Thesis (MA (VA)(Visual Arts))--University of Stellenbosch, 2009. / The purpose of the thesis is to contextualise my art works in theoretical terms. As counterpart to my art practice and consistent with its subject matter, the thesis deals with the handbag as subject and investigates the formation of an idiomatic, metaphorical or symbolic visual language that emerges in my handbag Collections. The thesis traces how such language pertains to social, cultural and personal history as sources of its conception to also serve as foundation for the conception of my art works. Its central questions are formulated around ‘how’, thus investigating the formative, the developmental and the process. Its thinking is relativist, embracing the belief that no option is absolute, but rather as susceptible to change as it is open to interpretation. As events of change and change inducing events, developmental processes are posed in a framework of generative structuralism that comprises the internalisation of externalities and the externalisation of internalities. As such it structures an attempt to define the genesis of my aesthetic idiolect in and from a cultural context. The thesis therefore posits its secondary aims as investigative rather than determinist of how social and cultural context informs my art-making processes and how generation and development occur in my art-making processes in order to determine how these factors contribute to a personal voice becoming evident in my work. My art practice and art works serve as primary sources of information and the thesis partially serves as a process of textual re-articulation of my own art-making practices to reveal the relationships between habitus as generative structure, enaction of identity and aesthetic idiolect.

This thesis is an ethnographic account of the carving of wooden ritual statues and of the shamanic figure of the seer among the Kuna of the San Blas archipelago of Panamá. Through a study of the production of wooden ritual statues and of the birth and initiation of seers, I show that the distinction between the visible and the invisible, and between designs and images, is a crucial aspect of Kuna ways of thinking and experiencing their world. On one hand, the Kuna theory of design shows the importance of the development of social skills in the creation of person and sociality. On the other hand, the Kuna concept of image points to the relation between human and ancestral beings and to the transformative capacities of both. Through the constant interplay of the two categories, people interact with cosmic forces and create social life. The ethnography explores three aspects of the problem. First, the relationship between the islands inhabited by Kuna people and the mainland forest is described, focusing on the distance and separation of the two domains. The forest is perceived as a space populated by ancestral animal and tree entities, as well as demons and souls of the dead. Second, the carving of the ritual statues and the skill of Kuna carvers are described in relation to human and supernatural fertility. The birth of seers, different from that of other babies, provides evidence of the importance of natal design as the potential skills of each person. Third, relationships between human and supernatural beings are described considering Kuna myth and ritual action, in comparison with other indigenous American societies. This thesis concludes that it is through carving wooden statues and developing the capacity to see, Kuna people seek security in social life and protection from a predatory cosmos.

This thesis examines an approach to directing Mac Wellman and David Lang’s opera, The Difficulty of Crossing a Field; in addition, the paper reflects on my artistic development as a Master of Fine Arts in Directing student in the Department of Theatre and Dance at the University of Texas at Austin. As a director I seek a balance between form and content. Similar to Installation Art, I consider the relationship between space/architecture (the stage/theatre) and sculpture, i.e., anything that can be used to create shape: performers, props, scenery, wardrobe, makeup, light, sound, music, language, etc. As a deviser, not a dictator, the success of my work depends greatly on interdisciplinary collaboration and strategies that promote understanding and appreciation among both artists and audiences. My aim is to create structures for formal elements that when arranged uniquely and sophisticatedly have the ability to provoke emotion, thought, and memory in vivid and compelling ways. This paper explores selected stages of directing The Difficulty of Crossing a Field, the strategies that I employed, and concludes with an artistic statement. / text

The contemporary Japanese manga industry began in 1959 when the first weekly manga magazines were published. Throughout the 1960s publishing companies attracted a large adult readership by incorporating radical political themes and realistic drawing styles in manga magazines. The readership continued to expand throughout the 1970s and 1980s and manga became a mass medium on a similar scale to television or pop-music. This thesis identifies two distinct trends in the cultural status of manga which were developing from the mid-1980s onwards. On the one hand, what had previously been seen as 'commercial' manga became respected as an 'art' form and highbrow communication medium. On the other, manga was vilified as pornography and as the extreme expression of an increasingly fragmented society. In the former trend, prestigious corporations sponsored a new category of 'information' manga, whilst in the latter, 'girls' and 'otaku' manga genres were censured by a quasi-governmental censorship movement. The amateur manga subculture in particular became the focus of a 'moral panic' where those involved were characterised as isolated and socially dysfunctional. This thesis, based on ten months' participant observation and intensive interviews in 'Morning' manga magazine editorial office in 1994, examines how this editorial was influenced by the changing status of manga in Japanese society in the formulation of its editorial policy and production methods. Editors felt that in the 1990s social changes presented the manga industry with serious production problems - in particular, a dearth of 'good' artists who could produce social themes, and a shrinking readership. Morning editorial attempted to overcome these problems by pioneering a new form of artistic, high-quality and respectable adult manga, aimed at older and more socially-elite readers. By creating a new proactive intellectual role for manga editors at the same time as sponsoring experimental graphic styles, Morning editorial produced a distinctive new form of conservative, state-supporting social and political adult manga. The re-definition of specific genres of manga as 'art' by Japanese institutions was paralleled by changes in commercial manga production which privileged the social and intellectual interests of editors over those of readers and artists. This study concludes that editors have become increasingly impo7tant in manga production between 1986 and 1995, and that there is a tight interrelationship between commercial cultural production and broader cultural and social discourses generally.

