly top-hat affair,
0:14:02 > 0:14:05that looks several sizes too big for him.
0:14:08 > 0:14:12It's actually made of this, straw that's been dyed black
0:14:12 > 0:14:16and it's a kind of fashionable Renaissance boater
0:14:16 > 0:14:19that everyone was wearing in 1432.
0:14:19 > 0:14:23Very light, practical, and as you can see, flattering.
0:14:27 > 0:14:32Look closely at van Eyck's hat and all becomes clear
0:14:32 > 0:14:36in the microscopic, almost magical detail
0:14:36 > 0:14:38that was van Eyck's trademark.
0:14:40 > 0:14:4330 years before the birth of Leonardo...
0:14:44 > 0:14:49..50 years before Michelangelo was born,
0:14:49 > 0:14:55the artists of Bruges were already seeing as clearly as this.
0:14:57 > 0:15:01What was happening here in the early years of the 15th century
0:15:01 > 0:15:06was nothing less than a pictorial revolution.
0:15:06 > 0:15:10A completely new way of seeing and painting.
0:15:11 > 0:15:16And in its clarity, its precision,
0:15:16 > 0:15:21it was far ahead of anything that was happening in Italy at the time.
0:15:24 > 0:15:27But that's not how art history sees it.
0:15:27 > 0:15:30Ever since Vasari, until very recently,
0:15:30 > 0:15:35these early masters of Bruges and Flanders have been looked down on,
0:15:35 > 0:15:40patronised. Do you know what they call them in art history books?
0:15:41 > 0:15:43THIS is what they call them.
0:16:01 > 0:16:05At the back of the Arnolfini Marriage, high up on the wall,
0:16:05 > 0:16:08there is one of these - a convex mirror.
0:16:10 > 0:16:14These convex mirrors keep popping up in Flemish art
0:16:14 > 0:16:19in various ways and for various reasons.
0:16:20 > 0:16:22In the Arnolfini Marriage,
0:16:22 > 0:16:26van Eyck uses it to smuggle in a cunning self-portrait.
0:16:26 > 0:16:31Now, if I ask our handsome cameraman Matt to step up to the mirror
0:16:31 > 0:16:35and film it, you'll see his reflection in the glass.
0:16:35 > 0:16:41And in exactly the same way, van Eyck uses it to show himself
0:16:41 > 0:16:44and a mysterious second figure, rhyming, as it were,
0:16:44 > 0:16:47with the Arnolfinis at the front.
0:16:47 > 0:16:52But other Flemish artists use them in different ways.
0:16:55 > 0:17:00When Quentin Matsys put one on the table used by a money changer
0:17:00 > 0:17:05and his wife, it's there for their protection.
0:17:06 > 0:17:11In Flanders, the bankers used them to see round corners
0:17:11 > 0:17:15and make sure no-one was sneaking up on them.
0:17:18 > 0:17:22It's like those helpful mirrors you get on the London Underground
0:17:22 > 0:17:25in the corridors so you can see if anything is coming...
0:17:26 > 0:17:28..the other way.
0:17:31 > 0:17:37Interestingly, here in Bruges, the guild of the mirror makers
0:17:37 > 0:17:40was the same guild, the Guild of St Luke,
0:17:40 > 0:17:43to which painters also belonged.
0:17:47 > 0:17:50St Luke was actually the patron saint of painters
0:17:50 > 0:17:55so you often see him in Renaissance art, presented as an artist
0:17:55 > 0:18:00who's drawing the Madonna, imagining the unimaginable.
0:18:03 > 0:18:06With St Luke by their side,
0:18:06 > 0:18:10the painters of Bruges were changing what art does...
0:18:12 > 0:18:14..and how it does it.
0:18:21 > 0:18:25This is the Madonna with Joris van der Paele, as it's called,
0:18:25 > 0:18:29painted by van Eyck again in 1436
0:18:29 > 0:18:33and it's another miraculous feat of observation.
0:18:36 > 0:18:41Look at the robes that St Donatian on the left is wearing,
0:18:41 > 0:18:44his cross, his mitre.
0:18:47 > 0:18:53Or, on the other side, the lovely reflections in St George's armour.
0:18:53 > 0:18:55And look!
0:18:55 > 0:18:58There's van Eyck again,
0:18:58 > 0:19:01haunting the picture with his secret presence.
0:19:04 > 0:19:07Now, to see as clearly as this,
0:19:07 > 0:19:11you either need eyesight that's miraculously good, or...
0:19:13 > 0:19:15..you need these.
0:19:17 > 0:19:19Joris van der Paele,
0:19:19 > 0:19:24who commissioned this great devotional picture from van Eyck,
0:19:24 > 0:19:29has been using his glasses to help him read his prayers.
