This is because of the misogynistic belief that women can be reduced to the qualities that they project on the surface or, to rephrase this, that women's personalities and values can be read from their appearances. Once the camera was invented, the idea that perspective realistically rendered the world began to change, as it became apparent that images also have a temporal dimension, which the conventions of perspective do nothing to capture.ĭescribe how representations of women throughout art history have reinforced their marginalization.Īs Berger posits, the fundamental difference between men and women's presence in the world is that women are constantly asked to survey themselves, simultaneously perceiving their images of themselves as they perceive the world around them, while men's perception, judgment, and action is turned outward towards the world.

However, this is fraught with contradiction: the position of the spectator feels godlike, as the world appears to exist to furnish their perception, yet they are necessarily fixed in one place, unlike an omniscient or truly all-powerful god. Essentially, this means that the whole world converges on the eye of the spectator who beholds a painting. This created the illusion of perspectival space, giving two-dimensional paintings and drawings the illusion of depth. What is the inherent contradiction in this idea? When and why did this convention begin to change?ĭuring the Renaissance, the belief developed that reality could be represented most faithfully by drawing the world as if it converged on a single point on the horizon. Explain the Renaissance idea of perspective.

Berger john ways of seeing