Preview

Ways of Seeing

Best Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1739 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Ways of Seeing
Ways Of Seeing (Chapter 7)

In today’s world, marketers and advertisers are fighting for every spot they get to display their ads and market their products. The ultimate aim is to get as much exposure as possible. This in turn, they hope, will translate into sales. The literature “Ways of Seeing – Part 7” underlines the theory of publicity. I chose this literature because it elucidates the backbone of marketing and advertising – publicity. It interests me because designers and advertisers revolve their careers around for many years in order to obtain ‘Publicity’.

‘Kodak sells film but they doesn’t publicize film. They publicize memories’ (Theodore Parker).
This is the mystery and theory of publicity today - to incorporate human emotions to affect the behavior and thereby to promote the product or a desired cause. The only intention being to draw the viewer not entirely towards the product but towards his own superior future, the future which is enhanced due to the presence of the product. This clearly indicates that human actions are based on emotional instinct, not logic.

When there come emotions, there comes art. This is because art uses the emotional palette for its expression. According to Marshall McLuhan, ‘Advertisement is the greatest art form of the 20th century.’ Publicity images being considered as an art form is a new expression given to commercial design. The approach taken for these images are being compared with the ones of oil paintaings and a cultural continuity is said to have established from the oil paintings of the 18th century to the publicity images of the 21st century.

This comparison with the previous century oil paintings and human behavioural response to publicity are the two main highlights of John Berger’s thought provoking write up in ‘Ways of Seeing’.

John Berger began his professional career as an artist. An art student from the Chelsea



Bibliography: Albert Einstein, Brainyquote (28 February, 2010) Albert Einstein Quotes (Internet) Available from: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/a/alberteins148819.html (Accessed 28 February 2010) All about jealousy (4 February, 2010) Jealousy Quotes-- jealous Quotes (Internet) Available from: http://www.all-about-jealousy.com/quotes.html (Accessed 1 March 2010) Capitalism in Cuba, David, Jacob and Jim Wong (28 February, 2010) Capitalism in Cuba (Internet) Available from: http://library.thinkquest.org/18355/capitalism_in_cuba.html (Accessed 1 March 2010) Creative Advertisements (1 March, 2010) Creative Advertisements: Psychology of Winning Ads (Internet) Available from: http://www.seochat.com/c/a/Website-Promotion-Help/Creative-Advertisements-Psychology-of-Winning-Ads/2/ (Accessed 1 March 2010) (Accessed 2 March 2010) Glamour, TED.com (February 2010) Virginia Postrel on glamour | Video on TED.com (Internet) Available from: http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/virginia_postrel_on_glamour.html (Accessed 28 February 2010) John Berger (1972). Ways of Seeing. London: British Broadcasting Corporation John Berger (5 August, 2010) Available from: http://www.johnberger.org/johnberger.htm (Accessed 28 February 2010) John Berger (21 February, 2010). John Berger - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (Internet) Available from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Berger#Literary_career (Accessed 28 February 2010) Marshall McLuhan (Canadian communications theorist Educator, Writer and Social Reformer) Ad-mad (28 February, 2010) Famous Advertising Quotes | Ad-Mad: Advertising News and Information (Internet) Available from: http://www.ad-mad.co.uk/node/414 (Accessed 1 March 2010) The National Gallery (2 March, 2010). Thomas Gainsborough | artist | 1727 - 1788 | The National Gallery, London (Internet) Available from: http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/artists/thomas-gainsborough (Accessed 2 March, 2010) Stephen Leacock, Thinknext (1 March, 2010) Stephen Leacock quotes (Internet) Available from: http://thinkexist.com/quotes/stephen_leacock/ (Accessed 1 March 2010) Theodore Parker, Thinknext (1 March, 2010) Theodore Parker quotes (Internet) Available from: http://thinkexist.com/quotation/kodak_sells_film-but_they_don-t_advertise_film/151167 (Accessed 1 March 2010) Will Rogers, Thinknext (1 March, 2010) Will Rogers quote (American entertainer, famous for his pithy and homespun humour,1879-1935) (Internet) Available from: http://thinkexist.com/quotes/will_rogers/ (Accessed 1 March 2010) YouTube (March 2010) YouTube - 'Cuba will stay socialistic ' (Internet) Available from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9EInIlVbQ4&feature=related (Accessed 1 March 2010) YouTube (March 2010) YouTube WAYS OF SEEING (final episode - advertising) 1/4 (Internet) Available from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmgGT3th_oI&feature=related (Accessed 28 February 2010) YouTube (March 2010) YouTube WAYS OF SEEING (final episode - advertising) 2/4 (Internet) Available from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6q0JvXiZw7o&feature=related (Accessed 28 February 2010) YouTube (March 2010) YouTube WAYS OF SEEING (final episode - advertising) 3/4 (Internet) Available from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbebPdXv70w (Accessed 28 February 2010) YouTube (March 2010) YouTube WAYS OF SEEING (final episode - advertising) 4/4 (Internet) Available from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tAJovNjXMTs&NR=1 (Accessed 28 February, 2010)

