Through the analysis of field based qualitative and ethnographic data collated over nine years, insights drawn from art theory, Cultural Studies, Sociology and Anthropology, I seek to understand the conditions and nature of my own and other artists' practices so as to lay out and analyse a more general and transferable 'fourth genre' model for `arts work in institutions'. I term the model of working I have arrived at the `Validation Model' because it attempts to undo what I assume is the invalidation of subjects (in schools and mental hospitals) that takes place when they enter prescribed social relations within institutionally defined categories, that is `pupil/child' and `mad'. This thesis aims to contextualise, understand, and draw out the Validation Model rationale and define its practice. I argue that arts practices transferred to institutions can function in a deconstructive and liberating way, breaking down narrow prescriptions and challenging received and categorical ideas. Creativity itself can be seen as an emptiness, a `negative' space that 'cancels out' ideas of normalcy allowing statements, or expressions or validations of what, we are in our own terms, for ourselves at particular times, full unto themselves rather than as staging posts in a journey mapped out for us by other (expert) people. There are three basic questions informing this thesis. First: what are the elements of a `fourth genre' of 'Validation' model arts projects? Second: what potential exists in this genre for the aiding of subjects to avoid the constraints of `negative' (mad people and children) positions? Third: how do `negative subjects" perceptions fall outside of the `normal' and can these perceptions be categorised, for some purposes at least, as creative rather than pathological deviations? This thesis explores and interrogates these questions through an open ethnographic methodology focussed on arts practices which seek to validate `client' perspectives, meanings and practices. In this thesis I first provide an overview of the related models of the first two 'genres' of arts practices:t he educationaal nd the therapeutico nes.I go on to outline how the third genreI am exploring shares some features with the old form of `community' arts but has more in common with New Genre Public Art, though differing from it in being situated within institutions. In line with Szasz's analysis of the `myth' of mental illness and with James, Jenks and Prout' s case for the social construction of `childhood', I argue that 'invalid' subject positions are socially enforced `negative categories' that `mad' and young people are constrained to inhabit. Third genre arts practices aim to help subjects to break free from these constraints. I identify threes tageso f the Validation model in Arts practicesI.n the first stageth e Validation Model provides `free space' for inmates to use as they see fit. The data indicates that inmatesu set his spacef irstly to questiona nd contestt heir invalid statusa ndt hen to resist it throughc reativea nda rtistic expressiono f their validity. In staget wo, to varying degrees, inmatesr esistb y subvertinga ndt urning back ontot he institution the very techniquesth at are used to control them so becoming more effective agents of social change by way of the inter subjectiver elationsi n to which thesea ctsl ead them.T his connectsin to a third stage whereby,a gaint o varying degreesm, ore open,s ometimesd irect kinds of criticism of, challengesa ndr esistanceto institutionalc ontrol arem ade. This thesis makes an original contribution to knowledge by defining a liberational model of arts practicei n institutions,s pecificallyi n elaboratinga nd exploringa rts practicest hat attempt to affect somes ort of socialo r political changeI.n doing this I addresslo ng standing problems identified by Kelly (1984)- community art died because it lacked a theoretical framework - and Lacy (1995)- there is no framework to evaluate the success or failure of such practice. Both theoretically and ethnographically, I have identified how art has the potential to help inmates question their prescribed positions and re-situate themselves as valid subjects in their own terms and not least in relation to practices of resistance to institutional control. Furthermore, in showing how validation takes place through defined stages I have provided the means for providing some sort of calibration of progress towards stated ends.

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This study is about the active lives of contemporary artworks. They are followed across their life trajectories, from their inception to material fabrication, exchange, exhibition and maintenance. Later in life, artworks are considered as they age, are materially re- fabricated, destroyed and memorialised. The hypothesis is that a contemporary work of art is not only an art object, but an object in an assemblage with people, documentation, other material things, names, space, images, places and more. I examine art objects as actors in collectives of activity with many persons and other material things. Anthropological theories about agency and distributed persons are utilised to identify the bonds among people, artworks and specifically the material parts of artworks. I also consider 20th century art historical questions about authorship, formalism and de- materialisation with reference to these anthropological theories. A principal goal for the thesis is in the examination of the roles and extent of the materiality of art. Further to observations of how decisions are reached and negotiated in practice over fabrication, conservation, re-makes, documentation and ownership, the study offers practical implications for contemporary art collections management.

