Boetie is verlore: the reproduction of militarized white masculinities through the lens of Boetie gaan border toe! (1984)
- Authors: Coetzee, Joseph
- Date: 2016
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/4245 , vital:20638
- Description: My father fought for the South African Defence Force (SADF) from 1983 to 1985. At that time the apartheid regime was involved in extensive military operations in what is now Namibia and Angola. This conflict was aimed at quelling the liberation movements in those countries and, as Gary Baines has noted, supported the United States of America’s Cold War interests (Baines 2007:1). When I was fourteen I found a piece written by my father in which he remembers the first person that he had killed in the aforementioned conflict. This was a child soldier who he compared to me as I was a similar age at the time of his writing. The idea of my father as a killer haunted me. He has carried the trauma of his experiences on the border with him; he has told me how the dead visit him in dreams. On the one hand, these memories, not my own, have been constructed through my interpretation of the events in my father’s stories. On the other hand, homologies may be drawn between his actual experiences and a fantasy representation of the conflict I have encountered, the film Boetie gaan border toe! or Brother goes to the border! (1984). This apartheid propaganda film presents an idealised representation of the conflict from the point of view of the apartheid state. The protagonist of the film, Boetie, is an example of the aspirational and dominant image of militarised masculinity the apartheid state wished young white men to emulate. The racist sexist, patriarchal and materialistic reality created within the film is one I am familiar with. The toys I grew up playing with, television shows, films, advertising and popular culture I consumed, alongside the boys’ school I attended and the University I currently attend are all rooted in and continue to reproduce this reality. I have encountered many similar archetypes to the Boetie character. With this in mind I wish through my art practice to create a work which draws upon my father’s writing and imagery from Boetie gaan border toe! (1984). I have placed these alongside windows into my contemporary context in order to emphasise the continual reproduction of these ideas. In reference to the Boetie film I have decided to create my own film entitled Boetie is verlore or Brother is lost. This is a magic realist documentary film that I have constructed through various interviews and fantasy dream sequences in order to paint a picture of the continual incubation and reproduction of realities similar to that of Boetie. Boetie is a rich white man who is characterised through his material possessions and his compulsive heterosexuality. White women are interchangeable to him whilst blackness in the film is made completely invisible. In South Africa such representations are strongly linked to the question of land and naturalising the white male coloniser’s dominance and privilege.
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Adaptive realities : effects of merging physical and virtual entities
- Authors: Fletcher, Lauren Jean
- Date: 2015
- Subjects: Virtual reality in art , Reality in art , Art, Modern -- 21st century , Art, Modern -- 21st century -- Themes, motives , Perception
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2509 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1018557
- Description: In the worlds of virtual reality, whole objects and bodies are created in an immaterial manner from lines, ratios and light pixels. When objects are created in this form they can easily be manipulated, edited, multiplied and deleted. In addition, technological advances in virtual reality development result in an increased merging of physical and virtual elements, creating spaces of mixed reality. This leads to interesting consequences where the physical environment and body, in a similar vein to the virtual, also becomes increasingly easier to manipulate, distort and change. Mixed realities thus enhance possibilities of a world of constantly changing landscapes and adjustable, interchangeable bodies. The notions of virtual and real coincide within this thesis, reflecting on a new version of reality that is overlapped and ever-present in its mixing of virtual and physical. These concepts are explored within my exhibition Immaterial - a creation of simulated nature encompassing a mix of natural and artificial, tangible and intangible. Within the exhibition space, I have created a scene of mixed reality, by merging elements of both a virtual and physical forest. This generates a magical space of new experiences that comes to life through the manipulated, edited, morphed and re-awakened bodies of trees.
