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'Polemical, meditative, radical, always original, Berger's essays are extremely wide-ranging' Geoff Dyer 'One of the most influential intellectuals of our time' Sean O'Hagan, Observer 'A wonderful artist and thinker' Susan Sontag 'Berger is a writer one demands to know more about ... an intriguing and powerful mind and talent' New York Times
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As a novelist, essayist, 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 between man and beast all but lost in the twentieth century? What is it about looking at war photographs that doubles their already potent violence? How do the nudes of Rodin betray the threats to his authority and potency posed by clay and flesh? And how does solitude inform the art of Giacometti? In asking these and other questions, Berger alters the vision of anyone who reads his work.
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41 of 42 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Nearly all of John Berger's books are worth five stars, in my opinion (the exceptions being a couple of his early novels). I wasn't thinking of writing a review of "About Looking", but the sheer inanity of the other review provoked me into doing so. (It's not Berger's fault that the other reviewer didn't bother to find out what this book was about before buying it.)
"About Looking" is a selection of essays mostly about artists and photographers, although there are also some classic pieces of sui generis critical-historical meditation, such as the extraordinary "Field". Most of these essays date from the late 60s and early 70s, when Berger was in a period of transition; he had left England for good and was relocating himself and his family in rural France, where he still lives. This was also the period of his controversial Booker-winning novel "G.", his most commercially successful work of fiction (although I personally prefer his later novels).
Among the pieces included here are his justly famous essay on August Sander's 1914 photograph of three young German farmers going to a country dance, as well as superb essays on Magritte, Rouault, Courbet and De Stijl. One of my personal favourites is his provocative comparison of the work of Francis Bacon with the cartoons of Walt Disney. It makes more sense than it sounds, and you'll never watch Goofy the same way again.
Not the least value of this book is that it does, in fact, contain a lot of valuable information about "why we are more attracted to certain things"; Berger as an art critic is distinguished by being far more attentive to human needs and desires than most of his peers.
An essay by Berger contains more thought than most writers can fit into a book. This is perhaps not the best place to start if you want an overview of Berger the critic; that would be the brilliant "Selected Essays", beautifully edited by Geoff Dyer. But once you start reading Berger, only the very dim or very right-wing don't get hooked. He is an inspiration.
"About Looking" is a selection of essays mostly about artists and photographers, although there are also some classic pieces of sui generis critical-historical meditation, such as the extraordinary "Field". Most of these essays date from the late 60s and early 70s, when Berger was in a period of transition; he had left England for good and was relocating himself and his family in rural France, where he still lives. This was also the period of his controversial Booker-winning novel "G.", his most commercially successful work of fiction (although I personally prefer his later novels).
Among the pieces included here are his justly famous essay on August Sander's 1914 photograph of three young German farmers going to a country dance, as well as superb essays on Magritte, Rouault, Courbet and De Stijl. One of my personal favourites is his provocative comparison of the work of Francis Bacon with the cartoons of Walt Disney. It makes more sense than it sounds, and you'll never watch Goofy the same way again.
Not the least value of this book is that it does, in fact, contain a lot of valuable information about "why we are more attracted to certain things"; Berger as an art critic is distinguished by being far more attentive to human needs and desires than most of his peers.
An essay by Berger contains more thought than most writers can fit into a book. This is perhaps not the best place to start if you want an overview of Berger the critic; that would be the brilliant "Selected Essays", beautifully edited by Geoff Dyer. But once you start reading Berger, only the very dim or very right-wing don't get hooked. He is an inspiration.
11 of 12 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
John Berger is never boring, even when he deals with very complex issues. He manages to examine things we take for ganted, like animals, and make us look at them in entirely different ways.
His essays on different painters are the same... he takes an entirely different viewpoint from everyone else and opens our eyes to physical, psychological and philisophical aspects of an artist's work. He involves himself intimately and emotionally with everything he views and manages to transmit his feelings of awe and delight to us with great skill.
Read this, its a different way of seeing.
His essays on different painters are the same... he takes an entirely different viewpoint from everyone else and opens our eyes to physical, psychological and philisophical aspects of an artist's work. He involves himself intimately and emotionally with everything he views and manages to transmit his feelings of awe and delight to us with great skill.
Read this, its a different way of seeing.
2 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
John Berger is a credit to humanity, and in these stimulating chapters has urged us to look again , in fresh ways, at both nature and artifacts. If appropriate,we should, of course, in the poet's words, stand and stare.
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