Ways of looking cover

Ways of looking

by Ossian Ward

Art has changed. Those reassuringly familiar styles and movements that characterised art production prior to the twenty-first century have all vanished. Traditional artistic media no longer do what we expect of them. This book provides a straightforward, six-step programme for understanding contemporary art based on the concept of the tabula rasa a clean slate and a fresh mind. Since artists increasingly work across traditional media and genres, the author has also developed an alternative classification system Art as Entertainment, Art as Confrontation, Art as Joke designed to help make sense of otherwise obscure-seeming works. Ways of Looking transforms a potentially intimidating encounter with cuttingedge contemporary art into a dramatic, sensually rewarding and thoughtprovoking experience.

Chappie’s discussion starters

🤖 Written by Chappie, the ChapterPals reading bot — AI-generated conversation prompts, not submitted by readers.

  1. Which character stayed with you after you turned the last page, and why?
  2. Was there a moment where you disagreed with a character’s choice? What would you have done?
  3. What theme did this book keep circling back to — and did it earn its ending?
  4. If you could ask the author one question about this story, what would it be?
  5. Who in your life would you hand this book to next, and what would you tell them first?