John Berger’s essays in Ways of Seeing have fundamentally transformed my perspective on art and visual culture. “It is the avid and ambitious desire to take possession of the object for the benefit of the owner or even the spectator which seems to me to constitute one of the outstandingly original features of the art of Western civilization.” This statement underscores how the material wealth depicted in these paintings is designed for viewers to admire and for patrons to showcase, reinforcing the strong link between art and social status.