GOCA downtown

Part 1

A beautiful piece of art at first glance, or is this a manipulation by commercialism to appeal to the public? I find the art in this piece to be in psychology rather than in the object itself.

An empty alley, surely entered by many who were simply looking for a night of fun or a night of desperation.

 

A storm approaches over downtown, a powerful omen in so many times but now citizens are desperate for rain.

 

Three forms of art, architecture from the past, sculpture planted so that it may be appealing, and the modern sign depicting the end of individual privacy.

A beautiful building meant to convey feelings of the past with shops of every modern convenience including drugs that our society tried to destroy.


Part 2

     In Ways of seeing John Berger focuses on the differences between the ways different people see art and photographs. This includes social classes, cohorts in different time periods, as well as the modern technologies that we have today. Berger believes that what we find in art is often a reflection of ourselves and is strongly affected by the things that surround us in our everyday lives. With my picture above one person may believe that an alley is dangerous and only trespassed by the likes of the lowest levels of society, however to a homeless person they may see the alley as a place where they can sleep at night with less change of being found by the police or other people who might bother them. This difference, the perception of safety versus danger, may only be influenced by how much money a person has and the resulting way they have had to survive in their life.

     One of the great aspects of Berger’s work is the concept of perception. To most people the idea of an alley is disgusting. It may be filled with food waste, trash, various oils and fluids from cars, and perhaps even people who may mean to do them harm. I see in that alley a place where people have been made conjugation, eat, slept, and been stabbed. I have seen every facet of life down that alley. I only have this experience after responding to many call for help to 911. To the person who only sees the police walk in and walk out with someone in handcuffs thirty minutes later they will never see it in the same way. 

     Berger wants people to see through the photographer’s eye. This requires understanding and contemplation. To see a picture the same way as I do you would have to know me, not just at the time in which the photo was taken, but in the long history of my life. The same holds true when we look at anyone’s art, to understand the meaning you must understand the person.

Berger, John.Ways of Seeing.London.Penguin Books, 1972. Print.