<p><bold>This dissertation deals with Cuban art criticism and other written texts related to Abstract Art. From a critical perspective that relates art to society and political and institutional practices, all of the above texts are interpreted as bearers of aesthetic ideologies, which are expressed in the paradigms from which Art Criticism attempted to validate Abstraction. This study further demonstrates that the dominant discourses in the realm of Art Criticism are strongly related to Ideological State Apparatuses. Art Criticism not only mediates between the artwork and the spectator, but also between artistic acts of provocation and the establishment.</p><p> Abstraction in Cuba constituted an important axis in the polemic between autonomous art and socially committed art, but the debates themselves were subsumed in ideological and even political battlefields. Art Criticism oriented these debates, by emphasizing certain problems, and diminishing the importance of other ones. </p><p>This dissertation is organized in function of the dominant questions that Cuban Art Criticism addressed. The first chapter accordingly deals with definitions of abstract art that were prevalent in art writing and publications from 1948 to 1957, a period in which Art Criticism is mostly concerned with the autonomy of art. The second chapter follows the debates about the social commitment of abstract art, which became predominant during the first years of a Marxist-oriented Revolution. This polemic is implicit in the emergence of an Anti-Academic movement in the visual arts, and it began to lose its strength once the Cuban Avant-Garde started to gain institutional recognition. After being relegated to a peripheral position, the question concerning the social commitment of Abstract Art became crucial after the triumph of the Revolution. The final chapter deals with the relations between Abstract Art and the diverse documents that embodied and defined the Cultural Policy during the Cuban Revolution. </p><p>Throughout, this study strives to establish the place of Abstract Art in the Institutional, and discursive practices from 1959 onwards. This place is defined by its instability, as it is constituted through intermittencies and steps backwards on the path towards the institutional consecration of non-figurative tendencies. </bold></p> / Dissertation

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Chicago, Dept. of Germanic Studies, June 1999. / Includes bibliographical references. Also available on the Internet.

O principal objetivo desta pesquisa consiste no estudo, desenvolvimento e aplicação de um conjunto de procedimentos metodológicos introdutórios para leitura e percepção da paisagem geográfica, direcionados ao ensino fundamental. Trata-se de uma proposta de articulação de conteúdos de Arte e Geografia baseada na noção de paisagem como texto não-verbal, cuja organização dos procedimentos de leitura recorre a subsídios da semiótica. Os conteúdos de Arte explorados nesta tese buscam identificar as transformações da noção polissêmica de paisagem, concentrando-se no abstracionismo informal e nas paisagens do pintor brasileiro Antônio Bandeira um dos principais representantes dessa tendência no Brasil a fim de possibilitar um processo alternativo de percepção estética da paisagem. Os conteúdos de Geografia alinham-se principalmente com as pesquisas recentes da Geografia Cultural, que após receberem múltiplas contribuições e influências, tais como da Antropologia, da História, da Filosofia fenomenológica e existencialista, concebe a paisagem como texto e como marca e matriz cultural, principais abordagens nas quais esta pesquisa inspirou-se. Após a reflexão teórica, foi realizado o experimento de uma parcela dos procedimentos metodológicos propostos, com alunos de 7ª série. Os resultados demonstraram que é possível uma mudança na percepção e leitura da paisagem geográfica, quando os modelos de paisagem também são modificados. Verificou-se: abandono da perspectiva e incorporação de vários pontos de vista numa mesma paisagem (visão horizontal, vertical e oblíqua); adição das sensações olfativas, auditivas e táteis; o consentimento da escala afetiva na representação dos elementos; possibilidade de vínculo com o aprendizado das representações cartográficas, dado o caráter abstrato das pinturas de paisagens contemporâneas; a leitura não-verbal como estímulo à expressão verbal; alto grau de interesse dos alunos não só pelos conteúdos desenvolvidos, mas principalmente pelas estratégias envolvendo arte e pintura a guache / The main objective of this research is the study, development and application of a set of introductory methodological procedures for the study and perception of geographical landscapes in elementary education. It is a proposal for the synchronization of the course content of Art and Geography based on the concept of the landscape as a non-verbal text, whose organization of study procedures relies on semiotic assistance. The Art-related content investigated in this thesis aims to identify transformations of the polyssemic notion of landscapes, focusing on informal abstractism and landscapes painted by the Brazilian painter Antônio Bandeira - one of the foremost examples of this tendency in Brazil - in order to create a feasible alternative process for the esthetic perception of landscapes. Geography content is mainly in accordance with recent research in Cultural Geography, which, upon receiving several contributions and influences, for example from Anthropology, History, and phenomenological and existentialist Philosophy, envisages a landscape as a text and a cultural mark and matrix. This approach was the main inspiration for this research. After theoretical reflection, an experiment was carried out involving a part of the proposed methodological procedures among 7th grade students. The results show that a change in perception and study of geographical landscapes is possible, when the landscape models are also modified. The abandonment of the perspective and incorporation of several points of view into a single landscape (horizontal, vertical and oblique view) was noted; addition of olfactory, audio and touch sensations; the contentment of an affective scale in the representation of elements; the possibility of a connection with the learning of map representations, given the abstract character of contemporary landscape paintings; the non-verbal study as a stimulus to verbal expression; a high-level of interest on the part of students not only in the content developed, but mainly in the strategies involving art and gouache painting

