Book SummaryWays of Seeing, by John Berger

1-Page Summary1-Page Book Summary of Ways of Seeing

In Ways of Seeing, published in 1972, art critic John Berger argues that throughout history, the way we see art has been manipulated by a privileged minority to preserve their social and economic dominance.

This text challenges the idea that to understand and appreciate works of art, we need experts to “translate” them for us. Rather, Berger urges us to pull back the curtain and look at the images before us with our own eyes.

Ways of Seeing is a collection of seven untitled essays, three of which are visual and contain no text. The essays can be read in any order, and while each essay focuses on a different topic, there are connecting themes of perspective (“ways of seeing”) and mystification.

In this guide, we’ve created a chapter for each of the five topics that Berger discusses in his book. Within each chapter, we present Berger’s analysis of how the topic is currently approached by art critics and the public, if and how mystification is present, and how he believes we should shift our thinking (in other words, our “way of seeing”). We examine Berger’s arguments, add historical background on both the artwork Berger analyzes and the landscape in which Berger is writing, and compare Berger’s ideas to those of contemporary art and culture.

What Is an Image?

An object, living being, or landscape that exists before your eyes in real life is a sight. The couch you are about to sit on, the floor beneath your feet, and the flowers you see in the garden outside your window—these are all sights. An image is a sight that has been reproduced or recreated. The sight becomes an image when it is separated from the place and time in which it truly exists (or existed). A painting, a video, even a photograph—these are images.

Berger says that once a sight becomes an image, it’s no longer an exact record of what was. The act of reproducing a sight inherently adds a subjective value to the image. Rather than being a historical record of the sight, it’s now a record of how someone saw the sight…and how you are seeing the image now.

(Shortform note: When an image is continuously reproduced, you might imagine the meaning being skewed each time—similar to the childhood game of Telephone. With each iteration, a nuance is added or a distortion takes place.)

Our Experiences and Beliefs Influence What We See

Berger argues that our beliefs, experiences, and knowledge strongly influence what we see. Imagine three people are looking at the same image of an iceberg. The person who is concerned with climate change will instantly assign a symbolic meaning and see a melting iceberg within a rapidly heating planet. The person who has been to Alaska will see a landscape that is familiar and majestic. The third person, a history buff, will see what caused the sinking of the Titanic. In each case, the belief, experience, or knowledge influences what the person sees.

(Shortform Note: One study found that the amount of context we receive influences how we interpret visual information. Particularly, when there is little to no context, we tend to fill in the blanks ourselves and think more critically. When given context, our brains naturally move toward it (also known as confirmation bias) and we’re less likely to diverge from the information given. This supports Berger’s argument that what we believe influences what we see.)

The Meaning of Mystification

Berger uses the term mystification throughout Ways of Seeing, and though there are contextual clues as to the implications of the word, he speaks as if the reader is already familiar and provides only one line of definition: “Mystification is the process of explaining away what might otherwise be evident.” Because this term is used so heavily in the text, we’ve added a breakdown of mystification, from its literal definition to the economic context in which it’s used:

• Dictionary definition of mystification: “an obscuring especially of capitalist or social dynamics (as by making them equivalent to natural laws) that is seen in Marxist thought as an impediment to critical consciousness.”

In Marxism, mystification refers to the intentional deceiving of the majority working class (proletariat) by the minority upper/middle class (bourgeoisie) to preserve their wealth. Berger takes this framework of mystification and applies it to the way art is critiqued and owned—particularly the idea that throughout history, art historians and the wealthy elite have obscured ideologies hidden within the art. Though he doesn’t use the term in a strictly Marxist sense, there are clear parallels between the two and it can be inferred that Berger’s Marxist beliefs influenced his perception.

The European Tradition of Oil Painting

The primary topic Berger discusses in Ways of Seeing is the European tradition of oil painting, which he says occurred between the years 1500 and 1900. The technique of oil painting (mixing pigment with oils to create a medium) was around long before the Renaissance, but it became an art form during this period because, for the first time, there was a need to develop and perfect the technique. This need was primarily due to the subjects being depicted: food, pedigreed animals, expensive objects, land, and so on. Tempera and fresco paintings couldn’t produce the intense realism that oil painting could, so to depict these subjects in a way that essentially placed them in the room—the desired effect—oil painting was necessary.