0:19:30 > 0:19:34"Joris" is Dutch for "George"
0:19:34 > 0:19:36and that's why St George
0:19:36 > 0:19:40is presenting his patron to the Madonna
0:19:40 > 0:19:43and making sure he's read his prayers,
0:19:43 > 0:19:47even though his old eyes are going.
0:19:49 > 0:19:53Now, glasses weren't actually invented in Bruges in the 1400s.
0:19:53 > 0:19:59They were invented in Italy about a century earlier in Pisa.
0:20:03 > 0:20:07And if you examine the older faces in Renaissance art,
0:20:07 > 0:20:12you'll see a pair of specs popping up quite often.
0:20:12 > 0:20:16Sometimes in unexpected places.
0:20:18 > 0:20:24Some are painted, some are carved, some are for seeing God,
0:20:24 > 0:20:26others for seeing money.
0:20:29 > 0:20:34Hieronymus Bosch, the great Flemish doom merchant,
0:20:34 > 0:20:39even managed to find a pair being sported in hell.
0:20:42 > 0:20:44Now, although glasses had been around
0:20:44 > 0:20:46for the best part of a century,
0:20:46 > 0:20:48it was in Flanders at the time of van Eyck,
0:20:48 > 0:20:53early in the 15th century, that the art of lens making was perfected
0:20:53 > 0:20:58and great steps were taken in ways of seeing.
0:21:00 > 0:21:04Unfortunately, I can't tell you exactly how
0:21:04 > 0:21:06these newly precise lenses
0:21:06 > 0:21:11and this new magnification were used in Bruges.
0:21:12 > 0:21:17Flemish artists were very secretive about it.
0:21:17 > 0:21:22To this day, it's a controversial topic.
0:21:22 > 0:21:25But when you look into the minute details
0:21:25 > 0:21:29crammed into this miraculous Renaissance art,
0:21:29 > 0:21:33a bit of help was surely needed.
0:21:36 > 0:21:37Let me put it this way -
0:21:37 > 0:21:41either for the first few millennia of Western art,
0:21:41 > 0:21:45no artist anywhere was born with good enough eyesight
0:21:45 > 0:21:51to record reality as clearly as it was recorded here in Flanders,
0:21:51 > 0:21:55or after these first few millennia,
0:21:55 > 0:21:58something happened here that made it finally possible
0:21:58 > 0:22:01to see things more clearly.
0:22:04 > 0:22:08I know which version I believe.
0:22:44 > 0:22:48I don't know if you've seen that rather bad George Clooney movie,
0:22:48 > 0:22:50The Monuments Men.
0:22:50 > 0:22:52Well, this was the painting
0:22:52 > 0:22:56they were trying to steal back from the Nazis.
0:22:59 > 0:23:04It's van Eyck's greatest achievement - the Ghent Altar,
0:23:04 > 0:23:11a masterpiece of spectacular complexity and mysterious ambition,
0:23:11 > 0:23:18with so much going on in it and this strange God
0:23:18 > 0:23:24looming up in the centre, like an all-powerful Oriental potentate.
0:23:26 > 0:23:32Now, the mirror makes a secret appearance in here as well, sort of.
0:23:32 > 0:23:37You see the Virgin Mary sitting on the right hand of God?
0:23:37 > 0:23:43Look at the band of writing above her head. See what it says.
0:23:45 > 0:23:51It's in Latin, but you can just about make out the first bit -
0:23:51 > 0:23:55"speculum sine".
0:23:55 > 0:24:00And if you could see through that gorgeous bit of cloth below,
0:24:00 > 0:24:02it would continue "macula".
0:24:04 > 0:24:10"Speculum sine macula" - it means the immaculate mirror.
0:24:10 > 0:24:13It's a quote from the Bible, the Book of Wisdom.
0:24:13 > 0:24:16Mary, who was born without sin,
0:24:16 > 0:24:23is being compared to one of these - speculum sine macula.
0:24:23 > 0:24:25And that is how van Eyck paints her as well,
0:24:25 > 0:24:30as a vision of unblemished female perfection.
0:24:36 > 0:24:39As with so much Flemish art,
0:24:39 > 0:24:43the Ghent Altar is very confusing at first sight.
0:24:45 > 0:24:49This is just a handy replica they keep at Ghent Cathedral.
0:24:51 > 0:24:53But even this is a challenge.
0:24:55 > 0:25:01As for the real thing, that sits behind bulletproof glass
0:25:01 > 0:25:08in a dark chapel at the back, where even the Nazis can't steal it again
0:25:08 > 0:25:12and where it looms up before us
0:25:12 > 0:25:18like a daunting cliff face of dense Flemish symbolism.