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Jean Dubuffet : a study of his concepts pertaining to the alienation of the artist
- Authors: Mather-Pike, Richard
- Date: 1989
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:21086 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/6290
- Description: I decided on an investigation into the nature of Dubuffet's remarks concerning the plight of the artist in modern societies, believing that the difficulties facing the artist are, at the time of this writing, still in force, and perhaps even more so now than they were in his day. These difficulties I believe, arise in the form of curtailments on personal and aesthetic freedoms brought about as the result of the artist's position in, and conformity to, the norms and values of his society. The problem is I believe, that these value systems not only censor or curb artistic freedom but actually restrict all individual enterprises by demanding that the indi vidual conform to the greater wish of the group, at the expense of his own creative and individual potential.
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Aspects of the woman in art
- Authors: Loubser, Annette
- Date: 1976
- Subjects: Women in art
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2485 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1012784
- Description: Woman has been depicted in all mediums throughout the ages, although her image and content have always taken on varying interpretations. Beauty has always been epitomized in the human figure - from an inexhaustible longing for perfection. Naturally her feminineaspects and her unconscious awareness of the rythms of nature made her central to the making of myths. She was depended upon as the Earth Mother - the creator and preserver of the species. And her mysteries reverberated throughout the ages. The discovery of the earliest Aurignacian Head (20,000 B.C) [Fig. 2] reiterates this. She is not only woman but also prophetess. Chap. 1, p. 2.
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International passports : portrait of the Nigerian diaspora
- Authors: Makun, Adetoun Jones
- Date: 2012
- Subjects: Portrait painting -- South Africa Nigerians -- Portraits Portrait photography -- Nigeria
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2429 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002226
- Description: International Passports: Portraits of the Nigerian Diaspora considers notions of 'alienation‘ and 'nation-hood‘ through the lens of portraiture. This dissertation addresses issues of identity and representation in a contemporary cultural context as they pertain to the concerns presented through my current visual practice. The paintings that I have produced from 'real‘ life are primarily depictions of Nigerian individuals, friends and acquaintances (professionals and students) residing in Grahamstown, South Africa as temporary or permanent migrants. I reference the mug shot pose of identity documents and passport photographs and render them in such a way that ideas of their persona are subject to the viewer‘s gaze and deliberations, thus provoking the spectator to consider questions of 'otherness‘ and 'stereotypes‘. This provocation is subtle and complex, and in many ways I am offering the viewer a 're-looking‘, an opportunity to examine one‘s moral position and subsequent implication within the act of stereotyping an 'other‘ individual. The initial idea within this body of work was to paint images of Nigerian nationals exclusively, yet the restrictive nature of such categorization pushed me to complicate certain nationalist ideologies through the inclusion of non-Nigerian individuals. I look specifically at notions of the 'other‘ and 'strangeness‘ in a contemporary South African context and how this connects to the concept of portraiture and not simply portraiture theory but also the social theory in relation to how people are 'imaged‘. Throughout this thesis I consider several theoretical concerns in portraiture practice and discourse whilst simultaneously unpacking the psychological and social contexts that influence my practice.
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Rhodesian African art, 1857-1974
- Authors: Des Fontaine, Fayne
- Date: 1974
- Subjects: Art, African Art -- Zimbabwe
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2481 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1011136
- Description: ART is life, and life is for living. This is the essential function of Mankind. Everything interrelates. African life and thought are inseparable. Art is an implement of power; it bridges the gap between Man and his Gods, and Man and Nature. The ability to understand art, does not depend on the ability to see and appreciate but to understand the culture of the people, to know the past). When considering AFRICAN ART, one can be sure that the ART OF RHODESIA is certainly the last to come to one's mind; that is, if one excludes the Prehistoric Artist of Rhodesia and the ART of the Zimbabwian culture, and concentrates on ART executed after the PIONEER PERIOD (circa 1857) to the turn of the century. Comparatively little has been written on the aspect of local art, and when it bas, it is primarily concerned with SHONA SCULPTURE. Rhodesian art is primarily functional, and the range of materials as well as the range of techniques are equally vast. The art of sculpture and carving particularly in wood, is a well-known characteristic of Africa. Rhodesia, however, does not offer such a vast selection of traditional art today, whether in wood, stone or metal. The carvers in Rhodesia, unlike those of some African States have long since downed their tools as there are no longer the rituals that at one time inspired the artist. These rituals have almost died out and the Kings that were his patrons have been out of power for centuries. The destruction of traditional African values is inevitable because of cultural change, white civilization, and more recently, ex:ploi ta tion has forced the traditional carver to become a carpenter or to join a co-operative in order to provide Tourist Art. Intro., p. 1.