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Advertisement, is a bait that were casually caught on and we don’t realize until where pulled in. This absurd idealistic method of Ad is a continuously changing strategy of producing a new generation of people. For this reason, this industry technique seem to be what shapes us to believe what we want or how we should be in the society. Cameron Johnson clarifies strongly in his essay, “The Mighty Image,” with narrative thoughts that could be provoking the human views from just an image.…

    • 257 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Air Rescue

    • 7498 Words
    • 30 Pages

    In the following essay, Jib Fowles looks at how advertisements work by examining the emotional, subrational appeals that they employ. We are confronted daily by hundreds of fads, only a few of which actually attract our attention. These few do so, according to Fowles, through "something primary and prim itive, an emotional appeal, that in effect is the thin edge of the wedge, trying to find its way into a mind." Drawing on research done by the psychologist Henry A. Murray, Fowles describes fifteen emotional appeals or wedges that advertisements exploit.…

    • 7498 Words
    • 30 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Advertising is everywhere we go; we see and hear advertising in magazines, newspapers, billboards, television, radio, internet, and even the classrooms. In the article, Kilbourne describes how advertising supports almost every communication, not by selling products to us but by selling us to the products’ manufacturers. Advertisers compete against each other for the opportunity to deliver their product to the consumers thru the media and companies are investing excessive amounts of money on psychological research in search of specific words and images necessary to capture the attention and money of consumers.…

    • 721 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Critique of Dorothy Cohen

    • 736 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The author begins by describing the balance requisite and how an advertisement can rely on how ‘visual weight’ is distributed within its ‘landscape’. In this first section of the article mathematical terms are used to illicit a sense of visual and spatial concepts, for example the ‘fulcrum’ or balancing point. In a secondary section, proportion is emphasized in regards to aesthetic layout in a graphic representation to best describe the size of an element in regards to the rest of the image/picture/advertisement. More specifically, it is demonstrated that non-proportional images use the proportion of a layout to fortify a particular theme or underlying message. In a third section, the movement aspect of graphic layout is explained as a sequence which enables directional flow in order to direct the interpreter into a coherent…

    • 736 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In Chapter 3 of his book, “Ways of Seeing”, John Berger argues that in western nude art and present day media, that women are largely shown and treated as objects upon whom power is asserted by men either as figures in the canvas or as spectators. Berger’s purpose is to make readers aware of how the perception of women in the art so that they will recognize the evolution of western cultured art.…

    • 707 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Ethnographic Summary

    • 553 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The final portion of the video gives the viewer a site for further information on…

    • 553 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Applied Management Project

    • 13570 Words
    • 55 Pages

    References: 1. Marla R. Stafford and Ronald J. Faber, 2005, “Advertising, Promotion, and New Media”, (pg: 68- 78).…

