Thesis (BTech (Surface Design))--Cape Peninsula University of Technology, 2010 / Forms of body adornment and scarification practices have been around since the origin of mankind. Many forms of traditional body adornment have evolved overtime and still exist within our mainstream society today, however examples of recent body adornments, show that although still very much in practice, in many cases the meaning has been lost. The motivational routes of western adornments are today based on what looks good as apposed to a ritual or right of passage that marks one's body for life. Therefore, the aim of this dissertation is to share the value of representation with the viewer - as representation has played, and continues to play, such an important role within the social aspect of mankind. Bycreating a link between traditional practices of African body adornmentl scarification and connecting these with body expression and representation within my own sub-cultural context, I hope to create awareness of body adornment throughout time. Finally the practical component of this research will consist of a portfolio of different photographs and videos documenting the process and completion of adorning different female bodies. These works of art will be traditionally inspired, nonpermanent three-dimensional body art that will also undoubtedly represent selfexpression and comment on 'trendv' sub-cultural society. As Idocument my progress and work it is hoped that I portray in a conceptual framework, a life cycle that comments on the evolution of culture from rural to urban, and from traditional to Western, and how Western lifestyle is diluting our social being with trends rather than using the method of body adornment as a cultural conversation.

Call number: LD2668 .T4 1963 L35

This thesis examines the extent to which a more accurate representation of the human body is developed from the last decades of the sixth century, and the reasons for this development. A sound knowledge of clinical anatomy is used to analyse closely the rendering of features and trace the way the Greek artist looked at his model. The study covers different media found in Attica (vases, sculpture in marble or in poros, bronzes, and terracottas) and shows that artists try to render the human body accurately in all, although the pace of development varies according to the cost, subject and technique used (painting, carving, casting, modelling). This move away from the conventional representation reflects a close observation of the life model even though the human figure is still rendered according to idealized proportions and features. In order to explain this change, literary evidence is gathered to reconstruct the knowledge of human anatomy and body at the time. A rich anatomical vocabulary is already developed in the Iliad and the Odyssey but is used in descriptions which combine imagination and reality, whereas, from the last decades of the sixth century, the extant philosophical and (slightly later) medical texts reflect a growing concern with anatomical features and internal organs in order to distinguish the human from the animal. This new approach may have influenced the way contemporary artists looked at, and represented the human figure, since it is probable that they knew these theories either from lay-texts, which often reproduce passages of philosophical or medical treatises, or from public lectures and readings.

Since the writings of Vitruvius in the first century AD, the use of the human body as a metaphorical and symbolic referent has provided what is perhaps the most prolific trope for architectural theory. The image of �Vitruvian Man,� with limbs outstretched to touch the circle drawn from its navel, took on particular significance during the Renaissance, as architects such as Alberti, Filarete, di Giorgio, Colonna, and Serlio published their own interpretations of Vitruvius� Ten Books. For these writers, the body, as microcosm, was the best available means for representing the order of the cosmos, the world as a whole. Yet just as the idea of the body as architectural referent was being reinterpreted, the body itself was being transformed by Renaissance anatomy. The unity and integrity of the body was jeopardised as anatomists studied the body through the dissection of corpses. The published results of these studies, the most notable being Vesalius� De Humani Corporis Fabrica, were highly influential, with the anatomical methods of observation and partition emerging as the fundamental tenets of modern science. Several centuries later, the transformation of the body from a symbol of the world to an object amenable to scientific observation and control was all but fully realised, as the discoveries of Pasteur were put to use in the conquest of disease. These changing medical conceptions of the body led to concomitant transformations of the sense of self, as the body as object was increasingly divorced from the operations of the mind, in both its conscious and unconscious forms. This thesis will examine how these changing conceptions of the human body have been interpreted within architectural theory since Vitruvius. Beginning with the idea of ornament as trope of sacrifice, it will examine how interpretations of the relation between the body as whole and as part have affected ideas of architectural composition. Further, it will examine the ethical implications of the trope of building as body, such that a building which reflects the proportions of a �well-composed� body (Francesco di Giorgio), is itself an injunction to �composure,� or appropriate behaviour. It will argue that modern architecture, while rejecting classical anthropomorphism, was nonetheless influenced by ideas and practices arising from anatomy. Then, in contrast to the object-body of anatomy, the thesis will examine phenomenological and hermeneutical conceptions of the body, which interpret the body as lived. From Merleau-Ponty�s study of perception to Scarry�s reading of the significance of pain, the contribution of the body to the sense of self will be explored, giving rise to a renewed conception of anthropomorphism as the manifestation not only of human form, but of human sentience. Further, to the modern fragmentation of both the body and architecture will be opposed integrative strategies of selfhood, such as the formation of narrative identity (Ricoeur), the engagement with a community through practice (MacIntyre), and the idea of the �monstrous� body (Frascari). These strategies will be used to explore ways in which the form of the body can be understood other than in purely material terms, and how this is translated into architecture.

