Artistic Tug o War 

 

 

In the book Ways of Seeing, Berger proposes the argument that people are the major driving force behind the publicity and the manufacturing of glamour.  Or in other words, the driving force in advertisement images.  I believe there is more to it.  People are very important, but I believe the emotional attachment to the work being produced, and the emotional attachment the consumer derives from it is just as, or more important. 

 

Berger goes on to sensationalize the idea by showing picture after picture of what the good life is like according to some of the works.  Some of the pictures of distant shores, or a hot rod with a huge house in the background.  This, for me does nothing to make me strive to want to have that kind of good life.  It is all just a bunch of meaningless pictures without the emotion attached to it.  Case in point, if you watch the television or read a magazine adds for such child sponsorship programs like (World Vision) or any number of child sponsorship programs across the world, they don't paint a picture of raindrops and lollipops on the cover showing just how great the good life is for those children.  It picture after picture of the devastating effects of being born in a nation not so fortunate as ours.  The point, is too grip you by the emotional attachment and make you want to do something, anything for those poor children, and oh by the way, 48% of all proceeds go to operating costs of the organization in question.   

 

If these organizations went about proclaiming how awesome it is to be a third world child, they would get no sponsors.  While Berger is right in the fact that people are the driving force, his examples of why they are the driving force are not the entire story.  This is why I picked the pictures that I did.  The artwork darkroom photography takes a picture of a young lady.  Nothing elaborate, just the photo and the raw emotions that it evokes.  I could easily see this artwork as the poster child of some support group talking about the wiles of abuse or some kind of social program talking about the need for winter jackets for underprivileged youth in our state.  The point is, it the picture grips you on an emotional level and if it was used, I'm sure the emotional response to the advertisement would be a success or as Berger puts it, "manufacturing glamour". Berger 1973.  Not to take away from the ideas proposed by Berger, but the fact that people are the driving force should not take away from the idea that emotions are what drive a market for a particular product.  The two work in perfect harmony making whatever it is you want to sell, a winner.

 

Works Cited

Berger, John. Ways of Seeing. London: British Broadcasting, 1972. Print.

Hand, Emily.  Darkroom Photography.  Discovery Canyon Campus