This research attempts to identify patterns of successful independent practice among contemporary visual arts practitioners for the purpose of increasing understanding of the structures of and activity within the visual arts in England. The intention is to draw conclusions regarding how such practice can be facilitated and supported. It looks at a particular kind of practice in the area of design craft, and at the organisations charged with the responsibility for state provision, setting this critique in a context of a historical and social perspective. Much of recent conventional practice in the visual arts is considered to have a narrow view of what constitutes acceptable practice and is based on the gallery-based fine arts model. This model is a dubious base line from which to encourage a healthy range of independentpractice, and is of little use to the practitioners in this study, and others of similar intent. The practitioners encountered in this research might beconsidered applied artists, as they have a need to engage with a public during the processes of conception, creation and selling of their work. The patterns have been documented with the assistance of concepts regarding small business, particularly a subsector called micro business. Micro business has recently been identified to describe a pattern of activity which is not conducted for profit or with goals of expansion. The motivation behind micro business is to maintain self determination.

Plays representing some aspect of the Holocaust produced in both the commercial and subsidised sectors of the London theatre throughout the Cold War period variously but consistently sought to evade, diminish or inappropriately qualify the cardinal fact that, in the formulation which was the Nazi's own, 'the Final Solution was that 'of the Jewish question in Europe'. Such dramatic distortions hinder perceptions of the identity and fate of the chief victims of the Holocaust. Playwrights', directors', managements', and to a marginally lesser degree, critics' failure to question or challenge these tendencies results not so much in the explicitly stated exoneration of those responsible for the Nazi genocide as the erasure or attenuation of both German guilt and Jewish suffering through dramatic speculation upon the universal human propensity to evil. In consequence the suggestion is made of Jewish agency in, and culpability for, their own fate during the Holocaust. At their most extreme these dramatic tendencies resort to the recurrent themes of anti-Semitic discourse. The ubiquitous dramatic strategies and tropes employed in the productions discussed, rather than succeed in their attempt to find and represent meaning in the respective episodes and events of the Nazi genocide dramatised, frequently re-present this elimination through the evasion, attenuation or erasure, of Jewish fate. The productions register the failure of dramatic art to find equitable metaphor and adequate representational means to provoke reflection of a kind which might transcend the meaningless facticity of mass murder and the impulse to annihilation, and are drawn into those same dynamics of annihilation, evidenced by the erasure of Jewish identity and fate. This phenomenon remains largely, but not entirely, unremarked in the immediate critical response of the British press, but almost wholly neglected in later commentary due to an 'absence of memoy: the lack of a specifically British critical discourse on dramatic representation and the Holocaust.

This thesis is an examination of the complex relationship between a broadly defined art market and the British State. it is an examination of the visual arts economy within a British market economy. It demonstrates the state's failure to support and improve this economy even as it declares such a commitment. For the sake of the visual arts and the national economy, an alternative to the Orthodoxy of the State is argued and mechanism for its achievement proposed. This has required me to to reveal and question some firmly held attitudes and beliefs about art, artists, connoisseurs and public good. Although they constitute a comfortable notion of patronage for a minority, these contemporary notions of art, artist and connoisseur contribute to a decidedly uncomfortable economy for the majority.

With specific reference to the cultural policy set out by New Labour, this research explores the individual and social function of the arts and the extent to which they are agents of inclusion. The arts, an important aspect even driver of culture, can be perceived as exclusive with taste reflecting socio-economic concerns which contradicts this function. Such a paradox requires an investigation into the complex and sometimes contradictory relationship between cultural and social inclusion and exclusion, as well as the methods used of evaluating impact. The thesis is divided into four sections. Part One sets out definitions of social exclusion and relevant government cultural policy. Part Two investigates valuation methodology and techniques of evaluating the social impact of the arts programmes in particular. This includes an analysis of relevant reports. Part Three then investigates cultural exclusion. A trilateral approach is taken that assets at, cultural democracy and popular culture. Part Four relates specifically to causal factors of inclusion and how the arts enable emancipation, empowerment and satisfy personal need. It also explores the wider social function and ideal location of the arts, especially with regards to a leisure framework. Throughout, the research questions the extent to which the social role of the arts and policy is one of accommodation or more concerned with reflecting individual needs and a wider counterculture. It concludes that an engaged freedom is the more natural agenda of the arts, which contrasts with an instrumental New Labour government policy that treats social inclusion as primarily related to employment and training issues in order to increase individual social capital.