0:25:26 > 0:25:29But that's only from a distance,
0:25:29 > 0:25:32because the real joy of the Ghent Altarpiece,
0:25:32 > 0:25:36the real joy of all of van Eyck's art
0:25:36 > 0:25:39is to get close and to see the details.
0:25:40 > 0:25:46- WOMAN SINGS: - # Il dolcissimo Signore... #
0:25:47 > 0:25:51When you press your nose against a van Eyck,
0:25:51 > 0:25:55the confusion ceases and it all gets intoxicating.
0:25:57 > 0:26:02Botanists have identified 42 different species of plant
0:26:02 > 0:26:06painted accurately on the Ghent Altar.
0:26:06 > 0:26:09TRIO SINGS IN ITALIAN
0:26:11 > 0:26:14And see that delightful landscape at the back?
0:26:14 > 0:26:18It's supposed to be the New Jerusalem,
0:26:18 > 0:26:22as described in the Bible at the end of the world.
0:26:23 > 0:26:28But it looks an awful lot like Flanders, doesn't it?
0:26:28 > 0:26:30Bruges made biblical.
0:26:30 > 0:26:35SHE SINGS IN ITALIAN
0:26:41 > 0:26:45All this perfectly recorded reality,
0:26:45 > 0:26:48this shiny truth that Flemish art invented,
0:26:48 > 0:26:51isn't reality for the sake of it.
0:26:51 > 0:26:53It's not trying to fool anybody.
0:26:53 > 0:26:59This is reality as a powerful new weapon of conviction.
0:26:59 > 0:27:05TRIO CONTINUES TO SING
0:27:10 > 0:27:14Van Eyck is smuggling big religious truths
0:27:14 > 0:27:17into the everyday life of Flanders,
0:27:17 > 0:27:21making them touchable, bringing them nearer.
0:27:24 > 0:27:26This is art that is having to envisage things
0:27:26 > 0:27:29that have never been envisaged before.
0:27:30 > 0:27:33And what a feast of invention it is.
0:27:34 > 0:27:40So how was it done? To see that, we have to get even closer.
0:27:40 > 0:27:46Normally, you can't get any closer than this to van Eyck's masterpiece.
0:27:46 > 0:27:49But this isn't any old arts programme.
0:27:49 > 0:27:55This is the Renaissance Unchained on the BBC, so I've managed
0:27:55 > 0:27:59to arrange some exclusive access to the Ghent Altarpiece.
0:27:59 > 0:28:04Not even George Clooney could get as close as we are going to get.
0:28:14 > 0:28:16In just a moment, we're going to be going in there,
0:28:16 > 0:28:19where they're restoring some of the panels of the Ghent Altar
0:28:19 > 0:28:23and we're going to get really close to van Eyck
0:28:23 > 0:28:26and see exactly how he does it.
0:28:26 > 0:28:28But first, I want to show you something.
0:28:33 > 0:28:40This is by Filippo Lippi, a painter from Florence much loved by Vasari,
0:28:40 > 0:28:47and it's a scene from the life of St Benedict, painted in around 1450.
0:28:47 > 0:28:51So that's 20 or so years after the Ghent Altarpiece.
0:28:53 > 0:28:59Now, this wasn't painted in oil paints, which is what van Eyck used.
0:29:01 > 0:29:04It was painted in egg tempera,
0:29:04 > 0:29:08the medium they preferred in early Renaissance Italy.
0:29:11 > 0:29:15It's basically watercolour with a binding of egg yolks
0:29:15 > 0:29:17to hold the pigments together
0:29:17 > 0:29:24and it dries very quickly into these fabulous glowing colours.
0:29:24 > 0:29:27What a gorgeous pink that is!
0:29:27 > 0:29:28So that's tempera over here...
0:29:33 > 0:29:37..but over here is van Eyck's Annunciation.
0:29:37 > 0:29:41So that's the Angel Gabriel telling the Virgin Mary
0:29:41 > 0:29:44that she's going to give birth to Jesus
0:29:44 > 0:29:50and this was painted about 20 years before the Filippo Lippi,
0:29:50 > 0:29:54but look how van Eyck's captured the fabrics.
0:29:54 > 0:29:57Look at what the angel's wearing.
0:29:57 > 0:29:59And compare this...
0:30:02 > 0:30:04..with this.
0:30:04 > 0:30:08See how the cloth is done in the Filippo Lippi
0:30:08 > 0:30:10or these plants over here.
0:30:11 > 0:30:12Compare those...
0:30:17 > 0:30:20..with the plants in the van Eyck,
0:30:20 > 0:30:22these beautiful white lilies,
0:30:22 > 0:30:24which, like the immaculate mirror,
0:30:24 > 0:30:28symbolise the purity of the Virgin Mary.
0:30:30 > 0:30:32It's a different world, isn't it?
