Ways of Seeing backdrop
Ways of Seeing poster
Documentary

All Episodes of Ways of Seeing

BBC Two

Browse all episodes of Ways of Seeing

All Episodes of Ways of Seeing

John Berger's Ways of Seeing changed the way people think about painting and art criticism. This watershed work shows, through word and image, how what...
Select Season:

Season 1

  • Psychological Aspects
    N/A/100 votes

    Psychological Aspects

    Season 1 Episode 1 - Aired 1/8/1972

    The first part of the television series drew on ideas from Walter Benjamin's The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction arguing that through reproduction an Old Master's painting's modern context is severed from that which existed at the time of its making.

    Director: Unknown

    Writer: Unknown

  • Women in Art
    N/A/100 votes

    Women in Art

    Season 1 Episode 2 - Aired 1/15/1972

    The second film discusses the female nude. Berger asserts that only twenty or thirty nudes in the European oil painting tradition depict a woman as herself rather than as a subject of male idealisation or desire.

    Director: Unknown

    Writer: Unknown

  • Collectors and Collecting
    N/A/100 votes

    Collectors and Collecting

    Season 1 Episode 3 - Aired 1/22/1972

    The third programme is on the use of oil paint as a means of depicting or reflecting the status of the individuals who commissioned the work of art.

    Director: Unknown

    Writer: Unknown

  • Commercial Art
    N/A/100 votes

    Commercial Art

    Season 1 Episode 4 - Aired 1/29/1972

    In the fourth programme, on publicity and advertising, Berger argues that colour photography has taken over the role of oil paint, though the context is reversed. An idealised potential for the viewer (via consumption) is considered a substitution for the actual reality depicted in old master portraits.

    Director: Unknown

    Writer: Unknown