Thesis (Ph. D.)--Rutgers University, 2008. / "Graduate Program in Art History." Includes bibliographical references (p. 346-362).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Rutgers University, 2008. / "Graduate Program in Art History." Includes bibliographical references (p. 261-292).

Thesis (MA (Visual Arts))-University of Pretoria, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references. Available on the Internet via the World Wide Web.

abstract: The Indian princess began as an imposition, a Eurocentric conception based in preconceived notions of cultural structures and gendered power roles - a mixture of noble woman and provocative demure maiden - created by Anglo men to epitomize an idyllic image of otherness and womanhood. This analysis begins by exploring the history of the icon that was first conceived through sixteenth century explorer's tales of exotic queens then traces her progression through the romantic idealizations of the Indian woman Pocahontas. Research then explores how the character, comprised of a mixture of feathers, beads, and buckskin, was implemented into performance, and discusses how her flesh and blood enactment became critical to her survival. Drawing on the theories of contemporary critics, final examination turns to twentieth century perceptions of the Princess and reactions to her by contemporary Native artists whose manipulations of the character opens alternative dialogs about the stereotype to offer reconstructions of her historic discourse. / Dissertation/Thesis / M.A. Art History 2011

abstract: From inception, the earliest museums in Europe were a haven for artifacts, many of which represented world cultures within its walls. The tradition of encyclopedic collecting characterized European museums and U.S. institutions modeled themselves after this example. In the 20th century, defining cultural property, in the form of excavated objects, became a priority for many nations and resulted in the scrutiny of ancient artifacts, in particular. This led to the establishment of international protocols which sought to protect items during times of both peace and war. Despite international legislation, the trade of illicit antiquities continued. A major advocate for repatriation, the nation of Italy aggressively sought return of many objects from antiquity and recently approached the Metropolitan Museum of Art regarding several items whose provenance was suspect. Ultimately the conflict was resolved through The Metropolitan Museum of Art-Republic of Italy Agreement of February 21, 2006, which transferred the title of six antiquities to Italy in return for long term loans of equivalent objects to the museum. The landmark agreement represents a mutually profitable resolution to a situation potentially plaguing thousands of institutions worldwide. The implications of replication of the agreement can potentially change how museums, nations and the public understand concepts of ownership and may reduce the role of permanent collections in favor of sharing, rather than possessing, world heritage. / Dissertation/Thesis / M.A. Art History 2011

Emerging from an early association with street art during the 1980s, the artist Jean-Michel Basquiat was largely regarded within the New York avant-garde, as ‘an exotic other,’ a token Black artist in the world of American modern art; a perception which forced him to examine and seek to define his sense of identity within art and within society. Drawing upon what he described as his ‘cultural memory,’ Basquiat deftly mixed together fragments of past and present, creating a unique style of painting, based upon his own experiences of contemporary American life blended with a remembering of an African past. This study will examine the work of Basquiat during the period 1978 – 1988, tracing his progression from obscure graffiti writer SAMO© to successful gallery artist. Situating my study of Basquiat’s oeuvre in relationship to Paul Gilroy’s concept of the Black Atlantic, I will analyse Basquiat’s exploration of his cultural heritage and depiction of a narrative of Black history, which confronts issues of racism and social inequality, and challenges the constraints of traditional binary oppositions. I will examine Basquiat’s representation of the icon of the griot; narrator of African history and mythical talisman, shedding new light on the artist’s reclamation of this powerful totem. Traversing the perimeters of the Black Atlantic I show how Basquiat’s work has influenced both fine art and urban cultural practice in Britain. Through analysis of Basquiat’s self-portraits I will examine his repositioning the black subject, literally and historically, within the tradition of painting, and argue that through this relocation, Basquiat’s work contributes to models of reparative histories. I will consider Basquiat’s processes of identification and his refusal to be labelled ‘a black artist,’ situating his visual construction of self identity in relation to a post-black aesthetic. Analysis of Basquiat’s paintings lies at the heart of my research, and I conclude my study with an in-depth consideration of three paintings created by the artist during the final year of his life which characterise the enduring themes within his expansive body of work. My research contributes to existing scholarship into the work of Jean-Michel Basquiat, providing original insight into the work of this important artist.