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An investigation into outsider sculpture with special reference to D.C. van der Mescht
- Authors: Cowley, Kerstin
- Date: 1991
- Subjects: Outsider art Art -- South Africa Sculptors -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2477 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1010608
- Description: It was both by luck and by accident that Dirk Charley van der Mescht's creations were discovered as a topic for research ... a recluse who lived out in what seemed to be the middle of nowhere. It was said of this man that he was a strange person who produced even stranger works. On investigation it was discovered that he was an Outsider sculptor by the name of D. C. van der Mescht. He and his family live at a small railway siding, known as Zuney, eighteen kilometres west of Alexandria. Isolated, uneducated and untutored, he had created an environment of sculptures for no apparent reason at all. The only explanation he appeared to be able to offer is that: he just does it. Intro. p. 1.
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Art marketing and management
- Authors: Anderson, Larna
- Date: 1995
- Subjects: Art -- Marketing Art portfolios Art -- Finance Art -- Economic aspects Community arts projects
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2392 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002188
- Description: Formal art education equips students with skills to produce artworks. A formal art education may increase the opportunity for employment, however, art-related employment is very limited. Art graduates would be better equipped to market and manage art establishments or their own careers if art education were to be supplemented with basic business skills. Artists who wish to earn unsupplemented incomes from their art should undertake to acquire business acumen. This includes being presentable to the market place in attitude and appearance. It also includes aptitude in art, marketing and management. Role models and non-models of success and failure in business should also be observed. Art graduates should adopt applicable tried and tested business methods. Good marketing is a mix of business activities which identifies and creates consumer needs and wants. Marketing activities involve research, planning, packaging, pricing, promoting and distributing products and services to the public to create exchanges that satisfy individual and organisational objectives. Art products include artworks, frames, art books and art materials. Art-related services include the undertaking of commissions, consulting, teaching, free parking, convenient shopping hours, acceptance of mail or telephone orders, exhibitions, ease of contact, approval facilities, wrapping, delivery, installations (picture hanging), quotations, discounts, credit facilities, guarantees, trade-ins, adjustments and restorations. Good management is a mix of business activities which enables a venture to meet the challenges of supply and demand. There is a blueprint for management competence. The three dimensions of organisational competence are collaboration, commitment and creativity. Self-marketing and management is an expression of an artist's most creative being. It is that which can ensure and sustain recognition and income. Artists, like other competent organisations and entrepreneurs from the private sector, should operate with efficient manufacturing, marketing, management and finance departments. They are also equally important and therefore demand equal attention. Artistic skill together with business acumen should equip the artist to successfully compete in the market place. There are no short-cuts to becoming an artist but there are short-cuts to becoming a known and financially stable artist. Understanding marketing and management could mean the difference between waiting in poverty and frustration for a "lucky break" (which may only happen after an artists's death) and taking control. Success should be perpetuated through continuous effort.
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The tightrope walker
- Authors: Dale, Jessie Patricial Dill
- Date: 1977
- Subjects: Art and religion , Art criticism
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2498 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1013336
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Decorative aspects of reality with reference to sociological painting
- Authors: Clark, Dorothy
- Date: 1974
- Subjects: Decorative arts
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2474 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1010501
- Description: The writer could not blame the reader for finding the title to this essay couched in somewhat academic terms. It must be said immediately that the title is a fake -- or that the following essay is a fake; the title has pretensions to the academic -- the essay has not. All academicism no longer has an independent existence -- it operates by formulae, is mechanical, uses faked sensations and vicarious experience and borrows its tricks and themes from a mature, established culture close at hand. This ' culture's life's blood is looted, given new twists, watered down and served up in academic terms. For these reasons, academicism and Kitsch are the same -- both change according to style and yet are always the same; both are the epitome of all that is spurious in our time. So, academicism could be said to be the 'stuffed shirt-front' for Kitsch. Preamble, p. 1.
