Ways of Seeing is a 1972 BBC four-part television series of 30-minute films created chiefly by writer John Berger and producer Mike Dibb. Berger’s scripts were adapted into a book of the same name. The series and book criticize traditional Western cultural aesthetics by raising questions about hidden ideologies in visual images. The series is partially a response to Kenneth Clark’s Civilisation series, which represents a more traditionalist view of the Western artistic and cultural canon.
CW: Around the 20 minute mark, footage of an execution is briefly shown.
Related essays can be found on ways-of-seeing.com
Cheers for sharing this here, I’ve watched about half of the first episode, and I’m quite enthralled. Old docs from the 70’s like this are my favorite.
Awesome! I enjoyed how Berger weaved art and politics in a way that still resonates. There’s another version on the internet archive without the overlaid subtitles blocking the artwork.
Are you familiar with documentary filmmaker David Hoffman? He uploads footage from his archive on YouTube, stuff from the 1950’s onward.
It’s a shame the Archive version isn’t quite as high fidelity, though in a way it sort’ve adds to the charm.
Yes! I love David’s docs. It’s a shame some of them were lost in his house fire a few years ago. :(
Oh no! I didn’t know that, what a bummer :( My favorite one of his is about the boomers who didn’t rebel.