Simon Schama's Power Of Art

This is not a series about things that hang on walls, it is not about decor or prettiness. It is a series about the force, the need, the passion of art... the power of art.

The power of the greatest art is the power to shake us into revelation and rip us from our default mode of seeing. After an encounter with that force, we don't look at a face, a colour, a sky, a body, in quite the same way again. We get fitted with new sight: in-sight. Visions of beauty or a rush of intense pleasure are part of that process, but so too may be shock, pain, desire, pity, even revulsion. That kind of art seems to have rewired our senses. We apprehend the world differently.

Presenter Simon Schama introduces his choice of artists and artworks and tells us why art matters. (Source: BBC)