• Seeing comes before words
• a child sees before it speaks
• seeing establishes our place in the surrounding world
• the way we see is affected by our knowledge
• seeing can never be completely covered by words (there's always something indescribable)
• we only see what we look at
• looking is a choice
• we always look at the relation between ourselves and our surroundings
• seeing and being seen form a dialogue that we constantly try to put into words
• an image is a reproduced sight, an appearance detached from the time and place it was made in/for
• everyone embodies a way of seeing 
• even photographs are a careful selection of the photographer's sight
• a photographer's way of seeing is reflected in his choice of subject
• our perception and understanding of an image in turn is based on our personal knowledge and experience
• assumptions concerning
• Beauty
• Truth
• Genius
• Civilisation
• Form 
• Status
• Taste, etc. 
• art is the best way to learn about history because it allows a somewhat personal placement in it to view and learn
• we accept what we see in images as far as it corresponds with our own observation of people, gestures, faces, institutions
• it is not a painter's/photographer's skill to 'seduce' the viewer
• Mystification is the process of explaining away what might otherwise be evident
• in order to avoid it, one must examine the relation between present and past; if one can see the present clearly, one shall ask the right questions for the past
• we see art like it has never been seen before; our perception is different
• e.g. perspective when it was first used consciously it was called 'reality'
• the camera momentarily captured appearances and in that destroyed the idea that pictures were timeless
• what you see is relative to your position in time and space: where you were when 
• paintings' perspectives suggested the viewer as the centre, photos revealed that there was no such thing
• it changed the way men saw, which, in turn, was reflected in newer paintings
• it has also changed the way men see art that had been done before the invention of the camera
• when a painting is reproduced by a camera and instead of being viewed in its designated locations is looked at in a different surrounding its meaning multiplies and fragments into many different meanings
• it is no longer what the image shows that strikes 'one as unique' -> its first meaning is no longer to be found in what it says but what it is
• I definitely see truth in this particularly, it reminds me of the time I saw Van Gogh's Night Café and I found I was more excited about having seen it than the painting itself
• its impressiveness increases with the market value (if it's worth $$$, it is a better piece of art)
• Gursky's photograph 'The Rhine' 
• museums: who goes closely relates to privileged education; the majority feels the paintings convey some kind of holy relics that excludes them
• the mystery of the rich, who they believe the art belongs to
• 'The meaning of paintings is no longer attached to them; their meaning becomes transmittable', it becomes information that can be accepted or ignored
• 'To whom does the meaning of the art of the past properly belong? To those who can apply it to their own lives, or to a cultural hierarchy of relic specialists?'
• the art of the past no longer exists, it has lost its authority. Now there's a language of images; important is who uses that language and for what purpose 

• Cultural Capital: refers to non-financial social assets that promote social mobility beyond economic means, e.g. education, intellect, style of speech, dress and physical appearance
• insufficient or the 'wrong' cultural capital can prevent you from realising your aspirations and dreams

• Subcultural Capital: the cultural knowledge and commodities acquired by members of a subculture, raising their status and helping differentiate themselves from members of other groups
• Self-policing and elimination, 'deploying their own versions of subculture as a rationale for their own exclusion' (p.2) 

• Self-efficacy: an individuals belief in his/her capacity to execute behaviours necessary to produce specific performance attainments; reflects confidence in ability to exert control over one's own motivation, behaviour and social environment

• How can self-efficacy be developed?
  -> representation! 

• 'Awkward' questions to ask about the social and institutional structures that support and maintain hierarchies of taste according to Eleonora Belfiore: 'If the debate on cultural value is to go beyond an empty rhetoric of self-celebration then it needs to  be an occasion in which awkward questions are asked of the sector as a whole. '
• 'For whom does the sector generate value?'
• 'What do organisations big and small do to live up to their status as public cultural organisations?'
• Amadasun adds:
• 'Do we want to encourage cultural omnivores by diversifying taste and/or do we want a radical overhaul of the very values that make distinctions between 'high' and 'low' culture?'
• 'How do we survive and make some progress in our day-to-day lives?'

‘For Bourdieu the body, how we carry ourselves, how we dress, how we feel, was key to how the game of power within any field was played out. When there is a fit between us and a particular social field there is ‘ontological complicity’; we are like fish in water.’ - page 1

'It does not feel the weight of the water, and it takes the world for granted.’ (p.127) - Pierre Bourdieu 

When reading this text, I could not help but think about all these classic American teenage high-school films and
 Questions I ask myself now: