This creative project interpreted and applied the buffalo in Native American culture - its symbolism, significance and virtues - to woodcarvings for the lives of people today. The carvings explored a range of styles, media and symbols but all use buffalo imagery and each piece represents how I have applied the buffalo to my life. Some pieces are based on historical events while others explore personal emotions. Wood surfaces differ from natural or bleached to painted. No style unifies the body of work. In each piece realism and abstraction, positive and negative space is handled differently. Buffalo facts and myths were interpreted to convey what white people can learn from the buffalo. It was a spiritual link and messenger from Native Americans to the Great Spirit. The buffalo was revered and respected as a vital in the life cycle. White man destroyed the buffalo during the nineteenth century through the acts of greed, disrespect and ignorance. It seems to have returned with a message for people of all races. This message is one that must be found within each individual. / Department of Art

The ambition of this creative project was to portray the communication between individuals of our time, which is being made shabby by the effect of technological life. As an artist, I am dealing with the issue of our sense of respect for each other and how much we are aware of each other.This study includes the art works of artists Robert Motherwell and Joan Mitchell by whom I have been inspired. I have learned a lot from their art works and from their philosophies. I will describe my art works one by one in terms of the techniques that I have used, and the feelings behind them. / Department of Art

The thematic unit formed by the five versions of The Adoration of the Magi painted by Sandro Botticelli provide a special opportunity for studying his artistic development. An investigation of these five paintings shows that Botticelli aimed toward a goal of perfecting compositional techniques. He systematically made alterations to these works in order to create special point of view effects. / This thesis outlines the general trends in art with respect to the Adoration theme and then concentrates on a demonstration of Botticelli's attempts at correlating compositional devices and the unique features developed with respect to spectator involvement. This selected study allows for a careful examination which spans the artistic career of Sandro Botticelli. As a result, it can be shown that it was perhaps Botticelli, rather than Leonardo da Vinci, who was primarily responsible for the development of a compositional format which became a foundation stone of High Renaissance compositions.

The subject matter of mental illness has fascinated artists and writers for centuries. Filmmakers have responded in diverse and innovative ways to the artistic challenge of portraying mental illness. In this thesis, I focus on the representations of mental illness in six recent films from Australia and New Zealand: Sweetie (Jane Campion, 1989), An Angel at My Table (Campion, 1990), Bad Boy Bubby (Rolf de Heer, 1993), Heavenly Creatures (Peter Jackson, 1994), Angel Baby (Michael Rymer, 1995) and Shine (Scott Hicks, 1996). In each film, the protagonist is diagnosed, or treated by others, as mentally ill. Mental illness is portrayed as an affliction which the protagonist struggles to overcome. I argue that these films cultivate a relationship of empathy between the mentally ill character and the spectator. Whereas the related emotion of sympathy involves feeling sorry for someone, empathy involves feeling with that person; in other words, rather than feel for these mentally ill characters, we are invited to feel like they do. (For complete abstract open document)

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Brown University, 2005. / Vita. Thesis advisor: Philip Rosen. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 246-262). Also available online.

Neste trabalho, foram analisadas duas obras que tratam sobre o Brasil e que são bastante conhecidas nacional e internacionalmente. O intuito foi apreender a formação das imagens femininas para saber se a sensualidade é um traço produzido por esses textos e se ele se torna relevante na construção da identidade das mulheres brasileiras, uma vez que aparece em descrições de estrangeiros sobre as mulheres brasileiras (SILVA; BLANCHETTE, 2005; PISCITELLI, 2005; PISCITELLI et al., 2007) e, igualmente, nas propagandas e mídias do Brasil (PISCITELLI, 1996; PACHECO, 2004; GABRIELLI, 2011). Fundamentada na semiótica francesa, a análise observou textos produzidos em momentos diferentes para possibilitar a percepção de semelhanças e continuidades ou de diferenças e rupturas entre as duas obras no imaginário sobre a mulher brasileira. A primeira narrativa investigada é a Carta do Descobrimento do Brasil, escrita por Pero Vaz de Caminha, no ano de 1500, e a segunda é Casa-Grande e Senzala, de Gilberto Freyre, publicada em 1933. Para analisar a contrução textual-discursiva da identidade feminina, o nível discursivo do Percurso Gerativo do Sentido se destacou, sendo observados os percursos figurativos e temáticos, as isotopias deles decorrentes, bem como as projeções da enunciação de cada texto. Ressalta-se que as manipulações, a sanção, as paixões, o ser e o fazer dos sujeitos contribuíram para a construção da identidade feminina. Os resultados da análise demonstram um direcionamento do olhar sobre as mulheres, que recai na sensualidade e na sexualidade. Em outras palavras, mesmo com uma extensão maior, tanto em Casa-Grande e Senzala quanto na Carta de Caminha as categorias de gênero e de sexualidade predominam nas descrições femininas e nas relações que elas estabelecem com a sociedade. / In this paper we analyzed two works nationally and internationally well-known dealing on Brazil in order to apprehend the formation of women\'s images to know if the sensuality is a trait produced by these texts and if this trait becomes relevant in the construction of Brazilian womens identity; since it appears in foreign descriptions about these women (SILVA; BLANCHETTE, 2005; PISCITELLI, 2005; 2007; et al) and also in advertisements and media in Brazil (PISCITELLI, 1996; PACHECO, 2004; GABRIELLI, 2011). Based on the French Semiotics, the study observed texts produced at different times to allow the perception of similarities and continuities or differences and ruptures between the two works in the imaginary about the Brazilian woman. The first narrative investigated is the Letter of the Discovery of Brazil written by Pero Vaz de Caminha, in 1500, and the second is The Master and the Slaves by Gilberto Freyre, published in 1933. To analyze the textual-discursive construction of female identity, the discursive level of Generative Route of Sense stood out being observed the figurative and thematic routes, the isotopies resulting from these routes and also the projections of each textenunciation. However, the manipulations, the sanction, the passions, the being and the doing of individuals contributed to the construction of female identity in the texts. The analyse results show a guidance of look at women which falls in sensuality and sexuality. In other words, even with a greater extention, both in The Master and the Slaves as in the Letter of Caminha, it is the category of gender and sexuality that prevails in women\'s descriptions and in the relationships that they establish with society.

