A photograph is a meeting place where the interests of the photographer, the photographed, the viewer and those who are using the photograph are often contradictory.
JOHN BERGERCompassion opposes this order and is therefore best thought of as being in some way supernatural.
More John Berger Quotes
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Compassion has no place in the natural order of the world which operates on the basis of necessity.
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The existence of pleasure is the first mystery. The existence of pain has prompted far more philosophical speculation.
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For the Cro-Magnons, space is a metaphysical arena of continually intermittent appearances and disappearances.
JOHN BERGER -
We can become anything. That is why injustice is impossible here. There may be the accident of birth, there is no accident of death. Nothing forces us to remain what we were.
JOHN BERGER -
What makes photography a strange invention is that its primary raw materials are light and time.
JOHN BERGER -
A peasant becomes fond of his pig and is glad to salt away its pork.
JOHN BERGER -
For me, drawing is a lot to do with taking out, with returning to the white of the paper.
JOHN BERGER -
By contrast, a woman’s presence… defines what can and cannot be done to her.
JOHN BERGER -
In the average European oil painting of the nude the principal protagonist is never painted. He is the spectator in front of the picture and he is presumed to be a man.
JOHN BERGER -
It dreams, like a dog in its basket, of hares in the open.
JOHN BERGER -
Compare the cinema with theatre. Both are dramatic arts. Theatre brings actors before a public and every night during the season they re-enact the same drama.
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What is to happen next will take place within the four walls of the story. And this is possible because the story’s voice makes everything its own.
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To remain innocent may also be. to remain ignorant.
JOHN BERGER -
Nakedness reveals itself. Nudity is placed on display. The nude is condemned to never being naked. Nudity is a form of dress.
JOHN BERGER -
If every event which occurred could be given a name, there would be no need for stories.
JOHN BERGER