<p> My dissertation studies the uses of the notion of archive in post-war contemporary art practices around the Lebanese Civil Wars (1975-1990). After the wars, a group of artists from Lebanon began to collect data and produce documents that referenced the traces and memories of the conflict. These compilations metamorphosed into aesthetic projects that took archival-like forms. In this dissertation, I discuss the archival works of Walid Raad, Paola Yacoub/Michel Lasserre, Gilbert Hage, Jalal Toufic, Joanna Hadjithomas/Khalil Joreige, Lamia Joreige, Akram Zaatari, Rasha Salti/Ziad Antar and Marwan Rechmaoui. </p><p> This boom of art practices around memory and archives in Lebanon has opposed the politics of amnesia sponsored by the Lebanese state through the Amnesty Law of 1991. Post-war artists, however, have addressed this official amnesia not by seeking to reconstruct the historical facts and recover the real documentation of the wars; instead, they have activated the memories of the wars by exploring the very destruction of these memories. These artists have produced and at the same time deconstructed archives by assembling fragmented, fabricated, para-fictional, and decontextualized collections of photographs, videos, and everyday materials. I describe these practices as <i>ar(t)chive production</i> (or <i>archives-in-the-making</i>). </p><p> While the notion of archive is common in modern and contemporary art regarding trauma and memory, my hypothesis is that the archival works of these Lebanese artists are shaped by the new structural context of global war. Most European models of archive pursue a recovery of memory against the destruction in the total wars of the twentieth century, particularly exemplified by the artworks about the Holocaust. By contrast, the practices on the Lebanese Civil Wars engage in the logic of constructive destruction of what Carlo Galli has theorized as global war. Within this logic, violence is both destructive and productive. In this respect, instead of opposing the official amnesia by reviving the memories of the wars, the post-war Lebanese artists reflect on amnesia by showing the construction of the past by means of its own destruction.</p><p>

<p> Shigeru Mizuki (1922-2015) is one of the most sophisticated and accomplished of modern manga artists. His work synthesizes ancient and modern Japanese visual artistic methods with contemporary tropes from Western graphic art to tell profound and complex stories that reflect major themes of war and the supernatural world. This thesis argues that Mizuki&rsquo;s work should be reevaluated as a valuable contribution to modern art based on the following three qualities: technical mastery and innovation in visual art; socio-political and philosophical depth of content; and his impact on other contemporary Japanese artists. Such study is significant because of the popularity of manga and other graphic art in shaping both popular culture and the view of art adopted by younger generations. Thus, studying Mizuki has implications for our understanding of art and its intersection with popular culture, and raises questions regarding whether popular media like manga should be considered seriously by art historians. </p><p>

<p> The Rue R&eacute;aumur, cleared and constructed between 1896 and 1900, was the first major urbanism project initiated in central Paris after the dismissal of Haussmann. Realized under the Third Republic and under the guidance of a democratically elected Paris Municipal Council, the street provoked an unprecedented public debate about urbanist priorities, the management of municipal debt, and architectural aesthetics. Disappointed with the visual homogeneity of the Haussmannian boulevard, Councilors liberalized building code and declared a Concours des Fa&ccedil;ades in the Rue R&eacute;aumur in order to visually revitalize their city.</p><p> That variation of the streetscape would turn on a monumentalization of the urban party-wall building through enlarged <i>saillies</i> and <i> avant-propos</i>, corbelled fa&ccedil;ade elements hitherto banned in the streets of Paris. Conceived as a central business district, the Rue R&eacute;aumur was also a unique concentration of commercial architecture, which encouraged an expanded use of iron structure to open building interiors and fa&ccedil;ades into naturally illuminated, floor-through spaces of manufacture. Construction in the Rue R&eacute;aumur was, then, guided by contradictory impulses. Charged with psychically countering the uniformity of the rationalized city, the exuberant elevations of the new street simultaneously masked a reordering of the architectural object by similar pressures towards economic and technological efficiency. </p><p> This dissertation treats the architecture of the Rue R&eacute;aumur and the public debate that shaped it as mutually determining engagements of architectural modernity. It situates the street's evolution as a response to the political, economic, spatial, and psychic challenges posed by the emerging capitalist metropolis. Reconstruction of the architectural and social discourses that informed design practice in the Rue R&eacute;aumur positions late-century eclecticism as an indispensable step in the development of interwar Parisian modernism. That architecture served as the primary object of rejection within modernist historiography and avant-garde theory due to its reliance on historical vocabularies. This study demonstrates that the perceptual immediacy desired of the late-century Parisian fa&ccedil;ade was of equal importance to the development of architectural modernism as theories of structural rationalism. It considers eclecticist architecture like that of the Rue R&eacute;aumur as a moment of dynamic invention within nineteenth-century theory and design practice, the terms of which would integrally condition Le Corbusier's reconception of architecture and architectural aesthetics a generation later.</p><p>

abstract: The German Dada artist Hannah Höch is considered one of the most significant artists of photomontage. What is less discussed is Höch’s continued use of other mediums, particularly watercolor, and how the two mediums of watercolor and photomontage are combined in many of her artworks. Berlin Dada criticized bourgeois artistic groups and mediums. The Berlin Dadaists Richard Huelsenbeck and Raoul Hausmann called for new ways of engaging with the medium of painting, which resulted in the group’s development of photomontage. However, other Dada artists such as George Grosz, Kurt Schwitters, Francis Picabia, and Hausmann, continued to engage with the traditional medium of painting. Höch was integral to the development of photomontage. Like her Dada contemporaries, she also experimented with painting. She developed the new hybrid medium of photomontage-painting. I argue that Höch’s photomontages are better understood as photomontage-paintings. Höch’s photomontage- paintings combine the mediums of (watercolor) painting and photomontage into a singular medium. My reexamination of these works as photomontage-paintings presents a more accurate view of Höch as a multidimensional artist. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Art History 2015