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Queering boundaries: visual Activism and representations of sexuality in the work of contemporary South African artists
- Authors: Littleford, Lara
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Homosexuality in art -- South Africa , Photographers, Black -- South Africa , Gay photographers -- South Africa , Lesbian photographers -- South Africa , Transgender people in art -- South Africa , Muholi, Zanele , Mlangeni, Sabelo
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/17816 , vital:22283
- Description: Zanele Muholi, a photographer and visual activist, and Sabelo Mlangeni, a photographer, explore the different ways of representing gender, particularly transgenderism, and sexuality, particularly homosexuality, in their photography. Muholi and Mlangeni document the daily lives and lived realities of people who are black and gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) in South Africa. African sexuality remains a contested subject that is difficult to discuss in light of the controversies it provokes due to colonial attitudes toward African bodies. In this instance, colonial attitudes toward African sexuality have exoticised African bodies. Moreover, hyper-sexuality is ascribed to bodies that are black and male, whilst fetishising and objectifying black female bodies. Furthermore, representations of homoeroticism in Africa transgress and challenge dominant ideologies of sexuality and gender in an African context. In this sense, Muholi and Mlangeni directly address tension and resistance between individual and community. Such tensions are found within and between categories of African-ness, whereby homosexuality and transgenderism are regarded as being ‘un-African’ and an import from the West. For example, Muholi represents the existence of homosexuality and transgenderism in her photography in order to subvert the notion that homosexuality is ‘un-African’, attempting to complicate the conceptions of identity, gender and sexuality in South Africa. Muholi’s photography is used as a vehicle for her ‘visual activism’, which purports to create socio-political awareness surrounding homophobia, transgenderism, and epistemic injustice in South Africa. The visual imagery of these two artists investigates the boundaries that are set by various social, political and cultural constructs. These boundaries inform existing social, political and cultural attitudes toward homosexuality and transgenderism, and these homophobic and transphobic attitudes result in crimes committed against homosexual and transgender individuals, such as hate crimes, which includes ‘curative/corrective’ rape, the prevalence of which is rising at an alarming rate. Muholi’s photography and visual activism seek to create visibility in order to raise public awareness of hate crimes, victimisation, alienation and stigmatisation that homosexual and transgender South Africans, specifically those individuals living in township areas, face on a daily basis. These two artists represent sexuality as a site of contestation and, as such, heteronormative traditions, hegemonic social structures, and cultural conventions are transgressed and contested in their photography.
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Being for others : critical reflections on the stranger, the estranged and the self in participatory art
- Authors: Munro, Samantha Fawn
- Date: 2015
- Subjects: Self , Identity (Philosophical concept) in art , Alienation (Philosophy) , Interactive art , Art appreciation , Art exhibition audiences , Interactive art -- Themes, motives , Social interaction
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2507 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1017771
- Description: By referring to established concepts and theories which contemplate our experiences in relation to others and space, this thesis examines the interactions and responses of an audience during various participatory artworks. I draw upon Jean-Paul Sartre’s Being and Nothingness and Elizabeth Grosz’ Architecture From The Outside: Essays on Virtual and Real Space in order to understand our interactions with other people, our interactions inside an environment, and the objects and ceremonies we use during these interactions. I align these experiences with the methods which are employed to anticipate and create the interactions between an audience and a participatory artwork. Our daily interactions can be considered a frame that an artist shapes for their represented situation to allow, provide and guide an audience towards their possibilities for movements and actions within a participatory artwork. The interactions that occur in participatory art are done in relation to others and include groups of people interacting with each other rather than an individual disembodied experience. I refer to Claire Bishop in her book, Artificial Hells, and Nicolas Bourriaud in Relational Aesthetics in order to define participatory art. In defining participatory art I focus on the idea that participation is a social activity without which the artwork does not function or exist. I unravel Brett Bailey’s Exhibit A, Anthea Moys Anthea Moys vs The City of Grahamstown and Christian Boltanski’s Personnes in terms of the frame they use to construct participation and interaction. I refer to my own exhibition Ineffaceable as an exploration of these frames which encourage participation. The inside and the outside are a constant theme throughout this thesis and my exhibition. This thematic re-emerges in relation to a number of opposing and fluctuating dynamics: the self and the other; the object and the subject; familiarity and strangeness; the participator and the spectator; the immersive and the disembodied; and the artwork and the audience. Participatory art has not been sufficiently explored particularly in South Africa with South African case studies and particularly from a practical standpoint that includes methodologies for creating participation. This thesis hopes to enrich and contribute to the contemplations on participatory art by focusing on our interactions with others.
