John Berger, Influential British Art Critic and Writer, Dies at 90 in Paris

John Berger, the influential British art critic and writer, died at age 90 in his Paris home. Throughout the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, he brought a left-wing perspective to art criticism during the Cold War era. His seminal 1972 BBC television series Ways of Seeing examined art's commodity status, collecting culture, advertising politics, and depictions of women, influencing political art history, feminist criticism, and cultural studies. Berger wrote prolifically for publications including the New Statesman, Arts News and Review (later ArtReview), and produced radio and television content. In 1972, his novel G won the Booker Prize, and he controversially pledged half the prize money to the Black Panther movement. Later fiction often focused on migrants and peasant workers. His 2016 essay collections Landscapes and Hold Everything Dear explored art as political resistance.