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Paintings record what the painter remembers. Because each one of us forgets different things, a photo more than a painting may change its meaning according to who is looking at it.

John Berger

Common-sense is part of the home-made ideology of those who have been deprived of fundamental learning, of those who have been kept ignorant.
JOHN BERGER

Common Common Sense Deprive Fundamental Home Ideology Ignorant Learning Part Sense
You cant draw it for others. You can try, of course, but it doesn’t work. People obeying rules laid down my somebody else is not the same thing as respecting life. And if you want to respect life, you have to draw a line.
JOHN BERGER

Course Else Life Line Obey Other People Respect Somebody
Modern thought has transferred the spectral character of Death to the notion of time itself. Time has become Death triumphant over all.
JOHN BERGER

Character Death Modern Notion Spectular Time Transferred
Whenever he looked he saw the labour of existence; and this labour, recognised as such, was what constituted reality for him. (On Vincent Van Gogh)
JOHN BERGER

Constitute Country Existence Labour Look People Recognised Saw Sky Vicent
You painted a naked woman because you enjoyed looking at her, put a mirror in her hand and you called the painting “Vanity,” thus morally condemning the woman whose nakedness you had depicted for you own pleasure.
JOHN BERGER

Enjoy Hand Look Mirror Morally Naked Paint Painting Pleasure Vanity Women
The envied are like bureaucrats; the more impersonal they are, the greater the illusion (for themselves and for others) of their power.
JOHN BERGER

Bureaucrat Envied Envy Greater Illusion Power Themselves
All photographs are there to remind us of what we forget. In this – as in other ways – they are the opposite of paintings.
JOHN BERGER

Forget Opposite Other Pain Painting Photography Remind Way
Hair is associated with sexual power. With passion.
JOHN BERGER

Associate Hair Need Passion Sexual
To be naked is to be oneself.
JOHN BERGER

Be Naked Oneself
The past is the one thing we are not prisoners of. We can do with the past exactly what we wish. What we can’t do is to change its consequences.
JOHN BERGER

Consequences Exactly Past Prisoner Wish
For those who are behind the curtain, landmarks are no longer only geographic but also biographical and personal
JOHN BERGER

Behind Biographical Curtain Geographical Landmark Longer Personal
Tracing an imaginary line between a cluster of stars gave them an image and an identity.
JOHN BERGER

Between Cluster Gave Identity Image Imaginary Star Trace
History always constitutes the relation between a present and its past. Consequently fear of the present leads to mystification of the past
JOHN BERGER

Always Constitute History Past Present Relation
There’s the artist’s intimacy and truthfulness to himself, but an equal intimacy to the Other [the one drawn].
JOHN BERGER

Artist Drawing Drawn Equal Intimacy Other Truthfulness
The power of the glamorous resides in their supposed happiness: the power of the bureaucrat in his supposed authority.
JOHN BERGER

Authority Bureaucrat Glamorous Happiness Power Reside Suppose
A tactic which allows people, as distinct from their elected but often craven governments, to apply a certain pressure on those wielding power in what they, the boycotters, consider to be an unjust or immoral way.
JOHN BERGER

Allow Boycott Consider Craven Distinct Elected Government People Pressure Tactic

Paintings record what the painter remembers. Because each one of us forgets different things, a photo more than a painting may change its meaning according to who is looking at it.

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Paintings record what the painter remembers. Because each one of us forgets different things, a photo more than a painting may change its meaning according to who is looking at it.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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