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A study of kitsch in South African suburban society
- Authors: Page, Lindsay Ann
- Date: 1984
- Subjects: Kitsch -- South Africa Decorative arts -- South Africa Popular culture -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2458 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1007673
- Description: Consider the possibility of the remnants of our present day society being excavated and studied in centuries to come. Imagine the craftsmanship, the art, artifacts and architecture that will then be compared to those of the past centuries. Our entire culture will be labelled by the endless array of rubbish that has become an integral part of our lives. The increasing prevalence of kitsch in the society goes almost unnoticed where it should be causing concern. Few people are aware of its existence, or the permanent aesthetic scars induced by this prevalence. How has this cult of sheer awfulness come about and why has it become prevalent? It is impossible to pursue all the avenues of kitsch - so vast is it but it is the purpose of this study to try and answer some of the questions, in order to make people more aware of what has crept into our society, to help them become more discriminating, and not merely to level criticism at the perpetrators of kitsch.
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The forensic aesthetic in art
- Authors: Spargo, Natascha
- Date: 2006
- Subjects: Violence in art Psychic trauma -- Pictorial works Aesthetics Human figure in art Smith, Kathryn, 1975-
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2435 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1004624
- Description: From Introduction: The 'forensic aesthetic' presents the viewer with traces and debris - the residue that haunts sites of transgression, violence and death. In his book Scene of the Crime, art critic and curator Ralph Rugoff (1997:62) defines the forensic aesthetic as follows: "Inextricably linked to an unseen history, this type of art embodies a fractured relationship to time. Like a piece of evidence, its present appearance is haunted by an indeterminate past, which we confront in the alienated form of fossilized and fragmented remnants." Through its play on seemingly insignificant detail&, clues and traces, the forensic aesthetic suggests that meaning is dispersed, fragmentary and uncertain. According to Rugoff (1997:17), the forensic aesthetic "aims to engage the viewer in a process of mental reconstruction". It compels the viewer to adopt a 'forensic gaze' : to sift through broken narratives and fragments of information, reading the artwork as one might read a sample of evidence. Rugoff (1997:62) argues that: "[S]uch art insists that 'content is something that can't be seen' ... it requires that the viewer arrive at an interpretation by examining traces and marks and reading them as clues. In addition, it is marked by a strong sense of aftermath. ... Taken as a whole, this art puts us in a position akin to that of [the] forensic anthropologist or scientist, forcing us to speculatively piece together histories that remain largely invisible to the eye." One might argue that some of the earliest known examples of the forensic aesthetic in art presented themselves in the Renaissance period in the form of the pseudo-forensic anatomical drawings of Leonardo da Vinci. In his Studies of the Hand (fig. 1), for example, Da Vinci methodically represents the underlying structures of the human hand in a series of drawings that are scattered intermittently across the page. The remainder of the page is covered with hand-written notations. In this work, the artist approaches the human body with a scientific, almost forensic, gaze. Here the body is presented in fragments, rather than as a whole. According to Rugoff (1997:86&88), the forensic aesthetic addresses the body "not as a coherent whole but as a site of prior actions ... as a dispersed territory of clues and traces". When read in terms of the mode of the forensic aesthetic, Da Vinci's Studies of the Hand may be said to look at the human body as forensic object. In this way, this work may be said to speak of the manner in which the forensic gaze operates in the context of the artwork. Throughout the following essay, I discuss the various ways in which the forensic aesthetic manifests itself in art. I have necessarily been selective in the artworks that I have chosen for discussion, as this topic is very broad indeed. In Chapter One, I explore the tradition of the forensic aesthetic in art by way of a select number of artworks. This chapter focuses on investigating the way in which these works, whether consciously or unconsciously, speak