Interesting, not as many examples as I would have liked. The hardbck edition would be better for me, so I could skip between the chapters.

As an Amateur artist it can be difficult to sometimes get some to understand what I create. This book tries to break that down from the viewers point. It’s well thought out and has made me appreciate art that I didn’t really understand

This book is well written, easy to follow, and accessible - doesn’t go over my head or make me feel like an idiot for reading it. Well done!

Sorry, I put the review in the wrong book!! I'm still reading this one and review is to come. This field requires 100 characters and I am now writing to meet that requirement.

How to enjoy art: A guide for Everyone is a friendly, low-threshold vade mecum which provides the reader with a few tools to enhance one’s appreciation of and pleasure in works of art and to develop one’s engagement with them. Written by a specialist for non-specialists, art historian and educator Ben Street offers assistance to the reader to find points of access to works of art by looking beyond the meaning one would draw from what is depicted or the traditional approach to categorize art in isms and the veneration of the canon.

This is a remarkably gentle book. Street approaches the reader kindly, almost cautiously, to make his point that specialist knowledge is not required to enjoy art. His is a warm invitation to engage with a work of art more intuitively and ‘viscerally’, not just cerebrally but by engaging all our senses when we approach a work of art, for instance by thinking in terms of a work of art’s physical resonance. He is aware that art, as stored in sacerdotal, silence-inspiring art temples like museums, churches and art galleries which one fears to thread can have an intimidating effect which makes people decide art is not for them because they assume they will fall short in understanding it, an assumption which is also reinforced by writing on art, at times turgid or hermetic.

Ben Street presents five distinct points of entry which can be helpful when we try to listen to the way a work of art speaks: colour, scale, process, placement and content – the latter deliberately coming last. Street dedicates a chapter to these five points of entry, illustrating each one with examples chosen throughout art history, ranging from ancient Egypt over Fra Angelico to contemporary art (Kara Walker, Lubaina Himid). I loved his insight that works of art have a tone of voice as well as poems, there are some who scream and some who whisper – if only by their size, miniature or monumental.

Another radiant and beautiful observation of Street is that a work of art needs time to what one thinks of it, and how much memories play a role in the meaning works of art get in our life – memory which is as much about how it felt to be there as about the art itself, the afterlife or ghostly life in the mind of an audience engaging with ephemeral forms of art like installation, performance and video art, the imaginative footprint a work of art that goes on existing in memory and imagination.

Written in a flowing, simple language, mostly free of art jargon, this is an accessible and pleasant read. The title however struck me as slightly ambivalent, trying to sit in two chairs at once, and made me wonder about the potential readership for this book: will it effectively speak to such a general audience as it seems to reach out to, or rather preach to the choir of readers already enjoying and interested in art? For the latter category of readers, I imagine an alternative title would also cover the merits of the book adequately: How to enjoy Art more.

How can we enjoy are more? According to Street this can be done by Not just reading the content of a painting and translation that into language, but paying closer attention to other aspects of experiencing the work that perhaps aren’t so easily analysed in art-historical terminology. This means paying attention to things that might actually appear obvious, things we might not otherwise consider: the scale of the work in relation to our own bodies; the way it was made and the marks of its making; the expression and effect of its colour; the way it feels to be there in its presence.

In Street’s perspective, enjoying art more means to be in the presence of the real work of art – a bodily, sensory experience. Reproductions – as positive they are as an extension of the imaginative footprint of art, are reductive, lack the scale and the surface qualities of the original object, but also the unique way in which works of art are interwoven with human bodily life, with experiences of space and weather and other people, and from their meanings rather additional potential.

A certain irony struck me in Street’s recurrent reflection that words are not able to capture the art experience as allegedly this book, besides the 30 illustrations , not unexpectedly mainly exist of words to nudge and invite the reader into the experience of art (a much as it is true that not all human experience can be easily described in words, the precision and existence of words in the context of art in my opinion are often helpful and enlightening to appreciate a work of art (another of Ben Street’s book seems to cater for that longing for words to capture the art experience, 200 Words to Help You Talk About Art). As I do love to read about art and I do love to visit museums, this accentuating of the falling short of words in the context of appreciating art, it took me until the third chapter before I could comfortably and entirely surrender myself to Street’s discourse. Probably this is just a personal peeve, without words I often feel lost in the visual – and such is one of the reasons I love reading about art, hoping words will learn me how to look.

