John Berger was born in London in 1926. His seminal Ways of Seeing was one of the most influential books on art in the 20th century. His many books, innovative in form and far-reaching in their historical and political insight, include To the Wedding, King, and the Booker Prize-winning novel, G. He lived and worked in a small village in the French Alps, the setting for his trilogy Into Their Labours (Pig Earth, Once in Europa and Lilac and Flag). In 2001, his collection of essays The Shape of a Pocket was published, and his Understanding a Photograph, edited by Geoff Dyer, was published in 2013. He died, aged 90, in January 2017.
Jean Mohr is a Swiss documentary photographer. He has worked with the Red Cross, the World Health Organization, and the International Labour Organization.He has produced 26 books of photography, five with his literary collaborator John Berger and one with Edward Said. In 1956 he married Simone Turrettini, a documentary filmmaker. They have two sons and four grandchildren.
Gavin Francis, the author of the beautiful Island Dreams, writes in the Guardian about the fascination that islands exert.
“The love of islands is a widespread affliction – why else are we still reading Robinson Crusoe after 300 years? Why Treasure Island? Why after 75 years and over 2,000 episodes are we still listening to Desert Island Discs? From the blessed isles of Tír na nÓg and Thomas More’s Utopia to the island-dramas of CS Lewis and Enid Blyton, it seems we can’t get enough of them.”
Gavin Francis
Guardian