Gaze to discover is the approach a viewer should take as s/he encounters the work within this exhibition. The main idea is that the work should be interactive. Developing this interaction is the objective of each piece. To engage viewers to interact with a piece of art coincides with the ability to acquire their undivided attention. The realization that it is difficult for a viewer to have a tangible interaction with artwork in a gallery setting leads to asking the viewer to interact visually, "to look fixedly" - to gaze (Webster's Dictionary). Gazing at the work will direct the viewer to discover; "to gain knowledge through observation, study, or search" (Webster's Dictionary). The desired outcome is a personal relationship with each piece observed. Games, play, and visual interaction are what this installation addresses. The familiar vessel forms chosen draw the attention, but the alliteration imagery keeps the viewer intrigued. With the help of a game card, a viewer is left with a puzzle to solve only obtainable through the gaze to discover. / by Tabitha Pennecamp. / Thesis (M.F.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2012. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2012. Mode of access: World Wide Web.

Cette thèse porte sur l'esthétique au sein de la phénoménologie, et plus particulièrement sur le problème de l'unité de l'esthétique, sur la question de la continuité entre sensibilité et art telle qu'elle est posée dans les philosophies d'Erwin Straus, de Maurice Merleau-Ponty et d'Henri Maldiney. Nous montrons d'abord comment la phénoménologie, en devenant phénoménologie de l'art, reprend et accomplit la philosophie de l'art traditionnelle, retrouvant par-là même ses difficultés et impasses : la subordination de l'art à la philosophie, le primat théorique de l’œuvre d'art sur l'artiste, l'assimilation de l'artiste au génie, la promotion de la peinture et de la littérature et l'exclusion de la danse, l'identification du spectateur à un incréateur. Nous mettons ensuite en évidence le fait que la phénoménologie est irréductible à une philosophie de l'art, qu'elle est aussi une esthétique capable de dépasser les problèmes de la phénoménologie de l'art autant que de l'esthétique classique, intellectualiste et empiriste. Seulement l'esthétique phénoménologique rejoue plutôt qu'elle ne déjoue ces problèmes : l'art et l'artiste demeurent mystérieux, l'esthétique phénoménologique est encore une religion de l'art. C'est pourquoi, enfin, une nouvelle esthétique s'impose – une esthétique cosmologique –, nourrie de la double déconstruction de la phénoménologie de l'art et de l'esthétiquephénoménologique, et dirigée vers l'impératif d'éconduire le mysticisme résurgent des doctrines sur l'art. En somme, ce travail vise à rendre compte philosophiquement, sans mythologie interposée, du phénomène artistique. / This doctoral dissertation focuses on aesthetics within the phenomenological movement, especially on the problem of the unity of aesthetics, on the question of continuity between sensibility and art as it is formulated in the philosophies of Erwin Straus, Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Henri Maldiney. We start by showing how phenomenology, by becoming a phenomenology of art”, recovers and completes the traditional philosophy of art, thereby rediscovering its impasses and difficulties: the subordination of art to philosophy, the theoretical priority of the work of art over the artist, the assimilation of the artist to a genius, the promotion of painting and literature and theexclusion of dance, the identification of the spectator with an uncreator. We then highlight the fact that phenomenology is irreducible to a philosophy of art, that it is also an aesthetics able to surpass the problems of the phenomenology of art as much as those of classical – intellectualist and empiricist – aesthetics. Nevertheless, “phenomenological aesthetics” updates these problems: art and artist remainmysterious, phenomenological aesthetics is still a religion of art. For this reason, finally, a new aesthetics is necessary – a “cosmological aesthetics” –, nourished by the double deconstruction of the phenomenology of art and phenomenological aesthetics, and directed towards the imperative to erase the resurgent mysticism of doctrines on art. In short, our study intends to explain – philosophically, without mythology – the artistic phenomenon.

It is the fundamental insight of phenomenology that meaning is first and foremost - not something which we intellectually reflect on. It is not a product of the mind reworking raw, perceptual experiences. Rather meaning, and our connection to the world, are perceptual phenomena. Thus, to understand the ways in which children find meaning demands a turn toward perceptual experiences - how children see and feel. In this theoretical dissertation, I explore questions of perceptual experiences through a phenomenological framework that I refer to as the perceptual rite of passage (PRoP). The conceptual framework, which centers on attentiveness, labors to help us understand the ontology of perception for preadolescents and how meaning emerges through everyday encounters.

How does it feel to be creative? Such a question, when approached from a phenomenological perspective, reveals new understandings about the embodied experience of creativity, and how it feels as it is being lived. This investigation begins with a provocative contrast of two environments where creativity is thought to manifest itself: school art classrooms, where creativity is often legislated from an authority figure, and New Orleans Second Line parades, where creativity is organically and kinetically expressed. A thorough review of the literature on creativity focuses on education, arts education, creative economies, psychology, and critical theorists, collectively revealing a cognitive bias and striking lack of consideration for community, freedom, and the lived experience of being creative. Further discussions in the literature also neglect sites of creativity, and the impact that place (such as a school classroom) can have upon creativity. The phenomenological perspectives of Merleau-Ponty, Heidegger, Bachelard, and Trigg support a methodological lens to grasp embodied knowledge, perceptions of placedness on creativity, and the interdependent frictions between freedom, authenticity, movement and belonging. The research method includes investigations in New Orleans in archives, examination of visual and material culture, participation in cultural practice, and formal and informal interviews. Further, the phenomena of walking and wandering became a methodology for embodied data collection that clarified the emerging rich experiences and descriptions of how it feels to be creative, especially how it feels to be creative in a creative place. What is also revealed are intense frictions, such as the tension between perceptions of personal freedom and a high demand for authenticity in terms of New Orleans traditions, that opens the space and fuels the inspiration for the abundance of creativity found in New Orleans culture.