advertising

In the throes of essay writing I stumbled across this quote read on a video about advertising. It excited me. Maybe more so becuase it was read over some great images and music. But I think it expresses something that we aren't aware of enough. That alternative life that is promised but never delivered but so often we spend our time pursuing:

“In our urban world, in the streets we walk, in the buses we take, in magazines we read, on walls, on screens we are surrounded by images of an alternative life. We may remember or forget these images but briefly we take them in and briefly they stimulate our imagination either by way of memory or anticipation. But where is this other way of life? It’s a language of words and images that calls out to us wherever we go, whatever we read, wherever we are. Where do they exist these fabulous rewards and objects and people? Where do they belong to, here, there or nowhere? They come with us everywhere, we take them away in our minds we see them in our dreams.”

(John Berger)