This thesis analyses the work of the artists living and painting in the area around the fishing village of Cullercoats and examines the conditions which fostered and maintained this colony during the period 1870 to 1914. As part of this process, two hitherto disparate bodies of scholarship are considered in tandem. Firstly, the increasing number of studies into European artists' colonies, encompassing consideration of both the phenomenon itself and of the artworks produced at them. Secondly, the locally-based recovery of late-Ivth-cenrury north east artists and their milieu, which has grown out of regional exhibition projects. Exposing the very clear areas of commonality between the two spheres of study underscores the central questions which this thesis addresses; namely, can the group of artists at Cullercoats be described as a colony; and if so, why has it been so consistently denied a place in colony surveys to-date? Answers are sought by engaging with a number of inter-related issues. These include the particular economic and social conditions which could sustain a local artists' colony and the variety of art clubs, exhibition spaces and sales venues which the colony fostered: the specific elements which are necessarily present to mark out a 'colony', rather than merely a 'sketching ground': the wider contemporary awareness of the colony and its work and how this compares with similar coastal colonies in Britain: the unpicking of the ideologies which underpinned the Naturalist subject in British art in the late-LOth century, including issues of race and gender ideals, nationalism and regionalism, tourism, and anxieties over urbanisation and industrialisation. The scope of this thesis demands an inter-disciplinary approach, combining social, economic and political history, gender studies, the wider field of 'cultural studies', as well as the usual analytical tools of the art historian. In essence, the thesis combines an empirical and theoretical contextualisation as the framework for a fresh perspective on the position and work of the Cullercoats artists' colony, which has wider implications for our understanding of European Naturalism and the colony phenomenon.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Florida State University, 2005. / Advisor: Dr. Lauren S. Weingarden, Florida State University, School of Visual Arts and Dance, Dept. of Art History. Title and description from dissertation home page (viewed June 7, 2005). Document formatted into pages; contains xviii, 294 pages. Includes bibliographical references.

En déplaçant les problématiques traditionnelles - celles des analyses strictement nationales - cette thèse propose d'explorer, à l'aide d'une perspective comparative, l'importance donnée au critère moral par la critique, française et anglaise, lors de sa réception de la peinture victorienne. Le corpus de ce travail s'appuie sur l'étude successive des œuvres anglaises présentées tant aux expositions universelles parisiennes (1855, 1867, 1878 et 1889) qu'à la Royal Academy et des commentaires critiques publiés dans la presse spécialisée ou non. Cette démarche révèle la dynamique des échanges interculturels entre les deux pays autour de la question morale et met en évidence l'existence d'une réception nationaliste de l'art par la critique. Dès lors, le jugement porté sur une œuvre par un critique dépend de sa culture, de son goût, mais aussi plus largement du contexte social et des principes propres à sa société. À ce titre, le climat de compétition entre la France et l'Angleterre se retrouve dans les articles et ouvrages publiés de chaque coté de la Manche. De puissants débats critiques mettent en lumière les processus d'appropriation et de rejet participant à la définition des deux cultures artistiques. Ils réunissent art et morale en interrogeant l'existence d'un « grand genre » victorien, l'exposition comme un espace permettant à la critique de circonscrire un art national et de se définir elle-même, ainsi que l'influence moraliste de John Ruskin (1819-1901) sur la société et son art. L'hétérogénéité de la profession de critique d'art associée à la plasticité du mot « morale » permet donc à ce travail de proposer une définition de la peinture victorienne et de ses acteurs. / By shifting the traditional issues - those of strictly national analyses - this thesis proposes to explore, using a comparative perspective, the importance given to the moral criterion by critics, French and English, when receiving Victorian painting. The corpus of this work is based on the successive study of English paintings presented at the “Expositions universelles” in Paris (1855, 1867, 1878 and 1889) as well as at the Royal Academy, and of the critical comments published in the press specialized or not. This approach reveals the dynamics of intercultural exchanges between the two countries around the moral issue and highlights the existence of a nationalist reception of art by critics. Consequently, a critic's judgment of a painting depends on their culture, their taste, but also more broadly on the social context and the principles specific to their society. As such, the competitive climate between France and England is reflected in the articles and books published on both sides of the English Channel. Powerful critical debates highlight the processes of appropriation and rejection that contribute to the definition of the two artistic cultures in relation to each other. They bring art and morality together by questioning the existence of a Victorian “grand genre”, the exhibition as a place for critics to circumscribe a national art and define themselves, as well as John Ruskin's (1819-1901) moralist influence on society and the art it produces. The heterogeneity of the art criticism profession associated with the plasticity of the word “moral” therefore allows this work to propose a definition of Victorian painting and its actors.