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27th out of 213 books
—
26 voters
About Looking
by
John Berger
As a novelist, art critic, and cultural historian, John Berger is a writer of dazzling eloquence and arresting insight whose work amounts to a subtle, powerful critique of the canons of our civilization. In About Looking he explores our role as observers to reveal new layers of meaning in what we see. How do the animals we look at in zoos remind us of a relationship betwee...more
Paperback, 224 pages
Published
January 8th 1992
by Vintage
(first published March 1st 1980)
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One of the strangest things in life is the way that things you had never heard of only a couple of months before can suddenly appear everywhere. Now, while that is quite to be expected with, say, that K-Pop guy pretending to ride a horse, I’m more interested in things like the most famous article in this collection, Why Look At Animals? I only really discovered Berger last year and his seminal work Ways of Seeing. Then my daughter was doing her honours year and was doing research into Japanese f...more
"All theories of ultimate origin are only ways of better defining what followed." (8)
"The photographic moment for Strand is a biographical or historic moment, whose duration is ideally measured not by seconds but by its relation to a lifetime. Strand does not pursue an instant, but encourages a moment to arise as one might encourage a story to be told." (47)
"What served in place of the photograph; before the camera's invention? The expected answer is the engraving, the drawing, the painting. The...more
"The photographic moment for Strand is a biographical or historic moment, whose duration is ideally measured not by seconds but by its relation to a lifetime. Strand does not pursue an instant, but encourages a moment to arise as one might encourage a story to be told." (47)
"What served in place of the photograph; before the camera's invention? The expected answer is the engraving, the drawing, the painting. The...more
Berger's book is a series of short essays (each originally published as a column in New Society ) examining the act of looking at visual culture. I picked this book up to assist in a project analyzing "the right to look" in several food studies texts. The first essay, suggested by the cover, engages the act of looking at Zoo animals and Berger's contention that zoo animals do no look back at us. This is the only essay I found really helpful for my project. I may have had a different experience...more
Hit-or-miss collection of essays. Berger's a really good writer, but there's a heavy Marxist slant to his thinking that makes a lot of this book seem dated and difficult to understand. That said, his essay "Why Look at Animals?" is terrific, one of the best I've read.
If you're new to Berger (or to the art world in general), I recommend skipping this and instead picking up "Ways of Seeing." That collection is far more accessible to a general audience.
"About Looking" is full of Berger's insightful and impressive commentary on art and photography. (And the collection "Uses of Photography" in this work is a good read for those who make their living behind the lens.) Where this edition fails, for me, is in its lack of illustrative plates. My knowledge of art his...more
"About Looking" is full of Berger's insightful and impressive commentary on art and photography. (And the collection "Uses of Photography" in this work is a good read for those who make their living behind the lens.) Where this edition fails, for me, is in its lack of illustrative plates. My knowledge of art his...more
I had some difficulty with the longer essays in the first section of the book, but strangely, I discovered (after limping through a few pages at a time, week after week) that I was reading the book with too-great attention. I needed to take it somehow less seriously in order to receive the intended content and not become mired in the individual sentences. I find many of Berger's provocative social statements very attractive -- and, in equal measure, tough. Even with my spotty knowledge of art hi...more
I remember Ways of Seeing from my undergrad Aesthetics class as a book that definitely changed the way I looked at art and life. One of the nice things about that book was that there were many clear illustrations in it. Also that it was written very simply--probably because it was linked to a TV series.
This book is written with clarity and grace, but the illustrations are awful and grainy. Even so, I enjoyed what I could understand. I think I probably would get more out of it if I knew more abo...more
This book is written with clarity and grace, but the illustrations are awful and grainy. Even so, I enjoyed what I could understand. I think I probably would get more out of it if I knew more abo...more
They say Berger is a writer of dazzling eloquence and arresting insight. For me the book was just a lot of words that signified nothing. I read more than half and realized I was getting nothing out of it, so I finally gave up.