0:30:32 > 0:30:36And, critically, a different technique.
0:30:44 > 0:30:49Now, Vasari tells us that van Eyck invented oil paints
0:30:49 > 0:30:51and that's just not true.
0:30:51 > 0:30:55They were already in use in Afghanistan in the seventh century,
0:30:55 > 0:30:58in Buddhist art.
0:30:58 > 0:31:03But he did master them in ways that no-one had mastered them before
0:31:03 > 0:31:07and used them with extraordinary skill
0:31:07 > 0:31:09and it's these oil paints,
0:31:09 > 0:31:12along with the lenses and the glasses,
0:31:12 > 0:31:15that made Flemish art possible.
0:31:23 > 0:31:27And inside here, they've been restoring van Eyck panel by panel,
0:31:27 > 0:31:33so it's a wonderful opportunity to see exactly how it's all done.
0:31:43 > 0:31:45The whole restoration of the Ghent Altarpiece
0:31:45 > 0:31:50is a very big project and the first step is the outside wing panels,
0:31:50 > 0:31:54which we're currently working on and we're already quite far.
0:31:54 > 0:31:58We took already all the vanishes off, the discoloured varnishes,
0:31:58 > 0:32:00and now we're actually in the process
0:32:00 > 0:32:01of removing all the overpaints,
0:32:01 > 0:32:04so we're actually scraping away the later additions
0:32:04 > 0:32:06to reveal the original intention of the artist.
0:32:06 > 0:32:11And you can see it really well there, all those dark brown,
0:32:11 > 0:32:14greens here are actually dirty varnishes that we left on
0:32:14 > 0:32:17to show people and this is the original colour that's underneath.
0:32:17 > 0:32:20So there's a bright white underneath those dark,
0:32:20 > 0:32:23- discoloured varnishes. - It's very vivid.
0:32:23 > 0:32:26You do see very, very clearly there.
0:32:26 > 0:32:29The white now has come out a Persil white, beautiful.
0:32:30 > 0:32:35Looking at the angel, what strikes me is this, as you said,
0:32:35 > 0:32:37the colours are brighter,
0:32:37 > 0:32:40this beautiful green that's come out of the angel's wings.
0:32:40 > 0:32:44Yeah, after the cleaning, they are a bit brighter and especially,
0:32:44 > 0:32:47yes, indeed, the green does jump at you.
0:32:47 > 0:32:50But I think, most importantly, it has an effect
0:32:50 > 0:32:53on the depth of field because not only the colours,
0:32:53 > 0:32:55I think the colours are, as I said, a bit muted,
0:32:55 > 0:32:59but once we start taking off the first varnish
0:32:59 > 0:33:03and then the overpaint, you feel like you're in a room again.
0:33:05 > 0:33:08You get drawn into the picture and the whole 3-D effect.
0:33:10 > 0:33:14I think it's the experience of being there in the room.
0:33:29 > 0:33:32So, what else could you do with these exciting new paints?
0:33:34 > 0:33:39One of the things you could record more clearly was people.
0:33:42 > 0:33:47In Flanders, the great artists of the Northern Renaissance
0:33:47 > 0:33:50began making their contemporaries immortal.
0:33:52 > 0:33:58We simply haven't seen faces as tangible as these in art before.
0:34:00 > 0:34:04This fierce-looking chappy and Vladimir Putin lookalike
0:34:04 > 0:34:10is Chancellor Rolin, staring with scary determination
0:34:10 > 0:34:14across one of van Eyck's finest landscapes.
0:34:16 > 0:34:22And they say this is van Eyck himself in a big red turban
0:34:22 > 0:34:25and the touching crow's feet around his eyes.
0:34:31 > 0:34:34There was so much invention, too,
0:34:34 > 0:34:37about this thrilling Flemish portraiture.
0:34:37 > 0:34:41This is the Sint-Janshospitaal in Bruges
0:34:41 > 0:34:43and it's full of the work of Hans Memling,
0:34:43 > 0:34:49a Bruges master who was particularly good at portraits.
0:34:52 > 0:34:55This fellow here is Maarten van Nieuwenhove
0:34:55 > 0:34:59and this is a two-part painting, or diptych,
0:34:59 > 0:35:05painted in 1487 and it's very clever.
0:35:08 > 0:35:13Maarten van Nieuwenhove is at a table praying.
0:35:13 > 0:35:18Look at that beautiful purple velvet jerkin he's wearing,
0:35:18 > 0:35:22bought from the Arnolfinis, perhaps.
0:35:22 > 0:35:27And in the other half, the Virgin Mary and Jesus,
0:35:27 > 0:35:34noticeably less realistic and the objects of Maarten's prayer.
0:35:38 > 0:35:40So he's praying to them,
0:35:40 > 0:35:44but - and this is so brilliant - they're both in the same room.
