Borromini in my opinion was the single most exciting architect there has ever been … The Picasso of architecture. ibid.
Bernini: as architect, as sculpture, as painter, the man could do everything. ibid.
His work is filled with movement and restless transformation. ibid.
The Baroque loved painted ceilings. ibid.
The first truly global art movement. ibid.
Baroque spread across Europe like a wildfire. Waldemar Januszczak, Baroque! – From St Peter’s to St Paul’s II
The Spanish Baroque was hardcore. ibid.
Valazquez – Spain’s greatest Baroque artist. ibid.
The Baroque’s fascination with lowlife … amounted to an obsession. ibid.
Wherever the monks went, the Baroque went. ibid.
I’ve got all the time in the world for Peter Paul Rubens ... The University of Cambridge made Sir Peter Paul Rubens a master of art. ibid.
Rembrandt was a classic Baroque hero. ibid.
The Protestant democratization of art caused all sorts of compositional problems. ibid.
Jan Vermeer of Delph … Vermeer is as much of a moralist as the rest of them ... Vermeer: the fragility of life itself, the vulnerability of beauty, the shortness of youth. ibid.
Seventeenth-century England was still stuck in the Middle Ages. Waldemar Januszczak, Baroque! From St Peter’s to St Paul’s III
The forces holding back progress were fiercely religious. ibid.
The Baroque poured into England. ibid.
The arrival in Britain of Anthony van Dyck changed everything here. ibid.
William Dobson ... the English Civil War: If Dobson hadn’t been there and put a face to his era the truth about these dramatic times would have gone unrecorded. ibid.
This square mile of the city of London contains the finest concentration of Baroque architecture outside Rome – 51 Baroque gems nestling among the money making skyscrapers. ibid.
Blenheim Palace ... like a great big ceremonial cake ... A Baroque architecture that resounds with power and might ... This Borromini of Blenheim – Nicholas Hawksmoor: Hawksmoor was the most inventive and madcap architect these shores had produced ... the chances are Hawksmoor did it. ibid
It’s a story of rebellion and courage. Monet painted some of art’s bravest pictures. Renoir some of the liveliest. Degas unleashed the ballet. Seurat unleashed the dot. Van Gogh – well he unleashed colour. I think it’s the most exciting mutiny in art. Waldemar Januszczak, The Impressionists: Painting and Revolution I: Gang of Four, BBC 2011
The impact of the paint-tube on art cannot be overestimated. ibid.
Monet and Renoir would spend their summers sniffing out modern places by the river. ibid.
The brush-strokes you can make with a fat brush are much more expressive. ibid.
Not a single picture survived the first Impressionist exhibition. ibid.
The outdoor art of the Impressionists – their most famous contribution to painting, the stuff we all know and love – was a bitch to paint. Waldemar Januszczak, The Impressionists: Painting and Revolution II: The Great Outdoors
The Impressionists were trying to be true to life. To paint things as they were. To make everyday life a suitable subject for art. Besides, when they started out most of them were famously poor. ibid.
The snow picture became an Impressionist’s speciality. ibid.
Traditional perspective was under attack. ibid.
The Impressionists staying indoors and watching the people was just as important as going outdoors and watching the landscape. Waldemar Januszczak, The Impressionists III: Painting and Revolution: Painting the People
Britain’s influence on Impressionism was crucial. ibid.
Painter after painter deliberately taking on the old masters ... All of them set out to prove that the modern world can be just as monumental, just as heroic and beautiful, as the ancient world. In the end it’s probably the most important of all Impressionism’s revolutionary messages: the present is just as precious as the past. Waldemar Januszczak, The Impressionists IV: Painting and Revolution: Final Flourish
Holland and the Dutch played a big role in the story of Impressionism. ibid.
The eighth Impressionist exhibition of 1886 which unleashed Seurat on the world and transformed Van Gogh turned out to be the last. ibid.
This is a film about the edgy relationship that Art has with the Night. Waldemar Januszczak, The Art of the Night **** BBC 2011
Night has turned out to be one of Art’s most productive times of day. ibid.
The most devoted painter of the stars was that hardened lover of the witching hour Vincent van Gogh. Van Gogh was obsessed with the night. ibid.
Gas-lighting was an interesting challenge to paint of course. ibid.
The Night Hawks by Edward Hopper ... Night Hawks is like a still from a gangsta movie. ibid.
The nocturnal imaginings of the Surrealists. ibid.
Dorothea Tanning ... One hundred and one years old ... These disturbing night fantasies of hers. ibid.
Impression Sunrise by Claude Monet: the picture which gave its name to Impressionism ... TV proof at last that Impression Sunrise actually shows a sunset. ibid.
This is a series about an artistic era that’s looked down on. Waldemar Januszczak, The Dark Ages: An Age of Light I: The Clash of the Gods, BBC 2012
For the first few centuries of Christianity there were no Christian images. ibid.
The first churches were ordinary houses. ibid.
The Visigoths … were pioneering Europeans who produced beautiful art. Waldemar Januszczak, The Dark Ages: An Age of Light II: What the Barbarians Did For Us
We’ve got the Dark Ages wrong – again. ibid.
Islamic star-gazers perfected the Astrolabe in the Dark Ages. Waldemar Januszczak, The Dark Ages: An Age of Light III: The Wonder of Islam
Jerusalem – the heart of the religious Dark Ages ... Herod’s temple was made entirely from white marble. ibid.
The Dome of the Rock – this whole building is taking on Christianity. ibid.
The hardcore determination of the Lindisfarne monks shows not only in the miraculous building in their great monastery but also in the stunning book art they made up here. So intricate. So detailed. So difficult. Waldemar Januszczak, The Dark Ages: An Age of Light IV: The Men of the North
It’s the carving of these boats and carts and sledges that makes this particular Viking find so exciting. ibid.
The Sutton Hoo treasure – this is the finest hoard of Anglo-Saxon gold ever dug up in Britain. ibid.
Those powerful Dark Age creatives – the Carolingians, rulers of the Franks. ibid.
Christianity arrived in Britain from three directions at once, in a three-pronged religious assault. ibid.
A treasure made of granite and limestone … the Anglo-Saxon funeral cross. ibid.
The Dark Ages – they weren’t dark. ibid.
It’s all coming back: every controversial, irritating and contentious moment of it. It’s all coming back. The Turner Prize – the bloody Turner Prize – every year the great and the good of the art world get together and award a gong to the best display of British art of the preceding twelve months. Waldemar Januszczak, Artsnight: What Has the Turner Prize Ever Done For Us? BBC 2016
But in 1991 a brave new mood entered the Turner: the short list included a group of young Turks in their 20s barely out of college: inc. Rachel Whiteread 1990 Ghost & Anish Kapoor 1990 At the Hub of Things. ibid.
Tracey Emin herself was nominated for an infamous work called My Bed. ibid.