Some of these essays are great, especially the one that is actually about looking. I wish there were pictures in the book of the art pieces he was analyzing in the different essays for us lay people.
An interesting enough collection of essays, although I would say that only the first and last in the collection are really essential. The rest read exactly as they are, newspaper or magazine columms with one or two interesting ideas not greatly developed, with a certaim ephemeral quality that comes from anything that is meant to be put in next weeks recycling. There is also a certain repition, which might have come either from a deadline or the rigidity of marxist analysis, However the first ess...more
Feb 14, 2010
Margot Note
added it
I was thinking so deeply about this book that I forgot to swipe my Metrocard and slammed myself against the subway turnstile. Bruises for Berger!
All essays in this collection are provoking insights on looking, in all its genres. I read it for the response essay to Susan Sontag's On Photography ("Uses of Photography"). However, the most interesting and original one turned out to be "Why Look at Animals?" - not just the cultural metaphors animals have been through the ages, but the act of looking at them. "Photographs of Agony", on the other hand, about photos of violence in the then-current war in Vietnam, reminded me of many discussions...more
Descubrí a Berger gracias a mi amiga Rosario. Me había contado una vez, hablando de las experiencias de mirar animales en Africa, que este libro tenía artículo sobre los animales en el zoológico. Coincidíamos en que mirar un animal en su "entorno supuestamente natural", te cambia mucho la percepción sobre los bichos y sobre la naturaleza en general.
El libro es maravilloso. Es el arte de mirar, pero reflexionado de una manera super poética, pausada y reposada. El primer artículo sobre el análisi...more
El libro es maravilloso. Es el arte de mirar, pero reflexionado de una manera super poética, pausada y reposada. El primer artículo sobre el análisi...more
This book reads much like it was written - as a series of articles for a newspaper. In the same way that one reads a critical review in the paper, and soon forgets it, one soon forgets the jist of what Berger was getting at. His commentary, while mildly interesting in the moment, comes across as a bit of navel gazing which, at the end of the day, makes no difference in how one goes about looking at art at all. It's all just his own speculation. Also, the reproductions in the book are useless, an...more
Tell me something I don't know Berger, tell me something I don't know... Visual culture fully dumbed down.
Great essays. My favourite is a description of a field in the last essay. I will never forget it.
As Berger's die-hard fan, I could only say that this book itself is a beautiful painting.
This book will quite literally change how you look at art. Fabulous.
I really enjoyed a few of these essays and the visual examples given.
The chapter, "Looking at Animals," was particularly interesting.
Loved this!
Felt that Berger had lost his sharp edge.
Well I bought this book for the photo essays, I loved it for all the essays. Very insightful and well-written, it, as good criticism does, made me feel my ignorance of that which I didn't know - which was a lot - and made me want to learn more. I should have read it before traveling Paris and Florence: I could have appreciated my museum visits all the more and learned where to look.
I will read his other art books as well.
I will read his other art books as well.
FANTASTIC.
Berger's insights can be profound, but too often they seem to get bogged down in Marxist rhetoric and theory. I'd go so far to say that he's overrated, but at least he has a point of view and a well-argued one. I'd stick with his beguiling fiction instead.
the essay "looking at animals" is really fascinating. chances are you'll have some problems with what Berger has to say about looking (at women in particular), but if you are interested in visual culture and spectacle, you'll get much from reading this book.
So far, my eyes are opening, haha.
Berger. Need more be said?
May 19, 2013
Arlu Reambonanza
marked it as to-read
May 19, 2013
Amy R.
marked it as to-read
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John Peter Berger is an English art critic, novelist, painter and author. His novel G. won the 1972 Booker Prize, and his essay on art criticism Ways of Seeing, written as an accompaniment to a BBC series, is often used as a college text.
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Feb 08, 2013 06:04am
They do take time to write, Rosie. And having more time ava...more
Feb 08, 2013 11:49am