0:35:44 > 0:35:48This space and that space are next to each other.
0:35:48 > 0:35:50Look at the table here.
0:35:50 > 0:35:52That goes across both pictures as well.
0:35:52 > 0:35:57And see Mary's robe - it flows to the bottom,
0:35:57 > 0:36:00goes over into Maarten van Nieuwenhove's bit
0:36:00 > 0:36:04and even overlaps a bit of the frame.
0:36:05 > 0:36:10So it's a wondrous blending of realities and, at the back,
0:36:10 > 0:36:13there's a typical Flemish payoff.
0:36:13 > 0:36:20Look - a convex mirror and reflected in it, Mary and Maarten
0:36:20 > 0:36:25from the back and from the side, sitting around the same table.
0:36:28 > 0:36:31This is art that can paint miracles.
0:36:33 > 0:36:35In the hands of the Flemish,
0:36:35 > 0:36:41reality became such a powerful weapon in the artist's armoury.
0:36:41 > 0:36:45Yet look what they call it.
0:36:45 > 0:36:50When Vasari wrote the north out of the story of the Renaissance,
0:36:50 > 0:36:58he planted 500 years of prejudice in the annals of art.
0:37:13 > 0:37:17Another thing oil paints were especially good at capturing
0:37:17 > 0:37:23was textures. Oh, my God, they were good at textures!
0:37:24 > 0:37:28In particular, the artists of the Northern Renaissance
0:37:28 > 0:37:30had a lot of fun with armour.
0:37:32 > 0:37:35And that's handy because one of the saints
0:37:35 > 0:37:37who pops up most often in their art
0:37:37 > 0:37:43was the armour painter's delight, St George.
0:37:46 > 0:37:51You know, whenever I see St George adopted as a nationalist symbol
0:37:51 > 0:37:55by right-wing factions in England, for instance,
0:37:55 > 0:38:00it always makes me laugh, because he was actually a Turk of Greek origin
0:38:00 > 0:38:04who was born in Palestine near Tel Aviv
0:38:04 > 0:38:06and who served in the Roman army.
0:38:06 > 0:38:08So all those skinheads
0:38:08 > 0:38:11who've got St George tattooed on their foreheads,
0:38:11 > 0:38:13they're actively promoting
0:38:13 > 0:38:19Turkish, Greek, Palestinian, Roman and Jewish unity.
0:38:19 > 0:38:20Well done, lads!
0:38:31 > 0:38:35St George was popular because he saved a princess from a dragon
0:38:35 > 0:38:41and that made him a ready-made symbol of Christian salvation
0:38:41 > 0:38:46and an exciting challenge for the new oil paints.
0:38:48 > 0:38:54The new paints transformed armour into a delicate metal mirror
0:38:54 > 0:38:58on which sophisticated games could be played with light.
0:39:01 > 0:39:05Apart from encouraging all this exciting investigation of light
0:39:05 > 0:39:09and its symbolism, something else the St George story did
0:39:09 > 0:39:14was to pull Renaissance art out of its comfort zone
0:39:14 > 0:39:19and to send it slithering into dark new areas of the imagination.
0:39:21 > 0:39:24Forced to imagine the terrible beasties
0:39:24 > 0:39:28that St George had to slay,
0:39:28 > 0:39:32Renaissance art took a step into dark new territories.
0:39:35 > 0:39:38So the St George story pushed Renaissance art
0:39:38 > 0:39:41into these dark new areas.
0:39:41 > 0:39:45And that wasn't all - it also made it necessary
0:39:45 > 0:39:47to tackle combat and movement
0:39:47 > 0:39:53and that had an especially powerful impact on sculpture.
0:39:56 > 0:40:02This is what I think is the finest of the northern St Georges.
0:40:02 > 0:40:05He's certainly the most spectacular.
0:40:07 > 0:40:13You probably haven't heard of him because he's in Stockholm in Sweden
0:40:13 > 0:40:17in the Church of St Nicholas.
0:40:21 > 0:40:23What a thing!
0:40:23 > 0:40:27Bigger than life-size and carved out of wood
0:40:27 > 0:40:33with breathtaking skill and drama and the details are horrific.
0:40:36 > 0:40:41Bits of dismembered body are strewn across the plinth.
0:40:43 > 0:40:47And little baby dragons poke their heads out of the ground,
0:40:47 > 0:40:51waiting to be murdered.
0:40:52 > 0:40:56And then, in a very un-Renaissance detail,
0:40:56 > 0:41:01this bisexual dragon is so traumatised
0:41:01 > 0:41:08by St George's mighty spearing that it's emptied its bowels with fear.
