Ways of Seeing

common English idiom says “a picture is worth a thousand words” but sometimes there aren’t even words to describe a picture. That is the case for “The Pillars of Creation”. This picture was taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. The photo depicts a nebula with three towers of gaseous regions, hence the name; in a way, it is metaphorical. Fortunately, for the normal people in the world, there are no controversies that provoke unreasonable people. The article “Ways of Seeing”, by John Berger, can be used to analyze the significance of this artwork. The significance of the “pillars of creation” is the idea that we all have a natural curiosity to learn and see more. When you look at it you instantly want to see more incredible and undiscovered sights. While some people may look at this photo and lose interest because it isn’t blatantly controversial, I look beyond the lack of controversy and see the ever-present curiosity of mankind and the beauty of pure creation. When people see something completely new to them often they have problems…

the social pyramid. The marketing strategies that are implemented by the individuals at the top are responsible for are changing the visual world around the common man. Ethan Watters in his essay “The Mega-Marketing of Depression in Japan” discusses the attempt by pharmaceutical corporations to effectively market and distribute their antidepressants amongst the Japanese population who have a different perspective on depression. John Berger’s essay “Ways of Seeing” discusses…

Chapter 4 of Ways of Seeing by John Berger is a picture essay. It begins with religious pieces of art, mainly from the thirteenth century. It carries on with work from the 14th, 15th 16th century and so on. The images contain subjects like deceased bodies, children, life, nudity etc. The essay is bringing us through the history of art and what was considered important during those years. The next chapter is about oil paintings. As economies grew so did people’s want for materialistic objects. At…

For centuries art is what brought the eye closer to reality. Art and freedom of expression extremely complement each other. The freedom to express anything through art has been around longer than the freedom to express through writing. New ways of making art are being created all the time for instance around the early 1900 's when printmaking first started; one of its many uses was to be used as political awareness. For example, many people in the towns of Mexico were illiterate, so these…

Seeing is a distant way of learning and exchanging with communicating. Moreover, seeing is a way to empower an individual to describe to the environment. In the article “ Ways of Seeing” by John Berger, he states that “Seeing comes before words. The child looks and recognizes before it can speak”(145). Every one of us sees things differently because stationary and individual can be different. An opinion can never make settlement because there are stand together between the words used and the…

Berger taught me a lot of things while reading "Ways of Seeing." The biggest thing that really stuck to me is the difference between naked and nude. Before reading this book, I thought naked and nude were the exact same thing. Berger made me realize that they have two different meanings. Nude is when you are looking at someone as an object, not as a person. Naked is someone who doesn't have any clothes on. This definition provided by Berger really made me understand that everything that you see,…

The desire to experience satisfaction is one that is felt by almost everyone. We seek to find enjoyment in our lives through partaking in various activities that interest or fascinate us, as doing what we love allows us to have more excitement and refreshment in our lives. Life would become quite boring and monotonous if we did not have anything that brought us satisfaction. The way one experiences satisfaction in their life, however, might not always be the same; people may have a change in the…

Imagine for a moment that you have to climb to the very top of a large, daunting mountain with the goal of eventually seeing the world from a new perspective. It is not that simple though because you are also unable to use any equipment or information to guide you in the task. Conversely, there is another person who, before beginning the exact same climb, already has an extensive knowledge provided to them for the venture, and additionally, they have high-tech equipment to make the journey…

In “Ways of Seeing”, John Berger says how the camera can change they way people see the world. “The invention of the camera changed the way that man saw “(Berger 149). Berger believed that the camera took away perspective of the way people see objects. The viewer sees through the photographer's eyes. “My way leads to the creation of fresh perspective of the world”(Berger 149). A picture may not be exactly what is seems. It may show what actually happened, or it could show parts of what actually…

“What the modern means of reproduction have done is to destroy the authority of art and to remove it.” (Berger, 126) This quote from, ‘Ways of Seeing’ indicates a portion of John Berger’s bitterness towards the reproduction of art. Throughout his essay he states that reproduction has belittled the original, and has made images of art valueless. On the contrary, I believe that the reproduction of art has generated countless benefits for the art community, such as knowledge, popularity, and value.…