A survey of San paintings from the southern Natal Drakensberg
- Authors: Steynberg, Peter John
- Date: 1988
- Subjects: Art, San Rock paintings -- Drakensberg Mountains Cave paintings -- Drakensberg Mountains Art, Prehistoric -- Drakensberg Mountains Art, Prehistoric -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2437 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1004918
- Description: From Introduction: The study of San rock art has undergone several different phases in approach to the interpretation of art. Two approaches are currently in use. The first emphasises the art as narrative or literal representations of San life and its proponents may be called the "art for art's sake" school. Adherents to the second approach make detailed use of the San ethnography on the belief system of these people and are highly critical of the literalists because they provide no such context. The second approach has rapidly gained ascendancy and replaced the "art for art's sake" school over the last twenty years. The watershed came with the researches of Vinnicombe (1967) in the southern Drakensberg and Maggs (1967) in the Western Cape who both embarked upon programs of research which had quantification and numerical analysis at their core, so that they could present "...some objective observations on a given sample of rock paintings in a particular area..." in order to compare and contrast paintings from geographically different areas. What Vinnicombe's numerical analyses clearly showed was that the eland was the most frequently depicted antelope and that it must have played a fundamental role "...in both the economy and the rellgious beliefs of the painters...", which opened up the search for what those beliefs might be and how they could be related to the rock art itself. In order to understand what the rock art was all about it was recognised that researchers had to meaningfully contextualise the art within the social and religious framework of the artists themselves. Without the provision of such a relevant context, as many different interpretations of the paintings could be made as there were people with imaginations. Such a piecemeal approach provides a meaningless jumble of subjective fancy which tells us something about the interpreters but nothing about the rock art. It is unfortunate that the advent of this explicitly social and anthropological approach marks the end of the amateur as a serious interpreter of San rock art, for the juxtaposition of the ethnography with the rock art requires a proper training in which the intricacies of symbol and metaphor can be recognised.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Steynberg, Peter John
- Date: 1988
- Subjects: Art, San Rock paintings -- Drakensberg Mountains Cave paintings -- Drakensberg Mountains Art, Prehistoric -- Drakensberg Mountains Art, Prehistoric -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2437 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1004918
- Description: From Introduction: The study of San rock art has undergone several different phases in approach to the interpretation of art. Two approaches are currently in use. The first emphasises the art as narrative or literal representations of San life and its proponents may be called the "art for art's sake" school. Adherents to the second approach make detailed use of the San ethnography on the belief system of these people and are highly critical of the literalists because they provide no such context. The second approach has rapidly gained ascendancy and replaced the "art for art's sake" school over the last twenty years. The watershed came with the researches of Vinnicombe (1967) in the southern Drakensberg and Maggs (1967) in the Western Cape who both embarked upon programs of research which had quantification and numerical analysis at their core, so that they could present "...some objective observations on a given sample of rock paintings in a particular area..." in order to compare and contrast paintings from geographically different areas. What Vinnicombe's numerical analyses clearly showed was that the eland was the most frequently depicted antelope and that it must have played a fundamental role "...in both the economy and the rellgious beliefs of the painters...", which opened up the search for what those beliefs might be and how they could be related to the rock art itself. In order to understand what the rock art was all about it was recognised that researchers had to meaningfully contextualise the art within the social and religious framework of the artists themselves. Without the provision of such a relevant context, as many different interpretations of the paintings could be made as there were people with imaginations. Such a piecemeal approach provides a meaningless jumble of subjective fancy which tells us something about the interpreters but nothing about the rock art. It is unfortunate that the advent of this explicitly social and anthropological approach marks the end of the amateur as a serious interpreter of San rock art, for the juxtaposition of the ethnography with the rock art requires a proper training in which the intricacies of symbol and metaphor can be recognised.
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Colour and sculpture : an investigation into the use of two dimensional media in sculpture
- Authors: Wright, Jeanne
- Date: 1988
- Subjects: Sculpture -- Technique Sculpture -- History Color in art
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2436 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1004783
- Description: From Introduction: Creative images which are normally called 'art' can be distinguished as either 'plastic' or visual. Both these forms throughout the history of art have relied to a greater or lesser degree on the use of colour. It is my intention to investigate specifically the changing role which colour has played in sculpture - the 'plastic' media of the visual arts and to chart the technical and aesthetic reasons for the use of colour. This investigation will encompass the historical perspective, the material qualities, aesthetic considerations, transitional codes and methods of approach in sociological frameworks and the examination of colour as a metaphysical element in the presentation of three dimensional media.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Wright, Jeanne
- Date: 1988
- Subjects: Sculpture -- Technique Sculpture -- History Color in art
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2436 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1004783
- Description: From Introduction: Creative images which are normally called 'art' can be distinguished as either 'plastic' or visual. Both these forms throughout the history of art have relied to a greater or lesser degree on the use of colour. It is my intention to investigate specifically the changing role which colour has played in sculpture - the 'plastic' media of the visual arts and to chart the technical and aesthetic reasons for the use of colour. This investigation will encompass the historical perspective, the material qualities, aesthetic considerations, transitional codes and methods of approach in sociological frameworks and the examination of colour as a metaphysical element in the presentation of three dimensional media.
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What makes a painting good?: an enquiry into the criteria used in evaluation
- Authors: Frost, Lola
- Date: 1988
- Subjects: Painting -- Appreciation
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2461 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1008542
- Description: From introduction: "To affirm that a work of art is good or bad is to commend or condemn, but not describe . Thus criticism does not, and cannot, have the impersonal character and strict rules applicable independently of time and place," .. . (Macdonald 1966: 111) "Criticism and appraisal, too, are more like creation than like demonstration and proof." (Macdonald 1966: 112) This essay articulates evaluatory criteria that are used by both critics and laymen and which are cross -culturally applicable. Thus it seeks to articulate relatively objective types of criteria which we all use when evaluating paintings. This essay articulates fixed and objective criteria, but within these categories recognizes that there is much room for skillful, sympathetic and knowledgeable criticism. Thus criticism is a creative act. These objectively- articulated criteria are best seen as aids to, rather than carbon copies, for evaluation.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Frost, Lola
- Date: 1988
- Subjects: Painting -- Appreciation
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2461 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1008542
- Description: From introduction: "To affirm that a work of art is good or bad is to commend or condemn, but not describe . Thus criticism does not, and cannot, have the impersonal character and strict rules applicable independently of time and place," .. . (Macdonald 1966: 111) "Criticism and appraisal, too, are more like creation than like demonstration and proof." (Macdonald 1966: 112) This essay articulates evaluatory criteria that are used by both critics and laymen and which are cross -culturally applicable. Thus it seeks to articulate relatively objective types of criteria which we all use when evaluating paintings. This essay articulates fixed and objective criteria, but within these categories recognizes that there is much room for skillful, sympathetic and knowledgeable criticism. Thus criticism is a creative act. These objectively- articulated criteria are best seen as aids to, rather than carbon copies, for evaluation.
- Full Text:
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