Sociological interest in psychoanalytic thought, which began early in this century, has thus far emphasized the implications of Sigmund Freud's clinical discoveries. However, beginning in 1912, Freud produced a series of works which addressed social themes. These works included Totem and Taboo, Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego, The Future of an Illusion, Civilization and its Discontents, and Moses and Monotheism, as well as a number of papers dealing with social themes. This study began with a review of the social and intellectual influences on Freud's life and thought. Then a content analysis of Freud's social writings, identified above, was undertaken, to assess the significance for contemporary social theory of Freud's social thought. Categories for analysis were constructed: Society: Social Origins, Social Control and Social Change; Social Groups; the Family; Religion. Freud's ideas concerning these social categories and social institutions were explicated and an assessment of Freud as a social theorist was undertaken.

This thesis examines how making extends artists' thoughts beyond their conceptions. Central to this is consideration of how an artist's statements and their work relate: this thesis argues that the relationship is neither of identity nor contradiction, but of a productive tension from which emerges a richer understanding of thought. A similar approach underscores this doctorate's relationship of studio and written components, both of which desire self-sufficiency. The studio work consists of discrete yet mutually informing series, all engaged with the specificity of a moment of exposure, whether here and now or recording a past moment. The notion of 'documentation' underscores these works, which include large chemical photographs, high-definition video, cyanotypes and extensive exploration of casting to reveal latent images. The written component is a thorough study of the various instances of Medardo Rosso's sculpture Ecce Puer, offering art-historical and theoretical grounding of hands-on making as a way pressing cultural issues inhere in a work at a more fundamental level than understood by its contemporaries or maker. The first chapter locates Rosso in his historical milieu. Chapter 2 assesses the elements constituting Ecce Puer; it argues that no definitions of a 'work' adequately encompass these, and coins the term 'complex work' to designate artworks indivisibly singular and plural, concrete and abstract. Chapter 3 offers phenomenological interpretation of Rosso's confused writings, illuminating them through Maurice Merleau-Ponty's late philosophy but understanding Rosso's thought as inadequate to the complexity of his work. Chapter 4 examines Rosso's photography, specifically his photography of photographs, connecting what this achieves to his phenomenology. Chapter 5 introduces a key notion of 'friendship' to understand how the connections between instances of Ecce Puer became 'meaningful'. Having offered a fundamentally new interpretation of Rosso's project, chapter 6 extends Michael Fried's history of French painting to relocate Rosso within early twentieth-century art.

This diploma thesis on the topic Home Pet contains art approaches that lead students to a sensitive and conscious behaviour towards animals. The theoretical part presents imaging of an animal in the history of art and possibilities of involvement of the animal themes to Framework Education Programme and School Education Programme for Elementary Art Schools. The thesis also focuses on the relationship between children and animals and the healing power of animals. Further, the thesis discusses the project method of teaching, which was chosen for the given topic at Elementary Art School. The practical part of the thesis was realized in the preparatory year and the first year of Elementary Art Schools in Dačice and Jemnice and reflects the course of my own lesson on the topic Home Pet.

AFRICAN LANGUAGES / MA (AFRICAN LANGUAGES)