A new series of specially-commissioned essays to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Ways of Seeing. Including pieces by Geoff Dyer, Olivia Laing, Tom Overton, Sinead Gleeson and Melissa Chemam.
First broadcast in 1972 on BBC Two, Ways of Seeing was a collaboration between the writer John Berger and director Mike Dibb. Across a series of four half-hour episodes, Berger talked about how we look at art, and why it matters: "The relation between what we see and what we know is never settled ... The way we see things is affected by what we know or what we believe ... Every image embodies a way of seeing. Even a photograph ... Our perception or appreciation of an image depends also upon our own way of seeing". The programmes explored Walter Benjamin's ideas about the work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction; the female nude and the male gaze; oil painting, status and ownership; advertising, art and commerce. The book published to accompany the series has never been out of print and has had a profound influence on popular understanding of art criticism and visual culture.
To mark the fiftieth anniversary of Ways of Seeing, we invited the five writers to tell us about an image that is important to them, and to reflect on how Ways of Seeing influenced their own ways of looking at - and thinking about - art.