of associations between violence and representation through the mode of the forensic aesthetic. The contents of Chapter Two concentrate on the work of South African artist Kathryn Smith. Smith's work may be said to possess a forensic quality, in that it references forensic practices and techniques. Her work has not been the topic of a lengthy monograph, but it has been considered in various exhibition catalogues, reviews and articles. For example, an essay by Colin Richards entitled 'Dead Certainties' (2004) investigates the forensic quality of Smith's imagery in terms of its play on notions of the trace. Similarly, an article by Maureen de Jager, entitled 'Evidence and Artifice' (2004), examines the manner in which Smith's work transgresses the boundaries between 'forensics and fantasy'. In her book, Through the Looking Glass (2004), Brenda Schmahmann addresses Smith's Still Life series (figs. 9, 10, 11) in relation to the issue of self-representation, exploring the relationship between the 'self' and the body as 'other'. Lastly, a review by James Sey, which was published in Art/South Africa (2004), considers Smith's work in terms of its aesthetic appeal, which serves as a framing device for the uncomfortable subject matter that informs the bulk of her imagery. My reading of Kathryn Smith's work departs from and expands on the available literature in that it focuses on the manner in which her images comment self-critically on the act of representation. I have chosen to focus on Smith's work in particular, as it uses the mode of the forensic aesthetic to speak of the field of artistic practice - a motif that runs throughout my own body of work as well. Moreover, Smith's work, like my own work, may be said to engage with the forensic aesthetic in a South African context. In Chapter Two, I compare a number of Smith's works to the artworks discussed in Chapter One, and examine the manner in which they speak of the links between art and crime. Chapter Three concentrates on outlining the ways in which my own work reads off the conventions of forensic investigation. In this chapter I discuss the manner in which my work, by way of a forensic approach, draws parallels between the medium of photography and the mechanisms of trauma. I focus on works that have been included in my Master's exhibition, Vigil (2005). The following essay is a study in representations of violence in art. In the course of this essay, I contextualize the forensic aesthetic as a mode of representation, as well as address the manner in which the forensic aesthetic seems to allow for, even facilitate, self-conscious reflection on the practices of representation itself.
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Hippocampus: seahorse; brain-structure; spatial map; concept
- Authors: Armstrong, Beth Diane
- Date: 2010
- Subjects: Hippocampus (Brain) Sea horses -- Symbolic representation Meaning (Philosophy) Deleuze, Gilles, 1925-1995 Escher, M C (Maurits Cornelis), 1898-1972 Visual perception Space perception Optical art Art -- Themes, motives
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2427 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002224
- Description: Through an exploration of both sculptural and thought processes undertaken in making my Masters exhibition, ‘Hippocampus’, I unpack some possibilities, instabilities, and limitations inherent in representation and visual perception. This thesis explores the Hippocampus as image (seahorse) and concept (brain-structure involved in cognitive mapping of space). Looking at Gilles Deleuze’s writings on representation, I will expand on the notion of the map as being that which does not define and fix a structure or meaning, but rather is open, extendable and experimental. I explore the becoming, rather than the being, of image and concept. The emphasis here is on process, non-representation, and fluidity of meaning. This is supportive of my personal affirmation of the practice and process of art-making as research. I will refer to the graphic prints of Maurits Cornelis Escher as a means to elucidate a visual contextualization of my practical work, particularly with regard to the play with two- and three-dimensional space perception. Through precisely calculated ‘experiments’ that show up the partiality of our visual perception of space, Escher alludes to things that either cannot actually exist as spatial objects or do exist, but resist representation. Similarly I will explore how my own sculptures, although existing in space resist a fixed representation and suggest ideas of other spaces, non-spaces; an in-between space that does not pin itself down and become fixed to any particular image, idea, objector representation.
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Certain aspects of eroticism in twentieth century western painting
- Authors: Marais, Estelle
- Date: 1973
- Subjects: Erotic art , Painting, Modern -- 20th century
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2486 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1012833
- Description: In this essay eroticism will be examined as it appears in some twentieth century representational styles. The decision to concentrate on the representational styles is based on the fact that eroticism is by nature incompatible with the non-representational or non-objective movements in art. This incompatibility is rooted in the knowledge that eroticism is intrinsically and fundamentally a human experience and could therefore find expression only in an art which is concerned with human experience, i.e. experiences which refer to man, his nature and his relation to Nature. It would be oversimplified and grossly inaccurate to equate the nonrepresentational with the abstract, abstraction being an element present in all art to a greater or lesser degree. However, when abstraction has reached the stage where it can define its aims, as, in the words of Kandinsky, "widening the separation between the domain of art and the domain of Nature", (Lake & Maillard: A Dictionary of Modern Painting, p. 1) then it may also approach the realm of the non-representational. When Michel Seupher states, "I call abstract art all art that does not recall or evoke reality", (Lake & Maillard: A Dictionary of Modern Painting, p. 136) abstract and nonrepresentational art becomes fused into an inseparable unity. Erotic expression will then be incompatible with this degree of abstraction. Intro., p. 1.
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Art and cosmology: masks : the instruments of metamorphosis ...
- Authors: Landman, J H
- Date: 1984
- Subjects: Masks Masks, African
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2439 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1005638
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An investigation into the enlightenment and aspects of Spanish life which may have influenced Los Caprichos (1797-1799) of Francisco de Goya (1746-1828)
- Authors: Ralls, Warren John
- Date: 1997
- Subjects: Goya, Francisco, 1746-1828 -- Criticism and interpretation Goya, Francisco, 1746-1828. Caprichos
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2421 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002217
- Description: The aim of this mini-thesis was to investigate if the Spanish artist Francisco Jose de Goya y Lucientes (1746-1828) was aware of the progress that enlightened thought brought to Spain during the late eighteenth-century, and to see whether this had any effect on his series Los Caprichos (1797-1799). According to some contemporary historians, such as Dowling (1985, p. 347), the " ... specific subject-matter of the Caprichos came directly from the ideology of the Spanish Enlightenment. " The contemporary historian Jeremy Black (1990, p. 208) described the Enlightenment as a " ... tendency towards critical enquiry and the application of reason." Enlightened thinkers were primarily critics who used reason as a goal and a method to create a better society. Reason was believed to be a characteristic trait of the human species, human development and social organisation. The Enlightenment is not a purely seventeenth and eighteenth century phenomenon, but originated in the ideas of the classical civilizations and also the humanism of the Middle Ages and Renaissance in Europe. Many intellectuals were responsible for this new direction of thinking. The ideas of these scientists and philosophers are discussed in some detail, especially those beliefs which are clearly seen in the subject-matter of Los Caprichos. In addition, consideration is given to the possible effects of some of the historical events on the life and work of Goya, for example, the French Revolution (1789) and the Reign of Terror (1793-1794) which followed the Revolution. In order to understand the background of the environment into which Goya was born and in which he developed, research was done on Spanish life and the monarchs of the eighteenth century. Specific attention is given to two Spanish kings from the House of Bourbon: Charles 3, who began numerous enlightened reforms in Spain and reigned around the time of Goya's early artistic and social development, and Charles 4 who did not continue the reforming policies of his father and ruled Spain when the Caprichos were produced. The extent to which the Enlightenment spread to Spain is investigated, especially during the period in which Goya lived. Notable progressive thinkers of this European country are discussed, and special attention is given to those open-minded people whom Goya met. There appears to be proof that Goya may have been inspired by numerous of these learned Spaniards, and where this has motivated the Caprichos, special mention is made. The general census of the twentieth century, however, seems to be that Goya was not a towering intellectual thinker, but he was most certainly not an illiterate, unintelligent person either. The themes of Los Caprichos strongly suggest that he was influenced by enlightened individuals many of whom were his friends, such as the wealthy businessman and art-collector Sebastian Martinez (17 ?