Why Oil Paints Are the Best Medium for Realistic Paintings

Tempera is an egg-based paint that produces muted colors and dries very quickly. Fresco painting is the process of using watercolor paints on wet plaster, which also dries quickly. In both of these mediums, the artist doesn’t have the luxury of taking...

Ways of Seeing Summary Shortform Introduction

In Ways of Seeing, John Berger argues that throughout history, the way we see art has been manipulated by a privileged minority to preserve their social and economic dominance.

This text challenges the idea that to understand and appreciate works of art, we need experts to “translate” them for us. Rather, Berger urges us to pull back the curtain and look at the images before us with our own eyes. Using Marxist-feminist theory, Berger demonstrates how the elite mystifies art analysis, and by doing so, preserves the very capitalism that he is criticizing.

About the Author

John Berger (b. 1926, d. 2017) was a modern renaissance man: He was a painter, teacher, poet, Booker Prize winning novelist, essayist, screenwriter, playwright, journalist, and—most famously—art critic. He is best known for his BBC television series “Ways of Seeing” and its companion book: Ways of Seeing. Berger was born, raised, and educated in London, England, but spent the second half of his life in France, where he died at the age of 90.

Though never an official member of the Communist Party of Great Britain, Berger kept close ties with the association and was a leading figure in the...

Ways of Seeing Summary Chapter 1: How We See

Berger begins with an in-depth look at how we see, arguing that before we can analyze how we see art, we must first understand how we see images in general. The concepts in this section are the vocabulary and foundation for Berger’s overall thesis, so in addition to the basics of how we see, we’ve added an explanation of Marxist feminism and mystification.

What Is an Image?

Foundational to art analysis is the concept of what an image is. Berger makes a clear distinction between a sight and an image.

An object, living being, or landscape that exists before your eyes in real life is a sight. The couch you are about to sit on, the floor beneath your feet, and the flowers you see in the garden outside your window—these are all sights.

An image is a sight that has been reproduced or recreated. The sight becomes an image when it is separated from the place and time in which it truly exists (or existed). A painting, a video, even a photograph—these are images.

Berger says that once a sight becomes an image, it’s no longer an exact record of what was. The act of reproducing a sight inherently adds a subjective value to the image. Rather than being a historical...

Shortform Exercise: Analyze an Image Using Your Beliefs, Knowledge, and Experience

Berger tells us that what we believe, know, and have experienced influences our interpretation of images. Analyze your own reaction to an image using these insights.

Take a look at the painting below. In 1-2 sentences, what does the image make you think or feel?

Ways of Seeing Summary Chapter 2: The European Tradition of Oil Painting

Every topic discussed in Ways of Seeing connects back to the European tradition of oil painting. Berger argues that understanding the dominant form of art from this period in Europe is key to understanding Western history and social order. Because so many paintings from this era are heralded as markers of artistic and cultural achievement in Western culture, he says it's crucial to understand the politics involved, and why they’ve been erased from (or mystified in) art history.

“The Tradition”

The primary topic Berger discusses in Ways of Seeing is the European tradition of oil painting, which he says occurred between the years 1500 and 1900. This is not a defined period of art history because there were several movements that occurred within it (Romanticism and Realism to name two), yet Berger recognized that this is a distinct period with overlapping norms, hence his classification of the medium and time period as a “tradition.”

While oil painting took off at the beginning of the Renaissance (around the year 1400), Berger argues that the artistic norms of this time period were not fully established until the beginning of the 16th century. The norms continued...

Shortform Exercise: Breaking With the Tradition

Berger says that the vast majority of oil paintings from this time period fall into the norms of the tradition, but there are a minority that break the conventional rules and are exceptional. Test your eye and see if you can identify the paintings that agree or break with the tradition.

Examine the images below. In your opinion, do they follow the norms of the oil painting tradition or are they exceptional? Why or why not? (Remember, the norms of the tradition lie in the paintings’ subjects and values: displays of wealth, mythology, and so on.)