Thesis (M.F.A.)--Rochester Institute of Technology, 1993. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaf 27).

Exegesis (BA--Art and Design) -- AUT University, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references. Also held in print (59 leaves : ill. ; 29 cm + 1 DVD (4 3/4 in.)) in City Campus Theses Collection (T 791.436561 WOO)

Thesis (M.F.A.)--Rochester Institute of Technology, 1990. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaf 33).

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Louisville, 2005. / Department of Fine Art. Vita. "May 2005." Includes bibliographical references (leaf 14).

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1971. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references.

M.Tech. / In this research I offer a reading of selected work by South African artists, Joni Brenner, Berni Searle and Minnette Vári in relation to Julia Kristeva‟s conception of the abject. In examining these artists‟ use of the formal elements of tactility in representation of their corporeality, I draw analogies between their work and two Kristevian theories of heterogeneity, namely the abject and the semiotic (see Pollock 1998: 9). The primary aim of this research is to examine how the use of tactility in visual art may disrupt notions of sameness with specific reference to the assertion of a non-gendered form of embodied representation. While I am indebted to feminist investigations of corporeality and identity, and use these as a theoretical framework, I attempt to reach beyond their politically gendered paradigm. In support of this, my research draws on certain arguments put forward by Kristeva as these are situated in, and advocate, a non-gendered form of embodiment. The element of homogeneity or pervasive naturalisation is aligned with the element of „sameness‟, characteristic of the symbolic element within signification (Lechte & Margaroni 2004: 108). Consequently, following Kristevian theory, I examine ways within visual art in which the semiotic element works in a constant, antagonistic dialectic with the symbolic element. Within this context, I argue these artists suggest the borders of selfhood to be fluid in nature. Within Kristeva‟s model of selfhood, the subject in process, the abject threat of dissolution of self may be contextualised. Therefore, the threat towards one‟s identity is not so much nullified, but is rather no longer separated from the understanding of self. Following Kristeva‟s (1991: 1) thought, one may argue that the foreign „other‟ and the self are intimately related. For the purposes of this research, the pertinent facet of the abject evident in these artists‟ work is an ambiguous, dynamic, open-endedness. I align the arguably consequential abject, partial dissolution of the binary logic of self and other suggested in these artists‟ work, through the use of the formal elements of tactility, with Kristeva‟s conceptualisation of intimate revolt. This intimate revolt advocates ii a continual, questioning revision which may lead to the renewal of the interlinked notions of language and identity. Using a Post-Structuralist approach to research I engaged in textual analysis in order to explore critical positions regarding embodiment, tactility and the abject in representation. In addition, in order to generate empirical research pertaining to her artmaking practice, primary research in the form of semi-structured interviews was conducted with Brenner. In this research, having drawn on Kristeva‟s heterogeneous tools of the semiotic-driven abject, the signifiance and poetic language of the speaking subject and practice of intimate revolt I offer a non-gendered reading of tactility as a transgressive means in the disruption of sameness. Through offering non-gendered readings of the chosen artists‟ work, I have attempted to emphasise the necessity of the abject within the continual formation and renewal of the non-gendered speaking subject within processes of signification and thus of identification.