Berger points out that the globe hovering behind Holbein’s The Ambassadors refers to incipient empire and so to racist violence. European conventions on perspective, he argues, offer the world up to the covetous viewer with a deference found in no other tradition. He tells us that still-life painting did not depict objects qua objects, but as items to be owned. He explains the difference between the painted nude-seductive, objectified-and the naked human being. In fewer than 200 pages, Berger whips the curtain back on contemporary advertising’s roots in European oil painting. It is very short, for one thing, and it moves very quickly. Revisiting the book now, you may find it reduced. Berger synthesizes, paraphrases, and boils down large swaths of important cultural theory into a work that is both inspiring and intuitive to understand. By the same token, however, professors assign Ways of Seeing to college freshmen because it is easy.
Berger takes his readers beyond the visible, towards a closer understanding of the world as it really is-the one capitalism, patriarchy, and empire try to hide from you. It’s a book about art history and the media, but it’s also a magic trick. I did: Holding that dog-eared copy in my hands today, the book still seems to shiver with revelatory power.įor many Berger fans, Ways of Seeing represents the first time a book trusted them to see past the appearance of things. If you were into art as a teenager, you probably read it then.
In the days since his death, Berger has been most widely eulogized for his 1972 BBC series Ways of Seeing, which was adapted into a popular book.
He began teaching painting in 1948, and published his last book of essays, Confabulations, only last year. It spanned the second half of the long twentieth century and at least six different jobs (art historian, novelist, playwright, critic, teacher, painter). Our grief has been poured out widely, in proportion to his great generosity. John Berger died on Monday, a few weeks after turning 90.