Encuentros y despedidas : Sobre imágenes y personas

“I have traveled to many places. I have lived my life. Here is a book of encounters (if I omit any, that’s another story). Each essay begins with an image that conjures up the moment I encountered it. Some will find it difficult to locate the places discussed here on a map; for others, on the contrary, it will be easy. Places, of course, that have also been visited by other travelers. I only hope that my readers will recognize them in this book and be able to say: I was there…” This is, therefore, a book of encounters, but also of farewells, and of the inevitable tension that lies between these two moments: between the critic and art, the artist and their subject, their subject and the unknown; between the invisible and the visible, presence and absence. Between images, ultimately, and people. But above all, it is an encounter between the author and the reader, who discovers themselves immersed in the eloquence and moral courage that John Berger’s imagination distills. Whether commenting on a painting, a postcard, or a photograph, Berger envelops us in the fascination and infinite richness of the visual world, focusing both on the image he is talking about and the constellation of associations it evokes around it.