    • 13570 Words
    • 55 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, consumer civilization increased dramatically and chapter six concentrates on the theories that can be applied to assess and disassemble advertising. It presents a thorough historical preface of consumer society, citing its rise in the perspective of modern ideologies, as well as the shifting of modern society to one of independence. This chapter creates connections between the tactics of advertising and the principles of fine art. It uses a plethora of advertisements…

    • 903 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    assignment1 soc109 02

    • 808 Words
    • 3 Pages

    An anthropological introduction to Youtube is one of the presentations by Michael Wesch of Kansas State University. He teaches a class called Digital Ethnography, and “ethnography is the study of a culture.” Nowadays, there are many kinds of mass media appearing to connect people around the world. Thus, on Michael Wesch’s website, he writes, “Our work explores how humans use media, how media uses us, and how we can use new media to reveal our insights in new ways.” That a reason why he and his team studied the culture in Youtube.…

    • 808 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Appeals of Advertising Potential customers are always attracted by advertising companies in at least some sort of way. These companies have learned over time that some things sell better based on the time period. The media have found ways to make topics more appealing to the consumer by providing an emotional connection. The human mind works on emotions and our senses react when there is something we desire. Those who do the marketing where we see the many hundreds of advertising each day, try to trigger an emotion that will create a need for us to have something we don’t particularly need.…

    • 703 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Ways of Seeing

    • 949 Words
    • 4 Pages

    John Berger has shown how to take any image, whether it is a painting, an advertisement, or a picture, and dissect it into a branching, almost fractal, network of deeper meanings. He has done this by changing observational techniques of looking at the image; by focusing in on specific areas within the image to reveal scenes within the overall scene or by controlling the arrangement in which we view the image (e.g. left to right, right to left, etc.). By pairing an image with music, or the context of which it is being shown, a different meaning altogether is presented, as opposed to viewing the image in silence, or out of context. Each of these methods of viewing enhances and conceals differentiations in what is trying to be conveyed. The experience is almost circumstantial and thus, utterly subjective to a degree.…

    • 949 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Best Essays

    * BBC FOUR, 2009, Lee Miller: A Crazy Way of Seeing, [off air video recording], BBC FOUR, 27th June 2009…

    • 4795 Words
    • 20 Pages
    Best Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Art is Art

    • 1296 Words
    • 4 Pages

    What is considered art has been a controversial question for many years in history and today. There are various forms and types of art. Because art is very complex and diverse, it is viewed and conceptualized in many different ways. Nancy G. Heller states even though a type of artwork is hard to understand, it’s considered art, and artwork that people don’t understand shouldn’t be disregarded from other types of art. She feels as though people shouldn’t be intimidated by artwork that’s hard to understand and her main goal is to try to help people feel more comfortable around art they don’t understand. Picasso believes that all art needs to be an original in order to be considerably successful. He states that nature and art are completely different things. Picasso explains that art is a lie that allows us to realize the truth. And finally, John Berger speaks about publicity being a form of art, and how it uses art to manipulate people into buying what is publicized. Berger says publicity ads have a way of working because ads focus on the future, which people are attracted to more than the present. Each of these authors have different opinions on how art is viewed and conceived, however they unite from similar points in their views.…

    • 1296 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Advertising has a big effect on selling products or propagandizes. That’s why; companies and organizations start to increase their advertising expenses. A research made in 1985 indicates that in 1983, companies worldwide spent $19,837,800,000 on advertising. In 1984, $23,429,700,000 was spent and in 1991, about $52 billion was spent on advertising by companies. This shows us that companies understood that advertising is the best way of selling. All of these companies want to make their advertisements effective and memorable, but what makes an advertisement memorable? An illustration, a headline and a copy can make an advertisement incredibly memorable.…

    • 823 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Ways of Seeing Analysis

    • 781 Words
    • 4 Pages

    In his article, “Ways of Seeing” (1972), John Berger analyzes different methods of being able to see or look at both people and objects in the world. He tells his audience how the invention of technology has affected the way people see and portray art and by means of mystification, which is the process of explaining away which is evident. He explains how seeing affects the way we learn throughout our life and how we can interpret it in many different ways.…

    • 781 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays