published_or_final_version / Architecture / Master / Master of Architecture

This thesis analyses the public art competitions arranged by the Public Art Agency Sweden (Statens konstråd) 1937-1970 and the discussions about public art competitions in within the art field of the 1940’s, -50’ and -60’s. The main material for this analysis has been the protocols of the Public Art Agency and the annual paper of the Swedish Artists' National Organization (Konstnärernas riksorganisation). The theoretical and methodological framework is based on Pierre Bourdieu’s understanding of the art field, and institutions as agents within that field. I also use Foucauldian discourse theory as another theoretical tool to understand the power relations between these institutions in the art field. My aim has been to understand why there were competitions for public art commissions – the purposes, the processes, the discussions and how these factors change over the decades. The purpose for public art competition can be understood through the ideology of the Swedish welfare state and the cultural policy of the Social Democratic government in the 1930’s. The public art competitions could support the Swedish artists economically, but was also a way for the Swedish Government, through the Public Art Agency, to control and guarantee that the public artworks were of high artistic quality. This idea of artistic quality became more and more dominant as a purpose for the competitions through the 1950’s and 1960’s.  The artists active in the Swedish Artists' National Organization found the competitions to be of great importance and the competitions were much discussed in the organisations annual paper. Many of the artists that discussed the artist competitions were of the same generation born in the 1910’s or 1920’s and were working with public art commissions to a great extent. For them, the public art competitions gave recognition and a possible income. My analysis also shows that the public art competitions were also connected to the concept of modernism. The status of the competitions changed along with the changing concept of modernism. The competition was at its highest status in the 1930’s and 1940’s, when many artists were engaged in public art commissions. It became less popular among young artists in the 1960’s, when the art field was more politically radical and critical against authorities.

published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

published_or_final_version / Architecture / Master / Master of Architecture

Keep Denton Beautiful (KDB) is inspired by Keep America Beautiful's model of community engagement to create a clean, beautiful, and vibrant city. The community mural initiative, Artscapes, aims to enliven public spaces, abate graffiti, and inspire community members to keep Denton, Texas, clean and beautiful. The goals of this research project are to understand the impact of Artscapes initiative, community perceptions of public art, and find ways KDB can better align future mural projects with the needs and desires of community members. By talking to artists that have worked with KDB, members of the mural art committee, and community members from the neighborhoods that have existing murals, this research provides input from these three populations to continue creating public art for the Denton community. I discuss the context of my work through Lefebvre's concept of "Right to the City," Rafael Schacter's opposition between sanctioned and non-sanctioned murals, Bourdieu's concept of symbolic and social capital, and David Harvey's work on neoliberalism and the entrepreneurial city.

Master of Landscape Architecture / Landscape Architecture/Regional and Community Planning / Mary C. Kingery-Page / The purpose of this study is to investigate and design public light art installations. The investigation consisted of evaluating select examples of public light installations in order to develop a typology, and designing two site-specific light art installations: one in Wichita, Kansas, and the other, in Denver, Colorado. Though public light art is found in most cities, its potential is often lost or unrecognized. In certain cases, public light art can be ‘plop art,’ which is plopped senselessly without much regard to context or experiential qualities. This project seeks to explore the different types of public light art and to find what approach or qualities should be considered when designing public light art. My approach can be described as artistic research. The methods include an apprenticeship to an artist, a precedent study, development of a light typology, an analysis of site and context, establishing a design matrix for two design projects, and an iterative process of making. Each of these methods were undertaken in order to effectively address my research question: What type of public light art is most appropriate for a specific site and how does it relate to creative placemaking? This project overlaps with a collective project group entitled Creative Place-Making, which is comprised of other fifth-year master of landscape architecture students with an underlying interest in art and design as place-making tools. Each student in the group addressed the site in Wichita, Kansas in a unique way. I addressed this site as a temporary landscape, creating an interactive light installation intended to be in place up to five years. In contrast, I addressed the Denver, Colorado site as a long term landscape, and designed a sculptural illuminating gateway. Each of these light art installations were informed by a particular set of characteristics that make each design site-specific.

