This thesis presents an in-depth discussion and analysis of the stylistic influences of Bulgarian composer Pancho Vladigerov (1899-1978), and their presentation in his Rhapsody Vardar , Opus 16. Vladigerov's background includes studies in both his native Bulgarian folk music, as well as formal western training at two different music academies in Berlin. The first chapter provides relevant biographical information, and explores aspects of Vladigerov's compositions which derive from Western European traditions, including a discussion of the composers and styles that influenced his writing. This is done through discussion and analysis of his Three Pieces for Piano , Opus 15, a work written in the same year as his Rhapsody Vardar . Chapter two provides a general overview of Bulgarian folk music, especially during the late-nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Chapter three brings together these observations in an analysis of Vladigerov's landmark piano work, Vardar Rhapsody .

This thesis redefines the Sixth Generation of Chinese film by examining the characteristics of some young directors’ films from the perspective of theme, form and production mode, essentially, from the perspective of the relationship between these directors and their times. I suggest that the most important condition in the construction of the concept of the Sixth Generation and the Sixth Generation film is the ideological rebellion against the government after the events of 1989. I hold the opinion that the Sixth Generation has adopted a more commercial outlook after the end of the 1990s, and explore reasons of this change from the perspectives of economy, culture and individual existence.

In the 1990s internationally renowned Indian artist Sheela Gowda exchanged oil paint for cow-dung. This dramatic shift occurred in response to the rise in Hindu fundamentalism and as way to voice her distress at the violence of the Hindu / Muslim riots. From a eurocentric art-historical perspective, adopting cow-dung to create art may seem like a radical move, but in India it is a material rich in multi layered histories and one resonating with ritual, economic and gendered subtexts and overtones. This thesis analyzes Gowda's multi-coded artworks in an attempt to render more visible an artist who is an important contributor to the international contemporary art scene, to render viable arts usually considered marginal, minor or folk, and to balance an art historical canon which still favours the "high arts" as well as white, western or male artists. It argues not only for the validity of art in its many forms, but also for art historical scholarship which functions as bridge to forge meaning and open up dialogue between artists, viewers, critics and curators.

The popularity of religious art in late seventeenth century Protestant England stands in apparent contradiction to the profound anti-Catholic sentiment that many current scholars argue characterizes the period. A close analysis of London auction catalogs from 1690 reveals that a significant number of all pictures listed for sale featured typically Catholic subject matter. Consulting both seventeenth century literature and current scholarship provides a rationale for this apparent contradiction. Factional conflict within Protestantism itself was often focused on the issue of religious imagery. Accordingly, it functioned as a means of articulating religious difference. While the radical Puritan mission may have involved abolishing all English "monuments of superstition," Anglicanism held biblical and hagiographic imagery to be an essential aspect of Christian worship. This thesis argues that Anglicans embraced religious imagery as a means of rejecting the Puritan cause and, in doing so, forged a unique Anglican identity.

This thesis catalogues performances of orchestral music written by Canadian composers, performed between 1980 and 2005 by six Canadian professional symphony orchestras (Victoria, Calgary, Winnipeg, London, Toronto and Montreal). This catalogue, referred to as the Main Repertoire Table (MRT), lists 1574 performances. Using the results of the MRT, I identify 63 composers who have contributed five or more works to the repertoire, and 44 composers who have had at least ten performances. I also identify 47 works that have been performed five times or more. These results form a standard repertoire of Canadian orchestral music. The second part of my thesis analyses these results. Trends in programming are also discussed, including the role played by various parties, especially conductors, in the establishment of the repertoire.

This dissertation examines the trace of circumcision in modern Malay/sian art. The term ‘Malay/sian’ is used in this dissertation to refer to Malaysians of Malay descent with Islamic affiliation. This research is premised on the hypothesis that the cultural politics that defines the works produced by artists of Malay-Muslim affiliation is constituted by the discourse of the body. This research takes the task of locating this hypothesis in a selection of paintings by these artists. I argue that circumcision, which in Malaysia is understood as the obligatory and identifying mark of the Malay-Muslim (male and female, to varying degrees), is a significant trope underlying the themes of the graphic mark, the body and social power in the production of personal, ethno-religious and national identities.

