After reading just several chapters of Ways of Seeing by John Berger and A Short Guide to Writing About Art by Sylva Barnet, I have become more aware of PERSPECTIVE.  First off, it is interesting to learn that art is not just about the painting or sculpture; it is also about viewers regarding it as art (the Institutional Theory of Art).  Simply put, we give different meanings to art because we are all unique individuals.  For example, the audience can interpret a piece of artwork in a way that the artist didn’t even think of him/herself.  Demographics, such as age, gender, race and ethnicity, can subconsciously affect the way we see art.  There is the culture and society of the time period that shapes us verses the artist’s contemporaries.  Finding more information about the artwork, such as reading the plaque in a museum, can change our initial thoughts.  Even the artwork nearby the one we’re looking at can affect us.  When a physical object is placed in a museum, it may lose its context and we may not be able to fully understand its significance.  Sometimes we’ve seen parts of the painting but not in its entirety or we’ve seen reproductions/pictures in varying contexts.  At other times, we’re not sure if the creator even intended for the object to be appreciated for its aesthetics.

Although I have become more open and welcoming of many different interpretations for the above reasons, I have also learned to be careful about jumping to conclusions too quickly.  This refers to the example involving Governors and the Governesses paintings by Frans Hals.  If we assume things about the subjects of an artwork based on what we know, we may become “mystified” and “seduced”.  However, we can avoid this “direct judgment” by writing about the emotions through the composition of the artwork.  We can also better understand the painting by learning about its time period.  In this way, we can balance out subjectivity and objectivity.  These are some things I will keep in mind when I visit the Modern Art exhibition at MOMA next week.

To me, art appears in odd ways. I tend to find it in the things I love, such as film, television and literature. However, I find it incredibly difficult to appreciate the other forms of visual arts that I have no passion for. Although my thoughts remain, in all, the same, John Berger’s Ways of Seeing and Sylvan Barnet’s  A Short Guide to Writing About Art have given me insight as to the significance of art, whether that is based on assumptions gained by looking at the painting or conclusions drawn by examining the context of the painting and its artist.

In Berger’s Ways of Seeing, the idea of perception is explored through the eyes the average spectator. In other words, our view of art is a creation of our own speculation, or as Berger puts it, “mystification” (Berger 11). We all assume that art always has a set of attributes which includes beauty, genius, taste etc. However, these assumptions “mystify rather than clarify” (Berger 11). This “mystification” obscures the art from being seen as it truly is. These misconceptions romanticize paintings until they are at such a distance that the only thing we can do is admire, but not observe and think. Because of this, we are unable to acquire the full context of a piece of art. Instead, we create an image of it that is pruned to our expectations of what a piece of art is. Therefore, when I will go to the MOMA, or any art museum for that matter, I now have a sort of reasonable suspicion for paintings. I’ll hesitate before endowing the painting with set requirements that it may or may not have. Instead, I will look at the history, and insert a certain context that will clarify rather than mystify.

Berger further discusses historical context in his book, but through the method and art form of oil painting. This portion of the book is quite similar to the aforementioned chapter, but it specifically analyzes the time period of the 1500s to the 1900s, when oil painting was most prominent. Berger uses oil painting because “it reduced everything to the equality of objects. Everything became exchangeable because everything became a commodity”. Here, Berger links oil painting with the possession of art. When looking at these pieces of art, many will notice the extravagance and dismiss it as mere beauty. However, Berger places that quality under scrutiny and suggests that extravagance being a common trait in many oil paintings, excluding a few rare exceptions, is to allow for their owners to boast about their wealth and power. Knowing this, the painting seems less beautiful and more of a medium for self-admiration and boasting. Those without this feature I will examine more closely because that might indicate a deeper and more personal meaning that the painter wanted to convey, like Rembrandt’s self portraits.

Barnet also discusses the context of context of paintings in his A Short Guide to Writing About Art. He asks the ever-relevant question, “What is Art?” In answering this question, Barnet draws upon the view of its spectators while ignoring the historical and social context of the art. This is coined as the Institutional Theory of Art. This perspective forces me to examine the authority of art institutions that seem to have the right to choose what we see as art. Barnet also looks at the other side of the coin. What is called the reception theory suggests that art is not the painting or work itself, but the activity of a spectator making sense of the work. I like this idea more because it places the burden of responsibility onto the observer. Otherwise, what is art if it cannot be observed? By having institutions choose for us what art is and isn’t, it takes away the point of observing a piece of artwork. When you observe art, you evaluate it. If you already know the end result, what is the point then?

Both Sylvan Barnet and John Berger have prompted me to be more analytical when it comes to forms of art that I am not quite interested in. Whether or not I find immediate pleasure in it, art is important and meaningful. To deny that would be to deny the existence of the art itself.

In visiting the Museum of Modern Art, I will keep in mind all of the ideas in John Berger’s Ways of Seeing and Sylvan Barnet’s A Short Guide to Writing about Art; however, there are three points that stood out to me in particular that I will apply the most during my visit and that I will explore in this blog post.