Yet I find Street’s nudge to refuse the siren call of the wall text and to foreground for instance the act of actually looking in the process of building meaning, immensely valuable and useful– even more as a person so obsessed with words that I seem to need words to enable me to even notice what is non-verbal visually. It is an excellent and refreshing advice to break free from the museum label, from the obvious contents depicted on or in a work of art – the invitation to engage physically with a work, to take the experience of being in a space with a work of art to refine our interpretation and exploration of its meaning – by simple acts like walking around sculptures, stepping back and resist reading the museum tags first (name of the artist, date, title). Street reminds the reader that ‘each label on a museum wall is the very tip of a vast iceberg of scholarship and speculation’, and like (art) history research, open to evolve, to fluctuate, to be erased by new interpretations. He posits that there is always room for creative interpretation, ‘even when faced with a seemingly impenetrable wall of veneration’.

Looking forward to bring into practice what I have garnered from this book I started dreaming of visiting Museum M in Leuven and the David Hockney exhibition Brussels soon– and preparing a visit to Museum M clarified there is, apart from the five points of entry, one other overarching aspect necessary to appreciate art: time. To experience art more deeply and richly, one needs to take time to literally stand still in the face of a work of art, to slow down one’ s pace and stay. I heartily agree with Street that taking time is essential to connect to a work of art – the intensity of attention one can or wants to give to a work of art is crucial to engage with the work of art, to create a more intimate relation with it, to bond. Unspectacular this conclusion might be, it is a welcome reminder in our hectic times in which so many stimuli seem to scream for our attention.

Without an art history degree, art can sometimes seem inaccessible and intimidating. In How To Enjoy Art, Ben Street attempts to tackle the daunting task of understanding and appreciating art in it many varied forms for the novice wherever you may find it. Street breaks it down into 5 chapters focussing on Colour, Scale, Process, Placement and finally Content using many different examples of art to illustrate his points.

Street writes about being active in looking at art, rather then being passive in thought, and asking questions to further your understanding of the piece at the present time and context in which you are viewing it, as appreciation of art is always open-ended and evolving.

A very rewarding read for anyone wanting to understand more about art, or how to garner a deeper appreciation of art.

Many thanks to NetGalley and publishers for a copy in return for an honest review.

How To Enjoy Art is an informative book that teaches you how to engage with art in a deeper more meaningful way. The author wants to make art accessible to everyone and provides the tools to help you observe, see and understand what you are looking at. It is written in a clear and accessible way and I like the way the authors passion is felt throughout. Taking the time to stop and look properly rather than just dashing through in this hurried world is a beneficial skill. Art really is for everyone and this book will help to equip you with the skills to see it properly. Brilliant.

In this short, but inspiring work, the author suggests five alternative themes to take into consideration when engaging with a work of art. Rather than starting with the rational question of what the artist has attempted to make manifest with their work of art, the author urges the reader towards a more visceral reaction. Certainly, you can pat yourself on the back for having recognised in a painting the characters of an obscure Greek myth, or a 16th century pope, and move on from there, but this would be robbing yourself of the experience of experience. As the author so nicely puts it, why would you ask such a closed question of an artwork? The author devotes a chapter to illustrate each theme in a number of well-known or lesser known artworks covering paintings, sculptures and photography, from Fra Angelico to the abstract art of Mrinalini Mukherjee.  The themes range from the rather obvious "colour" and "scale" to "process", "placement" and finally "content". 

I consider myself an avid enthousiast when it comes to art, and have spent many an hour wandering through the Louvre, Hermitage,  Met and Prado. Having read this book, I've realised that art for me has indeed always leant more towards an experience of recognition. The author is dismissive of the importance of labels and I similarly wonder what he thinks of my constant use of audio-guides to "rationalise" my way through a museum. For my next visit to a museum, whenever that may be, I have promised myself to spend less time reading the accompanying labels and spend more time travelling down the inroads of Street's suggested themes.

This book is highly recommended for anyone, like me, who considers themselves an enthousiast deserving of a subtle nudge in re-assessing their appreciation of art.