Curiosity, it can be said, alerts us to the interface between art and science, with the ‘object’ being suspended somewhere between the two. Curiosity interfaced with photography and collections are the main components of this thesis. This thesis is organized around two principle outcomes: a written component and an artistic component. The written component investigates how the use of photography as a method of inquiry into the secondary manipulation of ready-made material results in objects that become sites of new meaning and encourage new interpretations. The artistic component was comprised of a photographic installation titled ‘herbarium imaginaire’ (imaginary herbarium), which featured hand-built pinhole cameras and auxiliary photography equipment used in the production of a photographs, as well as featuring an open-house and presentation of botanical specimens and plant collecting processes that was held in the University of Victoria Herbarium.

By studying several paintings by Venetian artist Tiziano Vicelio, better known as Titian, this thesis explores how the Venetian painter’s works resisted the encroaching arrival of a masculine identity and reflected on the ramifications inherent in its performance. I will provide evidence that the contemporary discourses and/or criticisms of artistic production that informed Titian’s style allow us to situate his feminized male within both the historical framework of sixteenth-century Venice, and the delicate negotiation of gender that was taking place at the same time. This thesis also situates Titian’s works within contemporary literary acknowledgements about the fluidity of gender. I will begin by examining Titian’s painting of David and Goliath in the church of Santo Spirito in Venice, as a prelude to my main analysis of the whole cycle. Next I will study his painting of Tarquin and Lucretia, concluding with an evaluation of his enigmatic Il Bravo. I will argue that, using the metaphorical power of contrast in his paintings Titian was highlighting the violent nature of masculinity and the tragic consequences of its performance, while simultaneously offering the image of the feminized male as an exemplar.

Women composers have not traditionally been at the forefront of genre development. Western classical musical genres and formal structures tend to operate by conventions codified by male composers of European and North American descent, and, accordingly, reflect patriarchal aesthetics and viewpoints. The nascent genre of vocal theatre, however, has been primarily defined by the works of women composer/performers. Artists Meredith Monk, Diamanda Galas, and Pauline Oliveros have created new modes of theatre for the voice; in their personal explorations of extended vocal technique, the female voice is used as a tool for discovering, activating, remembering, and uncovering a consciousness that is primordial, pre/anti-logical, and oracular. My thesis proposes that the vocal theatre of these women functions as musical ecriture feminine, a term first introduced by French feminist theorist Helene Cixous. As a theoretical framework, ecriture feminine provides a particularly useful tool for interpreting these works, which, in the importance they place on openness, transcending language, embodied performances, and personal visions of womanhood, reveal aesthetic concerns that in many ways have more in common with the literary genre of ecriture feminine than those of canonical Western art music. I argue that these works are important not only as musical ecriture feminine, but as examples of an alternative, "feminine" compositional practice that prioritizes collaboration, improvisation, and intuitive modes of creativity. In doing so, they destabilize the traditional "maleness" of genre creation.

Isabella d'Este (1474-1539), the wife of Francesco II Gonzaga (1466-1519), Marquis of Mantua, is widely acknowledged for her patronage of the arts at the Gonzaga court in Mantua, during a formative period in her life, 1490 to c.1523. This thesis draws attention to a dilemma in Renaissance studies: namely, that musicologists have a far great[er] appreciation of Isabella's work as a patron of music, whereas she has been less positively appreciated in some of the art historical literature. A similar phenomenon is observed in the case of Francesco II, who was, for many years, the patron of the well-known artist, Andrea Mantegna, as well as being a strong patron of the liberal arts, including music, (sacred and secular), yet art historians have only recently begun to re-evaluate his contribution in a positive light, and some historians have undervalued his role as a politician, diplomat, and ruler. This study explores how this husband and wife team collaborated on various projects involving the visual arts and music to build up the cultural profile of their court at Mantua. It would seem that a greater cross-disciplinary interaction between art historians, historians, and musicologists, would broaden our understanding of patronage studies during the Renaissance.