No description available.

The dissertation examines the reception of Czech and European abstract art in Czechoslovakia in the 1920s and 1930s. It assumes that the Czechoslovak cultural milieu was unfavourable for abstract art at that time, yet various forms of its reception were occurring. Thus, the objective is to demonstrate and document opportunities for abstract art public presentation, related critical reactions and theoretical reflection. The reception history perspective followed in the dissertation deals with written sources, and focuses on relationship between viewers and abstract art and on handling particular artworks. Predominantly recipients such as theorists, art critics, editors, artists, and other participants in the arts sector are taken into consideration when exploring contemporaneous exhibiting, evaluation and interpretation of abstract art. The paper includes responses and attitudes to abstract painting and sculpture as well as to abstract photography, film and kinetic art.

Piet Mondrian, one of the most significant representatives of modern abstract art, applied himself, aside from his own art work, to writing of theoretical texts. In his essays, he did not advocate for his own paintings, neither did he manifest any particular art movement. In these texts, one can trace rather general aesthetically-theoretical reflection on art, on the development of our world and on the position of a man in modern society. This thesis introduces Mondrian's comprehensive conception of art in light of aesthetics and the philosophy of art. It touches on the substance and function of art, on artistic means, on the role of an artist and on the meaning of art related to society and its development. The thesis focuses on the bases of Mondrian's theory and its influences. In addition, it presents various ideas of other contemporary avant-garde movements that somehow inspired Mondrian and that, together with his conception of art, create a certain context of the artistic atmosphere of the first half of the 20th century. The thesis draws from Mondrian's original texts that have, in most cases, not been translated into Czech, yet.

This thesis examines a series of controversies in Portland, Oregon during the 1950s triggered by the placement of modem art in strategic public locations. This study examines the controversy surrounding the installation of Louis Bunce's mural at the Portland International Airport and the series of modern art controversies that followed the mural incident.

This dissertation explores how literary descriptions of visual artworks affect the narrative and descriptive fabric of a text. The novels I examine operate on three textual levels: the painter's creative struggles, his amorous entanglements with his model and/or the painted women of his canvas, and his aesthetic claims to revolutionize painting. My project argues that ekphrasis is a translational mode that takes two forms: the traditional, "contained" description of a visual artwork; and a mode of writing that pervades the entire text and emulates the characteristics of painting. For example, Balzac's "Le Chef d'oeuvre inconnu" and the Goncourts' Manette Salomon successfully adopt the ekphrastic mode of writing, transforming the narrative into a canvas where the boundaries between the media are blurred. On the other hand, Zola's L'oeuvre exploits ekphrasis in order to advance the superiority of literature over painting. At the heart of these Realist and Naturalist texts, the fundamental adherence to the mimetic principle of art is confronted with the nonfigurative experiments of their fictional painters. The female body, as the embodiment of Art and the manifestation of the artist's desire, becomes the symptom of his incursion into abstract painting and the site of the resistance to ekphrasis.

The purpose of this thesis is the development of an interactive computer-generated rendering system that provides artists with the ability to create abstract paintings simply and intuitively. This system allows the user to distort a computer-generated environment using image manipulation techniques that are derived from fundamentals of expressionistic art. The primary method by which these images will be abstracted stems from the idea of several small images assembled into a collage that represents multiple viewing points rendered simultaneously. This idea has its roots in the multiple-perspective and collage techniques used by many cubist and futurist artists of the early twentieth century.

The purpose of this thesis is the development of an interactive computer-generated rendering system that provides artists with the ability to create abstract paintings simply and intuitively. This system allows the user to distort a computer-generated environment using image manipulation techniques that are derived from fundamentals of expressionistic art. The primary method by which these images will be abstracted stems from the idea of several small images assembled into a collage that represents multiple viewing points rendered simultaneously. This idea has its roots in the multiple-perspective and collage techniques used by many cubist and futurist artists of the early twentieth century.