Through Your Eyes

Everyone sees things through their own eyes. Perspective is influenced by everything you have seen and experienced meaning every person’s perspective is unique. Webster defines art as “something made with imagination and skill that is beautiful and expresses important ideas or feeling”. In “Ways of Seeing” John Berger asserts that paintings are not the subject as it was but rather how the artist perceived and interpreted it. He claims that this is why paintings must be seen in person in order to understand what the artist truly meant and with the replication of art comes the warping of its original meaning by our own interpretations and perspectives. Berger’s claim that art is warped through replication holds some truth to it but it doesn’t mean that the artwork has become less valuable. There is no way that any person can experience the world the exact same as another so ultimately the art will always be seen differently by others. That’s where the actual value of the art comes from, what the viewer gains from the piece. Two different people could look at the painting “Starry Night” by Vincent Van Gogh and one might see a simple painting of a town on a beautiful night while the other whose had problems with depression could feel a sense of loneliness from it seeing it as a sad painting overlooking a depressing little town on a lonely night. The replication of art may have made the artists original vision become less and less evident, it allows the viewer to make their own interpretation based on the artists connecting the piece to the viewer on a deeper level.