How Art Made the World is a 2005 five-part BBC One documentary series, with each episode looking at the influence of art on the current day situation of our society.

"The essential premise of the show," according to Nigel Spivey, "is that of all the defining characteristics of humanity as a species, none is more basic than the inclination to make art. Great apes will smear paint on canvas if they are given brushes and shown how, but they do not instinctively produce art any more than parrots produce conversation. We humans are alone in developing the capacity for symbolic imagery."