Photocopies - John Berger

There is an image reproduced at the beginning of this book. It looks at first glance to be a photocopy, so stark is its contrast and so unclear its details, though it is in fact an image taken with a pinhole camera. It shows the author John Berger standing beside the first of the many people he writes about in this book, an artist who lives alone in the countryside. Very little can be seen of their surroundings, just the hazy silhouettes of a tree and the artist's house. The figures themselves are silhouetted also, their features and clothes indiscernible, their smiles unseen. And yet despite all this, or rather because of it, your attention is drawn to the ...  Read the complete review