There is something we sort of know, even if I suspect we are completely wrong in our intuition. This is agonising, as really all you will want to do is studying and think about these images for hours. The book is annoying because it should have been a coffee table book with large colour photographs and large font – instead it is a Penguin paperback with a font tending towards the unreadable and grey scale reproductions of the paintings that make them almost impossible to view.
This is a really remarkable series and a remarkable, although annoying, book. This is agonising, as This book is based on a television series which can be viewed on YouTube here. This book is based on a television series which can be viewed on YouTube here.
Winner of the 1972 Booker Prize for his novel, G., John Peter Berger (born November 5th, 1926) is an art critic, painter and author of many novels including A Painter of Our Time, From A to X and Bento’s Sketchbook.more It opened up for general attention to areas of cultural study that are now commonplace" -Geoff Dyer in Ways of Telling "The influence of the series and the book. He is a liberator of images: and once we have allowed the paintings to work on us directly, we are in a much better position to make a meaningful evaluation" -Peter Fuller, Arts Review
"Berger has the ability to cut right through the mystification of the professional art critics. he will almost certainly change the way you look at pictures." By now he has.
First published in 1972, it was based on the BBC television series about which the (London) Sunday Times critic commented: "This is an eye-opener in more ways than one: by concentrating on how we look at paintings. John Berger's Ways of Seeing is one of the most stimulating and the most influential books on art in any language. he will John Berger’s Classic Text on Art “We learned from him to see that basic assumptions about everything-work, play, art, commerce-are hidden in the surrounding culture of images.John Berger’s Classic Text on Art John Berger's Ways of Seeing is one of the most stimulating and the most influential books on art in any language.
“In contemporary English letters he seems to me peerless.” - Susan Sontag “Over the past sixty years, the great John Berger - art critic, essayist, screenwriter, novelist, poet, and artist - has made immeasurable contributions to our understanding of culture and politics, never more potently than in Ways of Seeing.” – The Village Voice He is a liberator of images: and once we have allowed the paintings to work on us directly, we are in a much better position to make a meaningful evaluation.” -Peter Fuller, Arts Review “Berger has the ability to cut right through the mystification of the professional art critics. “…perhaps the most bold, clear, and widely renowned explanation of art’s entanglement with capitalism.” - The Paris Review It opened up for general attention to areas of cultural study that are now commonplace.” -Geoff Dyer “The influence of the series and the book. “Berger fulfils the roles of a philosopher, listener, and somewhat of a magician as he makes tantalising worlds appear, and illusions vanish.” - Pratibha Rai, Oxford Culture Review “It’s a book about art history and the media, but it’s also a magic trick.” - The New Republic