Multiculturalism or cultural pluralism is a policy, ideal, or reality that emphasizes the unique characteristics of different cultures in the world, especially as they relate to one another in immigrant receiving nations. The word was first used in 1957 to describe Switzerland but first came into common currency in Canada in the late 1960s2. It quickly spread to other English- speaking and western developed countries.Although There is no clear link between the multiculturalism and the term that so called Balkanization, But this research tries to present the similar possibility of Multiculturalism discourse and Balkanization as a geopolitical term. In fact this research believes that   balkanization is The same idea of multiculturalism in practice, when it comes to the idea of state. On the other hand Vijay Parshad in his book Everybody was Kung Fu fighting  says that "I am interested in “how an investigation of kung fu can help us move from a limited multicultural framework into an antiracist, polycultural one.” This is the research and video that has been made about Bruce lee statue in Mostar, the divided city in Bosnia and Herzegovina", as a method of working in hyper- politicized society.

Barnkonventionen reglerar barns rättigheter och ansvaret för att den tillämpas i fysiskplanering faller på kommunerna. Rätten till lek kan planeras resurseffektivt genom rationellplanering men för att barns rätt att uttrycka sig i frågor som rör dem krävs kommunikativplanering. Det ställer krav på att kommuner själva aktivt samlar in åsikter genom oprövademetoder och icke traditionella sätt att arbeta. Synen på konst inom stadsplanering harbreddats och offentlig konst har en självklar plats i våra städer idag. Det finns en traditionellroll av en konstnär där denne bidrar med ett verk i slutet av en planprocess men allt oftarebidrar konstnärer utifrån en roll som konsult eller inspiratör i planprocessen, både vidmedborgardialog och gestaltning. Syftet med studien är att se över hur konstnärlig kompetens kan verka för barn deltagande iplaneringen av våra städer. Metoden utgörs av en fallstudie över Kristinebergs Slottspark därbarn varit närvarande genom historien och även planerades fortsatt verka för barn i framtiden.Studien tar hänsyn till hur planeringsprocessen, planeringsdiskurs och fysisk utformningutförts med barns deltagande i åtanke. Intervjuer med projektets konstnärlig ledare PäviErnkvist samt konstnär Elisabeth Westerlund har utförts för att se över konstnärens roll.Slutsatsen är att konstnärlig inblandning och kompetens kan verka bidragande för barnsdeltagande men det ställer krav på kommunikativ planering, medborgardialog och tydligmålsättning från planerarnas håll samt en kunskap och bredare syn på konstnärens roll. Allt fler barn växer upp inne i storstäder och synen på vad de kan bidra med har till viss delförändrats. Idag anses barn vid tillfällen vara experter på sin egen miljö och bidragande tillnya sätt att se på planeringen av våra offentliga miljöer. Deltagande är viktigt ur ettdemokratiskt perspektiv och värdefullt för människors livskvalitet. Synen på konstens värdeför stadsplanering har emellertid vunnit större acceptans genom ett mätbart ekonomiskt värdevilket omvandlar en del av varje byggbudget till konst. Konst främjar dialog och resulterardessutom ofta i fysiska verk i vår stad. Kan barn då vara med och skapa staden genom konst? / Communicative planning is considered to create participation for many social groups andcontribute to new perspectives on urban planning of public spaces as more levels ofknowledge are added. Through communicative planning, children's right to be consulted onmatters concerning them as stated in the Convention of Childrens Rights, can be taken in toaccount. But in order for children to be heard municipalities are required to actively collectchildren's views, and that in itself demands unproven methods and non-traditional ways ofworking. The view of art in urban planning has broadened. The traditional role of an artist iscontribution with a piece at the end of the planning process, but an artist's work can alsocontribute artistic competence or act as an inspiration. These roles, compared to thetraditional role, have not been fully accepted by officials and planners. The purpose of this study was to examine how artistic work can promote greater participationof children. An extensive literature study has been conducted based on scientific papers,legislation, reports from concerned authorities, reports, statistics, interviews and facts to get abroad understanding of children's participation and the role of art in the planning discourse,the planning process and the design of our public spaces. To interviews were held withartistic leader Pävi Ernkvist and artist Elisabeth Westerlund. The conclusions drawn were thatartistic involvement and expertise can enhance the communication with children, whichcreates a higher level of participation. Art can serve as a prototype for possible changes andwithin it the reflections may eventually create spaces based on the children's terms, whichcan give them a higher level of participation, primarily in smaller projects.

