Art, Passion & Power: The Story Of The Royal Collection (2018)

The Royal Collection is one of the most important and largest art collections in the world. Containing over a million works, it not only covers all aspects of the fine and decorative arts, but is also a personal record of the tastes and passions of kings and queens over the last five hundred years. Forty years since the story of the Royal Collection was last told so extensively on television, the BBC and Royal Collection Trust are working together in a major partnership to bring the many treasures of the Collection to television. In a four-part series for BBC Four, made by BBC Studios, Andrew Graham-Dixon selects some of the most spectacular works of art from this vast collection as he visits royal residences, museums and galleries across the UK. This is a collection that includes world-famous masterpieces by Van Dyck, Rembrandt, Canaletto and unrivalled collections of exquisite drawings by Holbein and Leonardo da Vinci. From grand sculpture and some of the most remarkable furniture ever made to Tudor miniatures and the extravagant creations of Fabergé, Andrew Graham-Dixon will explain what the objects meant to the artists who created them and to the royal collectors who acquired them. For centuries, the Royal Collection has helped the monarchy to perform its duty while also projecting its tastes, priorities and concerns. A record of British kings and queens at their most public, Andrew shows how it also reveals them at their most human.