This is a very readable, short book that is an excellent guide to art appreciation. I love looking at art works – in museums, in churches, art galleries, on the street … I have a fairly good idea of what I like: medieval paintings (often Christian religious), modern art, Islamic, anything geometric, symmetrical and a lot of sculpture, ceramics, mosaics – and what I don’t like: battle scenes, still life, most 18th and 19th century paintings. But, I don’t always know why a piece of art appeals to me – or leaves me cold – and I am often surprised by my reactions to certain works. I have no artistic training, and a five-year-old could probably create a piece of art better than I, so what I wanted from this book, was some guidance as to what to look for when I see something new, and some understanding of my likes/dislikes.
“And there are certainly artworks that are hard to enjoy, or whose intention is not to provide pleasure; they may, rather, engross, engage, challenge or enlighten us. But regardless of the sorts of experiences art can provide, one thing can be said: works of art, like all the arts, ought to be for anyone.”
The book is divided into chapters on:
1) Colour – colours used, shading, changes in the colours over time, whether the colours are separate or bleed into each other.
2) Scale – Is it intimate or huge? How does the scale relate to your own size?
3) Process – how did the artist create the work? What materials are used? How much time could it have taken – minutes, hours, years? Was it the work of one person or many? When was it created? For whom?
4) Placement – is it in an art gallery, museum, stately home, house, public place, inside or outside, church, mosque …? Is it high up, at eye level? How many people can view it at once? What does where it is, say about the art work?
and 5) Content – what is depicted? What can you relate it to?
Although various pieces of art are reproduced in the book to illustrate particular ideas, no genre or type of art, or artist, is recommended over any other. The ideas can be applied to any and all art works with which you come into contact.
“The point of this is twofold: to freshen our engagement with art by emphasising the present-tense experience of actually looking at it, and to explore ways in which anyone might find value and enjoyment in spending time with works of art, wherever and whoever they might be.”
As I was reading this book, I visited the Sophie Taeuber-Arp exhibition at the London Tate Modern. I knew almost nothing about the artist before I went, apart from that she was married to Jean Arp, who had created one of my favourite sculptures. It was a perfect opportunity to put some of the lessons from the book into practice. The artist worked with a great range of materials – paints, crayons, tapestry, wood, plywood, metal, wire, feathers … She made abstract art paintings and drawings, stained glass, puppets, designed stage sets, furnishings and clothing … By applying the ideas given in the book, I was able to get so much more out of my visit, than I would have in the past. Sophie Taeuber-Arp has now become one of my favourite artists. I found I was actively thinking about the art and spending a lot longer in front of each piece, noticing things I would have overlooked previously.
I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to appreciate art – in whatever situation you find it, whenever and however. This is a book for all people, of all ages.
I received this copy from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own and not influenced by either the author or publisher.

"Looking at art is much more than a skill, in fact: it's an art."

This is such a fabulous book about how to engage with art, that is written in an open and accessible style but which is also passionate, enthusiastic and which lightly pulls its punches (in a positive sense) as Ben Street is clearly far more knowledgeable than he perhaps lets on. Not to say that this is intellectually innocent in any way - it's not. But it does perhaps play down some of the politics of the art (and cultural) worlds, especially around gate-keepers, canonicity, authority and so on.

But that's not a problem here as this is quietly inclusive in its attention to art works and examples. Overwhelmingly, though, this is a book which encourages a slightly more subversive approach to art, allowing and gently enticing the viewer to move away from the speed-through approach often taken by our museums and galleries where art is pre-packaged, edged around with narratives and descriptions, historical and generic contextualisations, and the in-built authority of monumental spaces and, often, a philanthropic 'culture is good for you' approach.

The chapters are organised around themes: Colour, Scale, Process, Placement, Content - and within them, Street offers up multiple examples of how these elements work:. key takeaways are about the importance of experiencing art viscerally, as an object that exists in space as well as time; and about the way an object (like a book) is always open, always operating in the present, and never finished or closed.

I would say that it might be difficult to practice some of the suggestions at a big exhibition where the flow-through of visitors is carefully controlled and curated - but this is where anyone who lives or works close to a place where art is shown can benefit most - a lunch-time visit to a single object without the pressure to 'do' a show is where the questions posed by this book perhaps come best into their own. Interesting, enlightening, passionate and warmly enthusiastic - highly recommended.