J O H N B E R G E R // W A Y S O F S E E I N G
02:39b a s e d o n : 'Ways of Seeing' by John Berger 1 Seeing comes before words a child sees before it speaks seeing es...
02:39
b a s e d o n : 'Ways of Seeing' by John Berger
1
- 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
3
- the social presence of a woman is different from that of a man
- a man's presence is all about the promise of power, which he embodies (may be physical, moral, temperamental, economic, social, sexual) and its object is always exterior to the man
- a woman's presence expresses her own attitude to herself, what can and cannot be done to her (may manifest in her gestures, voice, opinions, expressions, clothes, chosen surroundings, taste)
- a woman is born into the keeping of men
- 'from earliest childhood she has been taught and persuaded to survey herself'
- the thought of the surveyor (male) and the surveyed (female) is always part of her identity
- how she appears to men is of crucial importance to her ('success of her life')
- men survey women before treating them
- women demonstrate to others how they would like to be treated through all of her actions
- women turn themselves into 'an object of vision: a sight'
- 'Men act and women appear. Men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at.'
- 'To be naked is to be oneself. To be nude is to be seen naked by others and yet not recognised for oneself. A naked body has to be seen as an object in order to become a nude.'
- women's representation (e.g. in oil paintings) when naked is often to appeal to a spectators (presumably male) sexuality
- 'the woman's sexual passion needs to be minimised'
- a facial expression of women are often 'responding with calculated charm to the man whom she imagines looking at her - although she doesn't know him.'
- women offer up their femininity as the surveyed
- exceptions are paintings of loved women, in which the presence of their actual lover is so strong that it leaves no room for a spectator