Firstly, in Barnet’s book, he poses the question “What is art?”¹ While I possessed a very limited scope of what I believed art to be, I came to realize from the readings and from our discussion in class that there are different “ways of seeing” art. From a famous masterpiece like Leonardo Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa to the design of the Apple MacBook Pro I am typing this blog post on, art is everywhere and in everything. Art is different to everyone, and so is their opinion about what is art and about what each particular piece of art means. Keeping an open mind is essential to fully enjoying and truly understanding any work of art – especially works of modern art.

Secondly, in Ways of Seeing, Berger states that “the meaning of an image is changed according to what one sees immediately beside it or what comes immediately after it.”² Although the lavish and magnificent displays add to your overall experience at a museum, they take away from each individual work of art by separating the onlooker from the work itself. When I visit the MoMA on Tuesday, I will attempt to view each piece of art separately from the museum and the collection of artwork around it.

And finally, by saying , “Even a reproduction hung on a wall is not comparable in this respect for in the original the silence and stillness permeate the actual material, the paint, in which one follows the traces of the painter’s immediate gestures,”³ Berger explains to the reader that reproductions are inaccurate to a degree because they cannot reproduce every minute detail of a work of art, and so they further distance the reader from it. Because of this point, I will show a greater respect for the artwork I see at the MoMA by taking in every aspect of the work instead of just taking a quick look and a snapshot with my camera and then moving on.

The works of Barnet and Berger helped me to better expand my knowledge of art, and they will definitely enhance my experience of viewing it at the Museum of Modern Art by causing me to question my previous notions and to look at art in a new perspective.

¹A Short Guide to Writing about Art by Sylvan Barnet, p1
²Ways of Seeing by John Berger, p29
³Ways of Seeing by John Berger, p31

What Berger and Barnet have done in their writing is challenge us. They have challenged us to reevaluate our notions of what we value in an art form–of such ideas as genius, beauty, realism, idealism–and in doing so have asked us to reconsider how and why we view art as an audience and as individuals.

It would seem that self-reflection and introspection are the qualities Berger and Barnet hope to instill most in their readers. Their focus is on the idea of contexualization–of understanding the art that we see in a sense that is greater than the artist’s intention or the piece’s societal significance. It is striking that what they are asking of us is to view art through the narrow lens of our own experience and self-perceived thoughts when art is something so unequivocally universal. How can it be possible for each of us, with our small minds and small worlds, to understand something as immense and important as a work of art?

Yet just as it is art’s universality that gives it such awe-inspiring depth, it is this same universality that allows us to find a piece of ourselves within every work of art that we encounter. Berger discusses this idea when he says, “We never look at just one thing; we are always looking at the relation between things and ourselves” (Berger 9). This line resonates in the sense that art had always been rather abstract to me. It is a concept that I would often struggle to understand, not because I was unable to appreciate or connect with the aesthetic or emotional qualities of the art, but because I would grapple with how to reconcile what I saw and felt with what others claim to have experienced in response to the same work of art. Perhaps a better approach–and the one I will be taking when viewing the Modern Art exhibition at the MoMA in the coming week–would be to set aside any preconceived notions I may have heard about why this or that work of art is so important and consider instead the reasons why the art I see is significant as it relates to me. I should look more deeply into the relationship I share with the work of art rather than worry about how I fit into the relationship the work of art shares with the rest of society.

I wonder then if that is the “true” definition of art. Is it that art is too relevant, too personal, too connected to each of us as individuals that to try to describe it in words would be as invasive and as impossible as trying to describe how a person is feeling when all we can really be is on the outside looking in? What reading Berger and Barnet has taught me is that there is no wrong answer when it comes to looking at art. When I go to the MoMA to view Surrealist art, no one can tell me that it’s wrong if I look at a piece and start sobbing because it touched me so deeply. There should be no anxiety in the viewing and analyzation of art because the worst that can happen is that I will see too far deeply into my self and even then that is still a beautiful thing.

When I see the Modern Art exhibition, I will not be worrying about how my thoughts match up with the artists’ intentions, as Barnet advised against, nor will I be concerned with the art’s economic and societal ramifications, as Berger so adamantly opposed. Barnet quotes Christian Zervos in his writing: “A picture lives a life like a living creature, undergoing the changes imposed on us by our life from day to day” (Barnet 22). Just as we induce these changes in art, so too does art impose these changes on us. We grow because of the art we witness; we grow because art allows us to witness ourselves. I can only hope that in the end I will have grown immensely because I will have seen myself through the medium of art. But, of course, by then I may not even have the words to describe it. Perhaps seeing truly does come before words.

As often defined through extensive discussions and argumentative conversations, art presents itself in rather convoluted forms. The continuous contrast between what some perceive as art and others argue to be otherwise becomes a central characteristic in both Ways of Seeing, by John Berger, and A Short Guide to Writing About Art, by Sylva Barnet.