0:41:10 > 0:41:18This was made by a German sculptor called Bernt Notke in around 1487
0:41:18 > 0:41:21when Michelangelo was still a teenager.
0:41:21 > 0:41:25Now, Bernt Notke isn't in Vasari, of course,
0:41:25 > 0:41:28because this is a Renaissance
0:41:28 > 0:41:33that obviously isn't trying to quote the Greeks or the Romans.
0:41:33 > 0:41:37It's a Renaissance that's slapping you about the face
0:41:37 > 0:41:41with action, drama and darkness.
0:41:43 > 0:41:48There's nothing Italian about it, that's true.
0:41:48 > 0:41:52But why does that make it a lesser achievement?
0:42:01 > 0:42:04The mad imaginings of the Northern Renaissance
0:42:04 > 0:42:06didn't stop with dragons.
0:42:08 > 0:42:11When art armed itself with oil paints,
0:42:11 > 0:42:16it armed itself with the power to make anything real.
0:42:21 > 0:42:24This really is supposed to be it -
0:42:24 > 0:42:26the mythical Fountain of Youth,
0:42:26 > 0:42:30where you go in old and you come out young.
0:42:35 > 0:42:38Now, you may not believe in the Fountain of Youth,
0:42:38 > 0:42:41but plenty of Renaissance folk did.
0:42:41 > 0:42:49This is how Lucas Cranach, prickly genius of the German Renaissance,
0:42:49 > 0:42:51envisaged its wondrous effects.
0:42:54 > 0:42:59Legend has it that a Spanish conquistador called Ponce de Leon,
0:42:59 > 0:43:02who'd been sent to the Americas to find it,
0:43:02 > 0:43:05landed here in Florida in 1513
0:43:05 > 0:43:09and discovered that it wasn't a myth -
0:43:09 > 0:43:13the Fountain of Youth really existed.
0:43:17 > 0:43:20In Cranach's delirious masterpiece,
0:43:20 > 0:43:25all the Joan Collinses in the village have been rounded up,
0:43:25 > 0:43:28dipped in the special waters
0:43:28 > 0:43:33and turned again into St Trinian's girls.
0:43:46 > 0:43:47It may have stopped working.
0:43:49 > 0:43:52Anyway, here we are in the Renaissance,
0:43:52 > 0:43:56this great rebirth of ancient knowledge,
0:43:56 > 0:44:00but all the old legends, superstitions and myths
0:44:00 > 0:44:03are exerting just as powerful a hold
0:44:03 > 0:44:06on the artistic imagination as they ever did.
0:44:11 > 0:44:17Enjoying Lucas Cranach is like visiting a German nature camp.
0:44:17 > 0:44:21What a lot of nudes there are romping about his pictures.
0:44:23 > 0:44:26Some of them are Lucretias.
0:44:26 > 0:44:30Others are Venuses.
0:44:30 > 0:44:34But all of them, you feel, are here
0:44:34 > 0:44:37because Cranach understood temptation
0:44:37 > 0:44:42and had personal reasons to warn us of its dangers.
0:44:46 > 0:44:52Perhaps that's why he's so unusually keen to paint Adam and Eve.
0:44:52 > 0:44:54Now, the Adam and Eve story,
0:44:54 > 0:44:59about the first man and the first woman committing the first sin,
0:44:59 > 0:45:05was the only story in the Bible that forced painters to paint nudes.
0:45:05 > 0:45:07There's no other way to do it.
0:45:07 > 0:45:10Clothes, after all, hadn't been invented yet.
0:45:15 > 0:45:18Set free in Paradise in their birthday suits,
0:45:18 > 0:45:25Adam and Eve gave Renaissance art a perfect biblical excuse
0:45:25 > 0:45:28to depict tempting human nudity.
0:45:31 > 0:45:33According to the Bible,
0:45:33 > 0:45:37Eve's crime was to pick forbidden fruit from the Tree of Knowledge...
0:45:39 > 0:45:41..and to tempt Adam with it.
0:45:44 > 0:45:48But I think we all know what really went on in Paradise
0:45:48 > 0:45:54when the first naked man met the first naked woman.
0:45:58 > 0:46:01But all these Adams and Eves of the Renaissance
0:46:01 > 0:46:04weren't just there for erotic reasons.
0:46:04 > 0:46:08There were other forces at work on the art of the times
0:46:08 > 0:46:15and the one that's always forgotten but shouldn't be is geography.
0:46:17 > 0:46:19It wasn't just the Fountain of Youth
0:46:19 > 0:46:22that was discovered around about now.
0:46:22 > 0:46:26So, too, was Paradise itself.
0:46:29 > 0:46:33It's a story told gloriously in a Renaissance art form
0:46:33 > 0:46:36that's been unfairly ignored -
0:46:36 > 0:46:41the great art form of the map.
