This Is Civilization

Matthew Collings

Epiosode Three

Save Our Souls

The third programme in the series explores the impact of the industrial revolution on our ideas about art, nature and society, focussing on the visionary ideas of the British art critic John Ruskin. Collings follows in Ruskin's footsteps to locations including Venice, the Alps and, closer to home, Britain's stunning Lake District.

Ruskin is one of Collings' heroes. He believed that art could save our souls. It could reconnect us with nature, and heal the spiritual wasteland created by industrialisation. And Matthew Collings argues that - as it becomes ever clearer what damage we've been doing to nature - these days we need to listen to what Ruskin had to say more than ever.