Ways of Seeing presents within itself countless confusions about the perception of art. An attempt to perhaps enlighten audiences into different perspectives about the subject, John Berger illustrates art as an exclusive medium for upper class as well as a depreciated entrance for lower society into what the world labels as such. Cynically analyzing the quasi-snobby existence in the elite world, Berger does not fail to disgrace the invention of mechanical reproductions which permit poorer individuals an easy access to unattainable artifacts. His view on the preservation of the meaning of art heavily leans towards the lack of digital presence in art itself. He suggests that the definition of this powerful entity is demented and misunderstood by means such as cameras and other digitalized equipment. Although against such modern attack on tradition, Berger yet seems to disdain the exclusive environment in which art is preserved. By providing an animate involvement in the exhibition of art, the author gives audiences a more aware relevance for such treasure. I myself will not snap pictures of art as Berger will probably haunt me with the idea that I will deform the value of something far too important to be meaningless.

Sylva Barnet is nonetheless relevant in the campaign to enhance art in its truest form. As an instructor on writing about art, as her book A Short Guide to Writing About Art implies, Barnet provides guidelines to inexperienced writers and art fanatics on how to approach these timeless masterpieces. Her guide informs readers with simplistic views on artistic concepts. “Art is what artists do,” she quotes, highlighting the opinion that art is universal. She enriches her audience by creating an awareness for the existence of art in anything an artist or his audience label as worthy. This overactive advice for art analysis is often titled ‘critical thinking’, an idea to which everyone is already acquainted. Besides the usual writing tips of an expert, Barnet conveys a coherent structure for the composition of a successful essay on art. In doing so, she willingly releases a routine capable of turning simple writers into careful art analysts.

Provided with powerful instructions on the meaning of art and how to approach it, visits to popular and crowded museums such as MoMA will become more than a superficial tour adorned in endless collections of mystified images. These visits will aim to not deteriorate the meaning of art but instead provide myself with non-superficial critiques on the treasures of New York City.

Both Berger in Ways of Seeing and Barnett in A Short Guide to Writing about Art conceptualize the viewing and understanding of paintings, and have informed me as to how to tackle analyzing art.

Berger discusses the idea of perspective, and how people interpret an art-piece in multiple ways. “The way we see things is affected by what we know or believe” (Berger 8). As a result of changing times, perspectives change. A black cat in a painting might be interpreted as a symbol of bad luck in medieval times, but as a symbol of feline grace in modern day. The painting itself is perceived in a different way. Also, when viewing art, one should focus on the painting as a single entity. From the museum room it is placed in to the caption beneath the painting, many things color the viewer’s perspective of a painting. Barnett argues how museums do not recreate the historical context of an art piece. “The object…is de-contextualized, or more accurately, but into a new context” (Barnett 30). A Native American headdress that is meant to be worn with a ceremonial robe in a sacred ritual does not invoke the same feelings when displayed in a glass case under harsh, fluorescent lights. The caption beneath a painting is information that was not intended to be given with the painting; it is excess information.

Both Berger and Barnett give “cautionary words” on reproductions of paintings. With the introduction of technology, it is rather easy to find reproductions of art pieces. However, these are always inherently lacking. Barnett discusses how reproductions lack the textures and overall depth of the original and tend to be viewed in smaller dimensions than the original, altering viewing of details and the very impression a painting gives. The emotions and ideas one would feel when standing in front of an original painting can be in stark contrast when looking at a reproduction.  In addition, when a painting is reproduced, the uniqueness of the painting is lost. “…the uniqueness of the original now lies in it being the original of a reproduction” (Berger 21). Taken out of its original context, the painting loses much of its meaning.

Barnett and Berger stress the point that a painting is a sacred thing. It embodies not only the feelings of an artist, but an entire historical time period. When looking at paintings in the MOMA, I understand that it is important not only to understand the perspective from which the painting is being viewed, but to focus on the painting itself. I need to try and make sense of the art piece, by delving into its past observing the uniqueness of the original. I will take notes on the smallest of details and hold discussions with others in order to see differences in interpretations among viewers of the same piece.

I have never considered myself artistic, nor have I ever claimed to fully understand art. I always believed that each person that views a piece of artwork would see and interpret the piece differently than the person next to them. However, I sometimes feel lost and even wrong when looking at certain artworks because my interpretation differs from that of the majority of the people who have also seen the art.

After reading the required sections of Berger and Barnet’s writing, I realized how silly I was for thinking that. For example, based on the circumstances of which a painting is seen, say, in a photograph or in person, the beauty of the art would be altered and some aspects of the actual piece would be missing because a photograph would not be able to capture the essence of the painting compared to if you were to see it in person. Barnet writes, “The color of images, reproduction in books, and images on the World Wide Web range from pretty accurate to very poor.” This applies to how I will view the Modern Art exhibition because I will be more detail-oriented in examining the texture, color, placement and objects within the piece. I also really like the line from the first chapter of Ways of Seeing that says, “The visual arts have always existed within a certain preserve; originally this preserve was magical or sacred. But it was always physical: it was the place, the cave, the building, in which, or for which, the work was made.” (pg. 32) It reminds me to think not only about the present work but also about the origin of the piece, the artist that created the piece and the time period during which it was made.

Both writers teach us through their text to analyze and interpret art from different angles. When I go to visit the MOMA for the Modern Art Exhibit, I will look through the exhibit and formally analyze them for their structure and components, just like Beer did in his analysis of Prince Khunera as a Scribe.