0:46:43 > 0:46:48These days, we're blase about maps, but in Renaissance times,
0:46:48 > 0:46:56maps were extraordinary creations with a huge cosmic significance.
0:46:59 > 0:47:01I can't think of many things
0:47:01 > 0:47:04that would have been harder to make than this -
0:47:04 > 0:47:08the so-called Fra Mauro Map,
0:47:08 > 0:47:14made in Venice in around 1450 by a Venetian monk.
0:47:15 > 0:47:21In those days, north was south and south was north
0:47:21 > 0:47:24so the world was upside down.
0:47:26 > 0:47:28It's exquisite, isn't it?
0:47:28 > 0:47:32The glorious imagining of a glorious new world.
0:47:34 > 0:47:39But, interestingly, round about here, there's something missing -
0:47:39 > 0:47:46a little place called America, which hadn't been discovered yet.
0:47:48 > 0:47:52So the first Renaissance map with the Americas actually on it
0:47:52 > 0:48:00is this one - the Waldseemuller World Map of 1507.
0:48:00 > 0:48:03There's America there,
0:48:03 > 0:48:07or as they called most of it in those days, "terra incognita".
0:48:22 > 0:48:25When Columbus discovered America in 1492,
0:48:25 > 0:48:28he didn't just change history -
0:48:28 > 0:48:33he changed art and particularly the story of Adam and Eve.
0:48:39 > 0:48:44Their depiction has always triggered powerful guilts and worries.
0:48:44 > 0:48:48Some of the most anxious paintings of the Renaissance
0:48:48 > 0:48:52are representations of the first man and the first woman.
0:48:55 > 0:48:58And up on the Sistine ceiling,
0:48:58 > 0:49:02Michelangelo has left us in no doubt whatsoever
0:49:02 > 0:49:07as to the terrible consequences of the first sin.
0:49:10 > 0:49:13But these were still theoretical anxieties,
0:49:13 > 0:49:17distant imaginings of distant biblical events.
0:49:17 > 0:49:21When Columbus discovered America, that changed.
0:49:26 > 0:49:30It wasn't just the Fountain of Youth that turned up in Florida.
0:49:32 > 0:49:35As news began to filter through Europe
0:49:35 > 0:49:39of the strange new world discovered by Columbus,
0:49:39 > 0:49:44the Renaissance mind began putting two and two together
0:49:44 > 0:49:50and Paradise itself suddenly had a location.
0:49:57 > 0:50:02This is Hieronymus Bosch's famous Garden of Earthly Delights,
0:50:02 > 0:50:07a painting about sin and its terrible consequences
0:50:07 > 0:50:12and look what Adam and Eve are sinning under -
0:50:12 > 0:50:19a dragon tree, Satan's tropical succulent of choice.
0:50:23 > 0:50:26Paradise was no longer theoretical.
0:50:26 > 0:50:30Columbus had found it and that was bad news,
0:50:30 > 0:50:33because according to the scriptures,
0:50:33 > 0:50:37man and woman would only return to Paradise
0:50:37 > 0:50:41after the Day of Judgment, the last day of all.
0:50:44 > 0:50:47When Columbus discovered America,
0:50:47 > 0:50:52he set in motion a countdown to the end of the world.
0:50:55 > 0:51:01A less superstitious era might have laughed it off,
0:51:01 > 0:51:05but the Renaissance really wasn't one of those.
0:51:06 > 0:51:08Later in this series,
0:51:08 > 0:51:12we'll be dealing in depth with Hieronymus Bosch.
0:51:12 > 0:51:19For now, all I ask is that you feel his anxiety -
0:51:19 > 0:51:22the anxiety of his times.
0:51:35 > 0:51:41At times like this, times of deep Renaissance despair,
0:51:41 > 0:51:47turning to the era's greatest talent ought to be a relief.
0:51:47 > 0:51:51But in this instance, it isn't,
0:51:51 > 0:51:57because Albrecht Durer, the greatest German painter of the Renaissance,
0:51:57 > 0:52:03was a stoker up of anxieties, not a reliever of them.
0:52:05 > 0:52:08Durer lived here in his house in Nuremberg.
0:52:08 > 0:52:13It's been kept exactly as he left it as a kind of shrine to him
0:52:13 > 0:52:17because one thing Durer made sure of from the start
0:52:17 > 0:52:20is that everyone knew how great he was.
0:52:25 > 0:52:28If they handed out medals for arrogance,
0:52:28 > 0:52:32Durer would have a shelf load.
0:52:32 > 0:52:37Born in Nuremberg in 1471,
0:52:37 > 0:52:41he was so good so quickly
0:52:41 > 0:52:46that, by the age of 13, he drew this -
0:52:46 > 0:52:50a self-portrait as a teenage genius.
