A Way Of Seeing

How do we see the world around us? The Penguin on Design series includes the works of creative thinkers whose writings on art, design and the media have changed our vision forever. "Seeing comes before words. The child looks and recognizes before it can speak." "But there is also another sense in which seeing comes before words. It is seeing which establishes our place in the surrounding world; we explain that world with words, but word can never undo the fact that we are surrounded by it. The relation between what we see and what we know is never settled." John Berger's Ways of Seeing is one of the most stimulating and influential books on art in any language. First published in 1972, it was based on the BBC television series about which the (London) Sunday Times critic commented: "This is an eye-opener in more ways than one: by concentrating on how we look at paintings . . . he will almost certainly change the way you look at pictures." By now he has.

An exciting new critical voice explores what it is that makes great art great through an illuminating analysis of the world’s artistic masterpieces. From a carved mammoth tusk (ca. 40,000 BCE) to Bosch’s Garden of Earthly Delights (1505–1510) to Duchamp’s Fountain (1917), a remarkable lexicon of astonishing imagery has imprinted itself onto the cultural consciousness of the past 40,000 years. Author Kelly Grovier devotes himself to illuminating these and more than fifty other seminal works in this radical new history of art. Stepping away from biography, style, and the chronology of “isms” that preoccupies most of art history, A New Way of Seeing invites a new interaction with art, one in which we learn from the artworks and not just about them. Grovier identifies that part of the artwork that bridges the divide between art and life and elevates its value beyond the visual to the vital. This book challenges the sensibility that conceives of artists as brands and the works they create as nothing more than material commodities to hoard, hide, and flip for profit. Lavishly illustrated with many of the most breathtaking and enduring artworks ever created, Kelly Grovier casts fresh light on these famous works by daring to isolate a single, and often overlooked, detail responsible for its greatness and power to move.

In Wittgenstein's Way of Seeing, Judith Genova provides a an illuminating introduction to two surprisingly neglected aspects of his work: his conception of philosophy and his search for a style to embody his revolutionary practice. Genova examines the nuances, contours, and texture of logical twists of language. She elucidates Wittgenstein's reliance on the work of Kant and Freud, and presents how words are acts for Wittgenstein.

Artist Mary Whyte has learned many lessons over the years--lessons about art and, perhaps more important to her, lessons about life. In this book, she uses specific illustrations from her training, her teaching, her travels and her mentors to show the reader how to see and how to appreciate the artist's experience. Referring to numerous color and black and white examples, she explains what her intentions and feelings were during the composition and completion of many of her favorite works. The techniques of watercolor painting can be learned. Skill, according to Mary, is never enough. One must learn to feel as well as to see in order to become a complete artist and a complete person. Her paintings are beautiful; so is her soul. Mary Whyte is a graduate of The Tyler School of Art and is a nationally known watercolor artist, author and teacher. She is a resident of Johns Island, South Carolina, where she finds many of her subjects among the Gullah people--descendants of the slave culture of the barrier islands of coastal Carolina. Her works have been exhibited at and collected by many art galleries and museums. She is the author of Alfreda's World and the illustrator of a number of children's books.

One of anthropology's leading writers on ethnographic methods, Harry Wolcott discusses the fundamental nature of ethnographic studies. Tracing its development from its disciplinary origins in sociology and anthropology, he points out what is distinctive about ethnography and what it means to conduct research in the ethnographic tradition. In this engaging and thought-provoking book, Wolcott distinguishes ethnography as more than just a set of field methods and practices, separating it from many related qualitative research traditions as 'a way of seeing' through the lens of culture. For both beginning and experienced ethnographers in a wide range of disciplines, Wolcott's book will provide important ideas for improving research practice.

When you look at an image, what do you see and feel? What do you want your audience to see and feel when they view your work? For over thirty years, Dr. Richard Zakia helped thousands of photographers hone in on their creative vision through the inspirational, informative text and images included in his classic book, Perception and Imaging. More than a step-by-step photography instruction manual, Perception and Imaging explores the fundamental act of photography – seeing – through a uniquely comprehensive combination of technique, history, visual perception, philosophy and psychology. No matter your level of technical skill, you can learn to think more clearly about what you wish to convey in your images. Fully revised to account for the unique influences and consequences of the digital revolution and online photosharing, John Suler newly addresses digital impermanence, sensory and cognitive overload, and the selfie, and their effects on perception. Additional coverage also includes microexpressions, Rorschach inkblots and subliminal reactions, transference, and synectics.

At the beginning of 2020, 66 long-term refugee camps existed along the East African Rift. Millions of young children have been born at the camps and have grown up there, yet it is unknown how their surrounding built environments affect their learning and development. Architecture as a Way of Seeing and Learning presents an architect’s take on questions many academics and humanitarians ask. Is it relevant to look at camps through an urban lens and focus on their built environment? Which analytical benefits can architectural and design tools provide to refugee assistance and specifically to young children’s learning? And which advantages can assemblage thinking and situated knowledges bring about in analysing, understanding and transforming long-term refugee camps? Responding to the extreme lack of information about East African camps, Nerea Amorós Elorduy has built contextualised knowledge – nuanced, situated and participatory – to describe, study and transform the East African long-term camps, and uncover hidden agencies in refugee assistance. She uses architecture as a means to create new knowledge collectively, include more local voices and speculate on how to improve the educational landscape for young children. With this book, Amorós Elorduy brings nuance, contextualisation and empathy to the study and management of long-term refugee camps in East Africa. It is empathy, she argues, that will help change mindsets, decolonise humanitarian refugee assistance and its study. Crossing architecture, humanitarian aid and early childhood development, this book offers many practical learnings.