John Berger Quotes

For the Cro-Magnons, space is a metaphysical arena of continually intermittent appearances and disappearances.

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.

For the artist, drawing is discovery. And that is not just a slick phrase; it is quite literally true.

When we read a story, we inhabit it. The covers of the book are like a roof and four walls.

Every authentic poem contributes to the labor of poetry… to bring together what life has separated or violence has torn apart…

A drawing is an autobiographical record of one’s discovery of an event – either seen, remembered or imagined. A ‘finished’ work is an attempt to construct an event in itself.

Deep in the nature of theatre is a sense of ritual. The cinema, by contrast, transports its audience individually, singly, out of the theatre towards the unknown.

There’s the artist’s intimacy and truthfulness to himself, but an equal intimacy to the Other [the one drawn].

The human imagination… has great difficulty in living strictly within the confines of a materialist practice or philosophy.

To be naked is to be oneself. To be nude is to be seen naked by others and yet not recognised for oneself.