The habit of honouring outstanding individuals with statues was common throughout the Roman Empire. Yet after the end of the Severan reign at the beginning of the third century AD, a decrease in honorific statues is generally assumed to have taken place. This thesis aims to evaluate this hypothesis, focusing specifically on the years AD 222-285. The thesis is assessing the contemporaneous imperial remains for the Roman Empire as a whole and the evidence from four exemplary cities that are particularly conspicuous in their statuary production and display, both before and after the time frame under investigation (Leptis Magna, Athens, Ephesus, Aphrodisias). The purpose is to explore the standards, conventions, and limitations of statuary practice in Roman society in a synthetic and comparative analysis and thereby to evaluate its political and social role during a state of internal and external instability, labelled 'the third century crisis'. By providing concrete figures, the practice of the third century can be juxtaposed with both the antecedent and subsequent centuries and this will facilitate a more coherent insight into the overall development and changes in Roman honorific statuary practice. The results suggest that the assumed decline in the number of statuary installations might have to be re-evaluated. It has become apparent that in order to obtain comparable numbers, the inclusion of imperial family members in any statistical evaluation is indispensable, a factor which has previously been disregarded. A gradual decrease cannot be supported and neither can a decrease in the appreciation of honours.

Calligraphic rubbing collections or rubbing collections of model calligraphy (fatie 法帖) are frequently described as a source of canonical models for the learning of calligraphy. They are often associated with and usually refer to the calligraphy of the Two Wangs (Wang Xizhi 王羲之, 303-61, or 321-79, and his son Xianzhi 獻之, 344-86). They also became acknowledged as embodying the classical tradition transmitted mostly from the Jin (265-420) Dynasty, one which was well-known as the calligraphy canon. In general, recent scholarship on rubbing collections holds that rubbing collections often transmitted important and highly recognized works which represented the classical tradition or calligraphy canon. This thesis aims to analyze how Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) people received new forms of rubbing collections, and explores some of their social roles in Ming China. Apart from traditional concerns, for instance for the aesthetic value and the origins of various editions of rubbing collections, other aspects of rubbing collections of the Ming, for example, socio-historical and material culture perspectives, have not been explored in detail. The development of this form of calligraphy reproduction in China is important as an instance, alongside original works of calligraphy, of how the history of calligraphy was created and contested. The thesis will evaluate which calligraphers were chosen to be reproduced in rubbing form, which of their works were included, and what proportion of rubbing collections their work occupied, as well as who the patrons were and when the collections were published. An analysis of this information will show how the rubbing collections challenged the calligraphy canon and facilitated social mobility between various social groups particularly, scholars-officials, merchants and commoners. It will be demonstrated that Ming rubbing collections were no longer exclusively devoted to the traditional canon, nor did they contain only calligraphy of high aesthetic value. Calligraphy after masterpieces written in the copiers’ own styles and writings of those without significant reputations in calligraphy were made into rubbing collections as well. The thesis will attempt to show the cause(s) for this change.

Interdisciplinary integration and practice through meaning making and context can contribute to the reconsideration and revolution of research by supporting narrativesand creating space for public discourse. In researching my heritage as a Korean adoptee, I found that the literature has been predominantly from adoptive parents' perspective,focusing primarily on child and adolescent development. Lacking in the literature is the adult adoptee perspective, and specifically their experiential voices. This interdisciplinary thesis has three major purposes (1) to explore how transracial transnational Korean adoption affects identity formation, (2) to illustrate how mentoring relationships can be a means to address and reframe the theme of loss as experienced by an adoptee, and (3) to use interdisciplinary inquiry as a means of expression to make meaning and illuminate adoptee identity formation. Drawing from my personal experience as an adoptee, an artist, a researcher, and as an educational mentee I integrate past research findings, Scholarly Personal Narrative (SPN: storytelling), epistolary Scholarly Personal Narrative (eSPN: epistolary storytelling), and visual artistic research through jewelry/sculpture to describe constructing my adoptee identity. Images of the jewelry/sculpture are provided, while a public art opening displayed the series of work.

