Let that not, though, diminish Berger's achievement in highlighting what is a very clear gender bias in European art. These factors interplay in subtle ways, meaning that the icons of visual culture will mean different things to different people at different times. Overlaying this is the way visual culture is perceived by an audience. The whole is rather more than the sum of the parts we must see the artist in isolation (as with the Edvard Munch example previously) but also the artist as part of a wider society. Is a theory of the way of seeing actually telling us much about the work itself? Berger presents the portrayal of nude women in some of the works he highlights as 'feeding the appetite' of scopophilic male viewers but that seems too sweeping a generalisation not all viewers will see it that way (even if it was intended) art works are not simply a product of society, any more than they are simply a product of an artist. In Ways of Seeing, John Bergers third chapter addresses the way we see women, as well as how they see themselves. The ideological approach says much about Berger, but does it say much about the works of art he uses in his argument. The approach is prescriptive rather than descriptive (Howells and Negreiros, 2012). It is then that Berger's work is seen as polemical rather than analytical. John Bergers work has revolutionized the way we understand visual language. Language is a body, a living creature and this creatures home is the inarticulate as well as the articulate.
The problems arise when one stops to think about what one does with the conclusion. Download File PDF John Berger Ways Of Seeing Chapter 7 both professionals and students working today. This Study Guide consists of approximately 43 pages of chapter summaries, quotes, character analysis, themes, and more - everything you need to sharpen your knowledge of Ways of Seeing. Berger's treatise is the more effective for being straightforward with direct and lucid use of language. Ways of Seeing - Chapter 7 Summary & Analysis. Berger lays bare the implied sexism in the art of the nude from Renaissance onwards, and we have seen this has not changed, perhaps even less subtle than in previous generations.
At one level it seems almost uncontentious now as much of contemporary visual culture openly objectifies and debases women, as described in the post Gendering the Gaze.