Ways of Seeing Summary Chapter 3: Nudity and Objectivity

Nude women were a prominent subject in European oil painting. Berger points out that in the same way oil paintings depicted wealth using images of land and objects, women were also seen as property to be flaunted.

Nudes, Berger says, are characterized by the objectification of the female “subject,” who through the assumed gaze of the male viewer is made into an object. Men who were wealthy or powerful enough to buy and commission oil paintings wanted nudes for the same reason they wanted oil paintings of valuable objects: to remind others and themselves that they were rich, powerful, and desirable.

Nude women in European oil paintings appear for the benefit and use of the assumed male viewer, who Berger calls the “spectator-owner.” He calls them this because the man who owns the painting “owns” the nude woman, and (in his mind) he’s also the reason why the nude woman is there—to display herself for him, the spectator.

RECLINING BACCHANTE BY TRUTAT 1824-1848

Berger notes that the nude woman is often being viewed by two or more men: A male within the painting, and the spectator-owner....

Shortform Exercise: Determine if Naked Is Nude

Berger uses set criteria to distinguish nudes from nakedness. Try out this particular way of seeing by analyzing 20th-century portraits using his methodology.

In each of these images, do you consider the subject to be nude or naked, according to Berger’s definitions? Why?

Ways of Seeing Summary Chapter 4: The Impact of Reproduction

The invention of the camera (and therefore a means to reproduce images) forever changed how art was viewed, understood, and appreciated. Berger notes that for several hundred years, fine works of art were segregated from the working class, only to be enjoyed and understood by the wealthy elite. Now, for the first time in history, art could travel to the viewer, and the viewer could be anywhere in the world.

As one form of mystification lifted, room was made for a different sort—the intentional distortion of meaning through physical manipulation of the image. In this section, Berger lists all of the different ways someone can change the meaning of a work of art (intentionally or unintentionally) simply through the act of reproducing it.

Walter Benjamin’s “The Work of Art in the Era of Mechanical Reproduction”

Berger notes that his discussion in this section draws heavily on philosopher Walter Benjamin’s essay “The Work of Art in the Era of Mechanical Reproduction.” Benjamin argued that reproduction of art devalues what he calls its “aura,” or its special, noble, meaning-giving power, which is present in the original...

Shortform Exercise: Manipulate Meaning Using Reproduction

In this chapter, we covered four ways that reproduction can be used to change the meaning of an image: removal from its original home, breaking the whole into parts, proximity to words, and proximity to another image. Test Berger’s theory by imagining how someone might manipulate an image.

Take a look at the image below. Using Berger’s theory, how could someone use words to manipulate the meaning of this image? Give an example.

Ways of Seeing Summary Chapter 5: Advertisements in the Modern Age

Advertisements (or publicity, as Berger says), are pervasive in the modern age, and made possible because of the power to reproduce images. Their presence in everyday life is so great that most of it surrounds us like a cloud of white noise—noticeable, but only if you pay attention.

Berger placed his essay on advertisements at the end of the book, and we mirror that choice in this guide. This chapter is a fitting end to Ways of Seeing, because advertisements serve as the nexus of all of the topics discussed in previous chapters: Their existence depends upon reproduction, they use the same style and traditions of the oil painting, they use nudity and displays of wealth to allure, and they distort our way of seeing through mystification. And what is their purpose? To keep the machines of capitalism moving. To keep the rich rich and the poor poor.

In this chapter, we’ll take a closer look at each of these connections in an attempt to demystify advertisements.

What Do Advertisements Promise?

Every advertisement you see offers a different product or service, but Berger explains that they all promise the same thing: An improved life. By...

Shortform Exercise: Observe How Ads Borrow From Paintings

Identify the connecting thread between a modern advertisement and the oil painting tradition.

Choose an advertisement near you that contains a strong image, ideally one that is static—on your phone, or in a print ad, for example. Give the advertisement a long look. Are you able to identify a connection to the oil painting tradition? What do the ad and the tradition have in common? How do they differ?