Quel est le sens donné à l’art par la minorité palestinienne d’Israël dans un contexte où l’État se définit uniquement en termes ethno-nationaux et religieux ? Les écrits sur l’art en contextes coloniaux et postcoloniaux ont tendance à considérer l’art comme une ressource de revendication identitaire face à une situation de domination. Autrement dit, l’art est souvent présenté comme un acte politique de reconnaissance à travers l’affirmation d’une contre-identité. Suite à un travail intensif de terrain ethnographique dans la région, cette recherche démontre que pour les artistes palestiniens en Israël, l’aspect politique de l’art ne vient pas de sa capacité à exprimer des revendications identitaires. À travers l’observation des pratiques et l’analyse des discours des artistes, elle remet en question la relation présumée entre l'art et l'identité. Plus concrètement, elle analyse les pratiques d’un groupe d’artistes issus d’une minorité nationale indigène dont le travail artistique constitue une interruption des régimes spatiotemporels d'identification. L’aspect politique du travail des artistes palestiniens en Israël s’exprime à travers un processus de désidentification, un refus de réduire l’art à des catégories identitaires dominantes. Les œuvres de ces artistes permettent l’expression d’une rupture esthétique, manifestant un « ayant lieu » politique qui se trouve entre l'art et le non-art. Il s’agit d’un espace qui permet la rupture de l’ordre sensible de la société israélienne à travers l’affirmation et la vérification d’une égalité qui existe déjà. / This thesis explores what it means for the Palestinian indigenous minority in Israel to produce art in a setting that has simultaneously controlled their movements and excluded them from full citizenship. It takes on the question of how Palestinian artists face discrimination within a monolithic state structure that defines itself primarily along religious and ethno-national lines. Most writing about art in colonial and postcolonial contexts tends to see art as a resource for asserting repressed ethnic, racial and indigenous identities in the face of ongoing control and domination. Art, in other words, is considered a political act of recognition through the assertion of a counter identity. The central question of this thesis concerns what happens when artists contest the colonial conditions within which they live without having recourse to identity-based claims about equality and rights. Based on intensive ethnographic fieldwork in the region, this research demonstrates that for Palestinian artists the political aspect of art is not related to claims about identity and that the relationship between art and identity is not homologous. Specifically, it explores artistic processes within a context in which spatiotemporal regimes of identification are being disrupted by an indigenous national minority. It establishes that politics in the case of Palestinian artists in Israel is a form of disidentification that is articulated through the figure of the present absentee. The central tropes found within the works of these artists can be seen as disruptive aesthetic acts, a “taking place” of politics that is between art and non-art, and outside of given identities; that is, a scene for the rupture of the “sensible order” of Israeli society through the affirmation and verification of an already existing equality.

This thesis explores how the practice and profession of architecture was increasingly understood and discussed in terms of the public in the first half of the twentieth century through six case studies. In the age of universal suffrage, architects began to recognise that, in order for the profession to flourish, the built environment would have to respond to the demands of public opinion and publicity, and that design would need to appeal to the 'man in the street' if the profession was to establish its position in the new culture of democracy. 'Architecture and the Public in Interwar Britain' thus challenges the view that the mainstream of interwar British architecture was parochial and backward looking, and seeks to reintegrate the stories of many well-known but academically neglected projects and controversies into twentieth century architectural history, which remains dominated by attempts to nuance the privileged narrative of the growth and 'triumph' of Modernism and the International Style. Instead, I argue that architecture is better conceived as a broad discourse involving a number of agents of diverse positions and attitudes struggling with common critical and professional challenges. The first section of the thesis considers architecture in the Imperial Metropolis. After offering a re-reading of 66 Portland Place, the headquarters of the RIBA, through the lens of professional anxieties in the interwar years, it considers two controversial rebuilding projects: Regent Street and Waterloo Bridge. The thesis then considers architecture and publicity in the suburbs, offering close readings of factories along the new arterial roads out of London, in particular the Guinness Brewery and Gillette Factory amongst others. The final section of the thesis unpicks the idea of the civic centre in interwar Britain through the contrasting examples of Southampton Civic Centre and lastly Norwich City Hall.

M.Tech. / This study is based on the premise that awareness of active citizenship among South African citizens should be encouraged and can be developed through specific educational and skills interventions embedded in Visual Art learning programmes. South Africa‟s developing democracy requires active citizens with the capacity to disseminate values of equality, dignity, liberty and social justice, amongst other constitutional rights. Our country‟s history in the struggle for liberation encompasses a legacy of resistance, and screen-printed protest posters played an important role in communicating dissent towards the apartheid state (Seidmann 2009, Peffer 2009). My research examines the role of screen-printing as a particular graphic medium which is an organising tool to create awareness and communication. The project uses co-operative enquiry as a participatory action research method to facilitate the application of hand-made fine art screen-printed artworks and posters that support skills development, an understanding of self-identity and a sharing of skills that contribute to active citizenship. I present three visual art screen-printing projects that I facilitated from 2010 to 2011 at Artist Proof Studio (APS), an art centre in Johannesburg, whose mission is to inculcate aspects of active citizenship among the participating learners. I contend that the combination of all three screen-print projects presented to the group of students, leads to skills-development, awareness of personal identity and participation in community engagement projects which may enhance their ability to participate as active citizens and which in turn supports the mission statement of the education unit at APS. Such an intervention serves as a learning model that can further contribute to social, educational and economic redress among the participants at APS.