American Indian graffiti muralism is a terminology that embodies the contemporary public art form of mural production by American Indian artists using public art installations to express ontologies of sovereignty, self-determination, and identity in different public spaces and on different objects. To date, there is no scholarship that has focused solely on American Indian graffiti muralism and ethnic markers within the medium of graffiti muralism. The dissertation, "American Indian Graffiti Muralism: Demystifying the Graffiti Medium and the Visual Harmonics of American Indian Signatures on the Modern Landscape," centers on the functionality of American Indian graffiti murals as markers of sovereignty, self-determination and identity in off-reservation municipal urban settings. Using a mixed methods framework of both qualitative and quantitative analysis this dissertation will provide new scholarship within the field of American Indian/Native American Studies and discourses on Native art and Native public art. Due to the fact that these public artworks contain multiple functions and meanings a mixed methods interdisciplinary analysis using the American Indian theoretical model of Survivance coupled with a social science theory of Geosemiotics, interviews with American Indian graffiti muralists, and quantitative empirical data collected through community-based Q survey creates a multi-narrative on the functionality of American Indian graffiti muralism. The aim of this research is to explore the functionality of different American Indian graffiti mural installations using Gerald Vizenor's Indigenous theory of survivance and the social science theory of geosemiotics. The theory of survivance aids analysis on how American Indian graffiti muralists infuse iconography and visual semiotic elements in their public art installations that (re)claim public spaces and infuse ontologies of sovereignty, self-determination, and identity in cityscapes. This is the first usage of survivance theory with Native public art and provides an ethnically appropriate means to investigate American Indian graffiti muralism. Geosemiotics theory provides analysis on how different American Indian graffiti murals interact with the physical landscape they reside within to create ideals of place and place perceptions in the populace. Geosemiotic analysis of American Indian graffiti murals illuminates how the art adds to a pluralistic public dialectic of place. By creating a dualistic theoretical lens this research addresses the suggestion that new discourses on Native art and Native public art require more analysis involving theoretical models and Indigenous ways of knowing through use of survivance theory, while also showing how a secondary social science theory can bolster a qualitative narrative on the functionality of Native public art. Artistic analysis is inherently subjective and the multi-theoretical application in this dissertation addresses how subjectivity and socio-political elements of American Indian graffiti muralism require a fully rounded framework to explore the function of these installations in our cities. The narratives of American Indian graffiti muralists regarding their mural installations offer intimate knowledge on the function of this art form and in this research provides first-person accounts of how artists approach public art differently than their studio art productions. It was also important to offer the perspectives from the artists themselves to illuminate how this graffiti muralism came to be the chosen form of artistic expression. The conversations with Yatika Fields and Jaque Fragua offer a secondary perspective to those of the researcher and public citizens. To further capture all of the perceptions surrounding American Indian graffiti muralism a public survey using Q methodology was completed to provide a platform for community-based input. Q methodology was used as a means to collect empirical data on the subjective attitudes towards American Indian graffiti murals. The output of Q surveying provided the first empirical data on American Indian graffiti muralism and concluded the multi-narrative of this project in the statements generated and tested by multiple public citizens. Furthermore, this multi-narrative foundation furthers future discourses in American Indian/Native American studies, the social sciences, and Native art historical research by offering elements that each can utilize as points of discussion and dissection.

Culture is an active process. It does not lie dormant in things (that is, any commodity, object or event that can be made to signify), waiting patiently to be awoken by an appropriate consumer. It is the practice and making of meanings. Culture is not in the object but in the experience of the object: how we make it meaningful, what we do with it, how we value it. John Storey (2003) Inventing Popular Culture, page viii The traditional arts, dance theater, music, visual arts and multi media are all accepted as being part of culture. In the same way that culture can be defined by the perceptions and feelings of each individual the arts belong to everyone. Bruno Frey (2003) in his book Arts and Economics: Analysis and Cultural policy considers the ways in which the arts are funded and supported and argues that a decision making system involving the diverse participants, audience, experts, artists and administrators is best equipped to establish and safeguard the constitutional rights to artistic expression (Frey, 2003:17). Can the experience of the arts be protected in the same way? This is an examination of the process, physical, historical and emotional issues that all play a part in the definition of the arts in Taipei. Entering the experience as a mother, artist, foreigner and long time resident of Taipei gave the researcher the opportunity to use many lenses simultaneously. This multifaceted view informed the choice of this topic. Can heritage sites and old buildings be successfully made into public arts venues? Do the underlying elements of history and conservation contribute to the venue’s ability to reach a large audience? Can free access be in part supported by in these sites through the use volunteers instead of paid staff? In order to better understand the role of the arts in contemporary Taipei life, the researcher, under the parameters of the Volunteer Services Act of Taiwan, conducted her research while a volunteer in the venues.