BBC expands arts coverage - but Rolf Harris stays

The BBC is seeking to dismiss claims of "dumbing down" by announcing a major shift in arts coverage on its flagship channel, BBC1.

The move, which includes a substantial rise in spending, follows protracted criticism of a lack of serious arts programmes on the main channel, fears of the new digital channel BBC4 becoming a ghetto for arts, and worries that recent BBC1 programmes such as Rolf Harris discussing art might be the precursor to celebrity-driven culture shows.

Perhaps stung by the criticism, BBC1 plans to spend more than £3.3m on arts programmes in the autumn schedules, which will be announced in the next few weeks. This is £1.5m more than last year. The number of hours dedicated to the arts will rise by 40 per cent.

The shift is demonstrated in such programmes as a three-part series on Leonardo da Vinci, narrated by the BBC executive and new chairman of the Institute of Contemporary Arts, Alan Yentob. Two-part documentaries on Christopher Wren and Michelangelo will also be broadcast. Other documentary subjects this autumn include the novelists E Annie Proulx and Patricia Cornwell, and there will be programmes on Lord Byron and art deco. The conductor Charles Hazlewood will present a programme on Vivaldi.

A series on 19th-century female novelists, including George Eliot and Jane Austen, will coincide with a dramatisation of Eliot's Daniel Deronda and a new film of Austen's Mansfield Park. Anna Chancellor will present the programme on Austen. The presenter for Eliot is not being announced yet but Daniel Deronda is being adapted by Andrew Davies. Mary Shelley will also feature in the series.

BBC1, however, will not be dropping Rolf Harris. The first series Rolf on Art had an average audience of 6.1 million – the highest ever for a series on the visual arts. A second series has been commissioned.

But the corporation will be setting up a working party to decide how future arts coverage should be shaped, and how it should be spread between BBC1, BBC2 and BBC4. The working party consists of Jana Bennett, the new director of television; Mr Yentob; Lorraine Heggessey, head of BBC1; Jane Root, head of BBC2, and Roly Keating, head of BBC4. Ms Bennett, as director of television, has told her colleagues that arts must now be a priority for the channel.

Speaking to The Independent, Ms Heggessey said: "It's been a case of getting the separate prongs of the strategy in place. We want to introduce a new audience to arts as well as appealing to those already interested in the arts; series like Rolf on Art will appeal to people who find an entry point to arts on BBC1 and can then go to galleries. But we also want to start to put into place the landmarks that we have done with science and are going to do with history.

"BBC1 can open the world of the arts to people who might feel intimidated to go to a gallery, but we don't want to ignore our heartland either."

Ms Heggessey said she also intended to put a "new arts strand" in place next year. The strand would be exclusive to BBC1, whereas Omnibus, the current arts strand, is seen on both BBC1 and BBC2.