-1800) (with whom Goya stayed during a serious illness in 1792-1793). The letters written by Goya to his childhood friend Martin Zapater (1746-18 ?) and selected prints from the Caprichos provide sufficient proof to indicate that enlightened thought inspired the work of Goya. It must be recognised, however, that there were other events that could have been influential such as: his appointment as Painter to the King in 1786, which provided Goya with a regular salary and released him from the demands of patrons, giving his imagination free reign; the illness that he suffered from 1792 until 1793, which could have caused Goya to view his life in perspective and could have given him the courage to criticise society. On a smaller scale, the possible love affair that Goya had with the Duchess of Alba, which turned sour, was possibly a blow to his self esteem. This is a subject which is seen in a few of the prints from Los Caprichos. The research gathered for this mini-thesis is from the ex post facto source-material available through Rhodes University library, and any other attainable published data connected to Goya. This information consists of secondary sources which include copies of manuscripts dating from the time of Goya as well as first-hand observations of Goya's art.
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Painting and the changing role of art
- Authors: Edwards, Veryan Courtenay
- Date: 1979
- Subjects: Painting Art and society
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2482 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1011740
- Description: It is necessary to find out what the role of art is in order to see whether it changes. The role of art can be taken as synonymous with the words, 'function of art'. The role of art and the art work itself are inextricably linked. If we look at the role of art as analogous to a wheel we can look at the argument thus : the wheel exists in order to roll. Its function is to roll. The wheel's function of rolling informs us about its existence. Function and the wheel's existence cannot be separated. The role of art and the art work itself are inextricably tied. Intro. p. 1.
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Political grey : areas of ambiguity and contradiction
- Authors: Koekemoer, Carmen
- Date: 2014
- Subjects: Politics in art , Art -- Political aspects -- South Africa , Leadership in art , Portraits, African , Portraits, European , Art and revolutions -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MFA
- Identifier: vital:2492 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1013136
- Description: This Master of Fine Arts submission, consisting of a thesis titled ‘Political Grey: Areas of Ambiguity and Contradiction’ accompanied by an exhibition titled ‘Positions’, encompasses the concept of leadership while uncovering and expressing its ‘grey areas’ in a contemporary and undefined moment in South Africa. The concept of leadership has been complicated throughout the thesis in terms of how it is conceptualised in a traditional royal African art context as well as how Leader-Figures have been and are portrayed in both Western and African portrait genres. The notion that the new is built upon the old is continued throughout my thesis and is evident in the accompanying body of work. This notion is expressed on a number of levels: by the re-contextualisation of the print medium; the creative processes described as ‘postproduction’ which I use in my work; as well as that which is described as a ‘post-transitional’ moment. The recent political history of the country is considered, with reference made to the anti-apartheid movement and resistance art produced. Printmaking, viewed as an archetypal medium for resistance, is discussed, with reference made to its socio-political role during the 1980s as well as to the extent to which it continues to be used by contemporary artists in a different realm of conflict and change. This is demonstrated by the shift from the medium as a tool for protest to the medium as an instrument of political irony and pointed commentary.
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