This study gives an account of audience research undertaken between 1981 and 1986 at a sample of London theatres, and covering a wide range of productions, with the aim of establishing a profile of the West End theatre audience. Prior to this research, audience surveys in the U.K. had take place primarily outside London, or had been limited to one or two theatres. The study details the development of a research methodology for use in a large scale audience research project covering a variety of venues. The process by which techniques for audience sampling, questionnaire design and layout, survey method, and analysis of results were decided on is documented. The process by which an aggregated analysis of the West End audience as a whole was prepared from the sampled research findings is also described. Analysis of the survey findings begins with an examination of the effects of three variables on audience profiles; time of year, day of the week and type of production. An account is then given of the West End theatre audience overall. Demographic profiles, theatre-going behaviour, press and publicity use, and attractions and deterrents of London theatres are documented and analysed for the audience overall. Variations in the fore-going aspects of audience profiles and behaviour are also documented and analysed for each of the major demographic groups. As a preliminary to a proposed future study on the economic impact of the West End theatres on the local economy, an account is given of audience spending and of its value to local businesses. The results of the study indicate that theatre-going behaviour may be largely determined by social factors, and that the research therefore has a predictive value. The implications of this finding for marketing the theatre and for cultural policy-making are examined in the conclusions.

The aim of the study was to consider whether opera performances could exert an influence such that audiences travel and stay away from home overnight in order to experience those performances. In particular, it was to be considered whether such visits were undertaken as a holiday and whether opera was the sole or most important reason for that holiday. Additionally, an opera-producing organisation (Buxton Arts Festival) was to be studied in order to assess its recognition of the tourism connection and any influence of that upon the organisation. It was concluded, from an examination and synthesis of existing work, that there were grounds for believing that some of those in an opera audience could be tourists and holiday tourists for whom opera dominated as the reason for the tourist visit. A consideration of Buxton, the geographical location of the opera performances, confirmed its partial function as a tourist resort. Concern about the present and future nature of that function was identified. The Festival company was studied through a combination of observation, examination of internal papers and discussions. It was concluded that the company had acknowledged a need for and/or a desire to attract audiences from a widespread area. This tourism dimension did not dominate policy nor influence the product. Audiences at Festival operas were surveyed directly and by post. The surveys showed that there were tourists in the audiences and also those who classified their tourist visit as a holiday. For both holiday and non-holiday tourists itwas concluded that the operas had been the most important factors influencing the decision to visit. Despite some differences between holiday and non-holiday tourists, the factors causing the holiday/non-holiday distinction remained unclear. The distinction between the tourist and non-tourist was largely, though not necessarily, one of distance from Buxton.

'Grace Under Pressure: Re-reading Giselle' is a close reading of the Romantic ballet Giselle (1841) , focusing on the Birmingham Royal Ballet production of 3 March 1992. The Preface provides a personal introduction, and notes the status of ballet within dance studies and the academy. It also observes that in choosing Giselle as a text one is required to reassess the historical treatment of emotion and beauty within academic feminism. Chapter One gives an historical background to Giselle, a literature review and a methodological overview. Ballet has received relatively little attention from the academy in comparison with other performing arts. Whilst dance scholarship is a growth area in the university, ballet remains neglected. Hence, in order to bring theory across from areas of greater academic activity, this thesis is structured around textual juxtaposition. Thus Chapter Two compares the plot of Giselle with that of the film Blade Runner, and Chapter Three compares the movement of Giselle with that in the book SEX by Madonna. These comparative texts were also first viewed in 1992: whilst Giselle is usually categorized as 'High' art, however, they belong in the popular domain. This thesis demonstrates that the comparative texts differ from their own genres, dystopian fiction and pornography. Consequently, Giselle is shown to be materially different from other Romantic ballets, particularly in its selfreflexive critical framework. Chapter Four concludes the discussion of the 1841 and the 1992 Giselles, and focuses on the repercussions of this study for the academy and the production and reception of ballet. Throughout this thesis runs the assumption, common in dance studies but less overt in English Literature, that academic activity is a personal and political activity, and that a study such as this requires that one engage with the status of academic enquiry both within and without the academy.