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The Thesisd rawso n the argumentst,h emesa nd issuest hat haveb eend evelopedth rough a number of publications concerning the politics of arts and cultural policy. The Thesis contains a development of the commodification thesis and the policy attachmenat rgument Thesen ew approachetso the analysiso f public policy haveb een specifically applied to arts and cultural policy. The major focus of this application has beeno n Britain over the last 50 years,a nd has incorporatedn ational,r egionala nd local levelso f analysis.I n additiond evelopmentisn Europeh aveb eenc onsidered. A major theme concerns the necessity for methodological pragmatism in undertaking research within these policy areas. Such an approach allows for the development of appropriate analytical tools for complex policy systems. The validity and utility of the commodificationth esisa ndp olicy attachmenat rgumenat s tools for policy analysis are discussed. December 2003

My thesis is entitled L'Inconnue de la Seine. Between Early and Late Modernity (1898-2002): Text, Image, Crossings. I examine the cultural meanings invested in a death ask known as the 'Inconnue de la Seine'. This mask, of a young woman thought to have drowned herself in the Seine at the close of the nineteenth century, has fired the imagination of artists for over a century.

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Dans le domaine éditorial, l’élaboration des contenus est soumise à la tension établie entre, d’une part, une tendance collective à la standardisation et, d’autre part, une nécessité commerciale d’innovation. La guerre embarrasse les acteurs du livre. Elle est donc un terrain propice pour mesurer la capacité du livre pour enfants à actualiser la représentation des normes sociales en vigueur. La volonté, plus ou moins consciente, de perpétuer un modèle social incorporé par les acteurs adultes de l’édition jeunesse, alors qu’ils étaient eux-mêmes enfants, a un effet conservateur, voire archaïsant. Cette tendance mimétique est renforcée par l’empreinte très marquée de l’ethos littéraire et iconographique propre à la littérature de jeunesse. Ce que nous avons choisi de désigner comme nostalgie du conteur crée un décalage entre un message de socialisation en partie obsolète, véhiculé par la littérature jeunesse, et le besoin de socialisation actualisé, émis par les groupes sociaux. L’analyse des processus de production et de création dans l’édition pour la jeunesse en France depuis 1980 a été conduite en sociologie des œuvres d’art et dans la logique phénoménologique et interactionniste de la cadre-analyse d’Erving Goffman. Le corpus est constitué par un échantillonnage de 300 livres de fiction destinés aux moins de 12 ans, correspondant à la première étape des processus de socialisation selon Peter Berger et Thomas Luckmann. Les outils de l’analyse, orientés vers l’interprétation de gestes techniques, servent une approche compréhensive du consensus et de l’embarras chez les acteurs. / In the publishing field, contents are submitted both to a collective desire for standardization and to a commercial need for innovation. War, a much awkward topic, is a useful terrain to evaluate how children books cope with current social norms and picture them. Adult actors in publishing for the youth want, with more or less awareness, to perpetuate a social pattern incorporated when they were children. This behavior has a conservatory, or even archaistic, effect on their art work. This mimetic trend is strengthened by the literary and iconographic ethos of youth literature. The storyteller’s nostalgia, as we chose to name it, open a gap between a partly out-of-date socialization message, which is fostered by youth literature, and the need for an updated socialization, demanded by social groups. The processes of production and creation in publishing for the youth in France since 1980 have been studied according to the sociology of artworks and the phenomenological and interactionist perspective borrowed from Erving Goffman’s frame analysis. The corpus consists of 300 fiction books for children under 12. This group fits with the first step in the socialization process according to Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann. In order to avoid searching ethical echoes in a feebly rationalized cultural activity, analysis tools are meant to explain technical gestures. They take part in a comprehensive approach of consensus and trouble among actors.