0:52:53 > 0:53:00Durer invented the artistic self-portrait.
0:53:00 > 0:53:05Other artists had put themselves in their pictures before,
0:53:05 > 0:53:11but no-one had made themselves the stars of their own art as Durer did.
0:53:13 > 0:53:16Here he is at 22,
0:53:16 > 0:53:22enjoying mightily his own Renaissance handsomeness.
0:53:22 > 0:53:29And look, at 26, he's put on his best dandy ware
0:53:29 > 0:53:32and loves himself even more.
0:53:35 > 0:53:37And then, in 1500,
0:53:37 > 0:53:42in a momentous Renaissance slippage of human modesty,
0:53:42 > 0:53:46the 29-year-old Albrecht Durer
0:53:46 > 0:53:52compares himself unmissably with Christ.
0:53:58 > 0:54:00All over Durer's art,
0:54:00 > 0:54:05we find him interjecting himself into the storylines.
0:54:05 > 0:54:09You even see it in his altarpieces.
0:54:11 > 0:54:14In this busy crucifixion in Vienna,
0:54:14 > 0:54:19who is that standing at the back of the crowd?
0:54:19 > 0:54:23Oh, look, it's Durer.
0:54:25 > 0:54:29And who's invited himself along to join the Virgin Mary
0:54:29 > 0:54:34and Christ in this ruined masterpiece in Prague?
0:54:36 > 0:54:37Who do you think?
0:54:40 > 0:54:45To my eyes, Durer's altarpieces are not as successful
0:54:45 > 0:54:48as he'd like us to believe.
0:54:48 > 0:54:53He couldn't do grandeur or emotional bigness.
0:54:56 > 0:54:59Durer gets better as he gets smaller.
0:54:59 > 0:55:05His portraits, for instance, are often transfixing,
0:55:05 > 0:55:10as with this divine portrayal of a girl from Venice.
0:55:16 > 0:55:22It's as if he couldn't work with a big brush, only a small one.
0:55:22 > 0:55:27Lots of little things combining to create the final image.
0:55:27 > 0:55:30It's a talent which came in particularly useful
0:55:30 > 0:55:33here in his printing studio.
0:55:36 > 0:55:39It's a belief widely held in art
0:55:39 > 0:55:44that Durer was the greatest printmaker of all.
0:55:44 > 0:55:48He was certainly one of the busiest
0:55:48 > 0:55:52and so successfully did his prints spread his fame
0:55:52 > 0:55:58that even Vasari heard of him and gave him a chapter in his book.
0:56:02 > 0:56:05Everyone knows Durer's Melencolia.
0:56:05 > 0:56:09It's probably the most famous print ever made,
0:56:09 > 0:56:12a mysterious figure surrounded
0:56:12 > 0:56:20by all this scattered Renaissance knowledge and made anxious by it.
0:56:23 > 0:56:27Lots of people have suggested that Melencolia
0:56:27 > 0:56:30is another disguised self-portrait
0:56:30 > 0:56:34and I'm certainly prepared to believe that.
0:56:35 > 0:56:37Because, as far as I can see,
0:56:37 > 0:56:44Durer never passed up an opportunity to put himself in his art.
0:56:58 > 0:57:02But, you know, it wasn't actually Durer's prints
0:57:02 > 0:57:05that finally convinced me of his genius
0:57:05 > 0:57:10or his altarpieces or even those extraordinary portraits of his.
0:57:10 > 0:57:15The day that took my breath away and finally blew away all the doubts...
0:57:19 > 0:57:23..was the day I saw his watercolours.
0:57:27 > 0:57:30The Albertina in Vienna has a collection of them
0:57:30 > 0:57:34that only goes on show every couple of decades.
0:57:35 > 0:57:39If you're alive for such an occasion, go there.
0:57:42 > 0:57:48This is Durer's famous Hare, twitching timidly before us.
0:57:50 > 0:57:56And the wings of a roller, coloured so freshly and brightly,
0:57:56 > 0:58:00they might have flown through yesterday sky.
0:58:03 > 0:58:06He thought he was divinely chosen
0:58:06 > 0:58:09and at moments like this,
0:58:09 > 0:58:12you find yourself believing him.
0:58:15 > 0:58:22So, that's the Northern Renaissance, an epoch of startling invention.
0:58:22 > 0:58:25It gave us oil paints.
0:58:25 > 0:58:28It gave us optics.
0:58:28 > 0:58:30It gave us the truth.
0:58:35 > 0:58:39In the next film, I'm heading south again.
0:58:40 > 0:58:45If Vasari got the Northern Renaissance so wrong,
0:58:45 > 0:58:50what did he also get wrong about the Renaissance in Italy?
0:58:50 > 0:58:54WHIPPING