From the late 1960s to the present, women have utilised performance art as a 'form' with which to resist, transgress, contest or reveal the position of women within wider society. However, as both the nature of feminist politics and the contexts within which the work has been produced have changed, the enactment of such oppositional strategies has also shifted. This thesis aims to locate and account for such shifts by mapping multiple subjects, including performance art, feminism(s), contemporary theory, performers and women's performance art. In the late 1960s throughout the 1970s, the strategies most often utilised by women performance artists either offered alternative, supposedly more 'truthful' representations which drew on the real, material lives of women, or completely reimagined woman, locating her in a place before or outside of the patriarchal structure. From the 1980s onwards, however, the practice of women's performance art looks somewhat different. While performers continue to contest the material conditions and results of being positioned as female in Western society, such contestations are now often enacted from within what might be considered a 'deconstructive' or 'poststructuralist' frame. Acknowledging the impossibility of ever representing the 'real' woman, since 'woman' is always already a representation (and is always multiple), I suggest that the aim of this work is therefore not so much to reveal the 'real' woman behind the fiction, but to take apart the fiction itself, revealing the way in which the signifier 'woman' has been differentially constructed, for what purpose, and with what real effects. I have nominated this shift as a movement from a performance and politics of identity to a performance and politics of subjectivity.

This thesis aims to elaborate the concept of responsibilty in design towards user in a critical manner. It investigates the perspectives of the professional design organizations through their design definitions and ethical guidelines, and analyzes the approaches to the issue of responsibility towards user in the design literature. The study sekks to understand the concept of user -the subject and object of design- through the concept of &quot / other&quot / borrowed from philosophy, and offers a different conceptualization of responsibility towards user together with its ethical implications.

This project is driven by omissions at the intersection of ecological game studies and media-ecology. Although authors have studied videogames from a variety of ecological approaches, few have attempted to develop a holistic methodology, embracing videogames' specific attributes while recognising their role within larger physical systems. This thesis is an attempt to address this, reading videogames as simultaneously about and functioning as ecologies. My methodology draws on the agential-realist philosophy of Karen Barad whose theory of 'intra-activity' is abundant with ecological ramifications. Adapting Barad's 'intra-active' framework for use with contemporary videogames, I read them as assemblages of hardware, software and their human players. I explore three significant aspects of game studies: interaction, aesthetics and affect. Focusing on interaction, I analyse the game Shelter. Emphasising the role of hardware and software, I read these processes in conjunction with an understanding of gameplay. This encourages a shift away from seeing gameplay as 'interaction' as it is defined within human-computer-interaction, and instead promotes a view that is 'intra-active'. Siding with Barad, play is radically reframed as a phenomenon that produces the apparent objects of its inception. In the second study I approach a series of more experimental games illustrating how an agential-realist worldview influences aesthetics. Analysing high-concept puzzle games Superhot, Antichamber, and Manifold Garden, I suggest that these games place a focus on aspects of ecology often over-shadowed in so-called 'natural' imaginings of our world, such as time, space and their entanglement. Finally, bringing my focus to the role of the player in my ecological understanding of games I analyse a number of short, human-centred or biographical games. Seeing the role of the player in an ecological manner, designers deviate from traditional methods of generating pathos and affect. Rather than developing empathetic relationships between player and avatar through immersion, viewing the player as only a part of an ecological system demands a posthuman response from players. These designers ask players to empathise while acknowledging their role is small and not central. This thesis presents a novel point of view that draws attention to the ambitious design practices of artists while suggesting new avenues in the future.