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.

Esta tese tem como foco principal a análise das letras e letreiros presentes em projetos arquitetônicos desenvolvidos entre 1925 e 1955 na cidade de São Paulo. Leva em consideração tanto as letras utilizadas para fornecer informações, quanto aquelas projetadas com o intuito de efetivamente serem inseridas nas edificações. O desenvolvimento da pesquisa aqui relatada foi baseado num corpus constituído por 170 projetos arquitetônicos de autoria de arquitetos cujo trabalho está significativamente relacionado ao estilo Art Déco: o Escritório Técnico Ramos de Azevedo Severo & Villares; o escritório Siciliano & Silva; e os arquitetos Elisiário Bahiana, Álvaro Botelho, Gregori Warchavchik, Rino Levi e Jayme da Fonseca Rodrigues. Teriam as letras e os letreiros utilizados nas pranchas de projetos arquitetônicos desse período, repetido as características gráficas e posturas encontradas também nos letreiros de edificações Art Déco construídas? Esta é a questão central da tese, que procura ainda, responder a questões secundárias relativas à relação entre estilo de letra e edificação; ao estabelecimento de padrões de desenho de letras em escritórios, ou entre escritórios; e à possibilidade de identificação dos profissionais envolvidos no desenho das letras e letreiros. Em relação ao letreiros arquitetônicos projetados para uso nas edificações, buscou-se compreender de que maneira isso ocorreu no trabalho dos arquitetos analisados, verificando como eram detalhados e especificados esses letreiros. Também fez parte deste trabalho, o levantamento das práticas de ensino do desenho de letras e caligrafia dentro dos principais cursos de formação profissional para arquitetos e desenhistas existentes em São Paulo naquele momento, o do Liceu de Artes e Ofícios de São Paulo, o da Escola Politécnica de São Paulo e o da Escola de Engenharia do Mackenzie College. A resposta à questão central foi positiva, porém com nuances nos resultados conforme as características particulares de cada um dos arquitetos. Os questionamentos secundários revelaram descobertas que possibilitaram um maior entendimento sobre o uso dos letreiros no desenho arquitetônico. / This dissertation focuses on the analysis of the letters and letterings found in architectural drawings produced between 1925 and 1955 in the city of São Paulo. It takes into account the letters used to convey information, and also those designed to be part of the buildings. The development of the research reported here was based on a corpus of 170 architectural designs from major architects whose work is significantly related to the Art Déco style: the companies Escritório Técnico Ramos de Azevedo Severo & Villares, and Siciliano & Silva; and the architects Elisiário Bahiana, Álvaro Botelho, Gregori Warchavchik, Rino Levi, and Jayme da Fonseca Rodrigues. Would the letters and letterings present in architectural drawings during this period, have repeated graphic characteristics and postures also found in architectural lettering on Art Déco buildings from the same period? This is the central question of this dissertation, that also aims to answer secondary issues regarding the relationship between letterform and architectural styles; the establishment of lettering standards in the offices or between them; and the possibility of identification of those responsible for drawing those letters and letterings. Concerning the design of letters for architectural use, it was sought to understand how that occurred in the work of the architects analyzed, observing how were detailed and specified. A survey of lettering and calligraphy teaching practices in the main professional courses for architects and draftsmen in São Paulo in the period was also conducted. The answer to the central question was positive, but with nuanced results according to particular characteristics from each architect. Secondary questions revealed findings that made possible a better understanding of the practice of lettering in architectural drawing.

Cette recherche tente d’envisager l’art du cinéma comme un art cinégraphique, c’est-à-dire, selon la définition qu’on propose dans ce travail, comme un espace d’images en mouvement se déployant au regard à travers des influx énergétiques qui en animent les composants. Pour en dégager cette substance scripturale et en relever les implications sur le langage du cinéma, cette recherche entreprend un détour par deux pensées de l’image qui ont traditionnellement fait de l’art du tracé un art majeur, manifestant par-là des préoccupations esthétiques et des pensées du langage qui nous semblent en divergence avec celles qui ont conduit l’histoire culturelle occidentale à inventer le cinéma. Que devient alors le cinéma lorsqu’il est investi par ces pensées ? Réciproquement, que peut leur apporter le cinéma en tant que technique, dispositif et matière ? Le premier détour, en posant des questions de mouvement, de geste et de temps, passe par la calligraphie et l’art pictural chinois pour interroger le cinéma en tant que machine à enregistrer, liée à une pensée de la conservation, de la mémoire et de l’événement. Le second détour, en posant des questions de lumière, de regard et d’espace, passe par la calligraphie et l’art pictural musulman pour interroger le cinéma en tant que machine optique, liée à une pensée de la mimésis, de la profondeur et de la monstration. Ces détours servent enfin de base théorique pour penser notre rapport quotidien aux images (numériques principalement), rapport qui se transforme de manière exponentielle et qui reconfigure notre manière de voir, de lire et de toucher les images ; selon un mode précisément cinégraphique. / This research attempts to envisage the art of cinema as a cinegraphic art, that is to say, according to the definition herein, as a space of moving images unfolding themselves to the gaze through energetic impulses that animate its component parts. In order to draw forth this scriptural substance and to ascertain its implications for the language of cinema, this research detours into two realms of thought on the image, which have traditionally elevated the art of drawing into a prominent art form, thus manifesting aesthetic preoccupations and notions of language which we perceive as diverging from those that led Western cultural history to invent cinema. What then becomes of cinema when endowed by these thoughts? Conversely, what can cinema offer them as a technique, a device and a subject? The first detour, by posing questions of movement, gesture and time, journeys through Chinese calligraphy and pictorial art to question cinema as a recording machine, bound to a conception of conservation, memory and of the event. The second detour, by posing questions on light, gaze and space, journeys through Muslim calligraphy and pictorial art to question cinema as an optical machine, bound to a conception of mimesis, depth and of showing. These detours serve as a theoretical grounding for thinking about our everyday relationship to images (mainly digital), a relationship that changes exponentially and reconfigures our way of seeing, reading and touching images; according to a strictly cinegraphic mode.

My dissertation, Pen and Printing-Block: William Morris and the Resurrection of Medieval Paratextuality, considers William Morris’s influence on the rise of paratextual awareness, his negotiation strategies for Victorian England’s social identity, and his rhetorical construction of an idealized past through textual artifacts. The effect of Morris’s growing social awareness on his transition from illumination to print is reframed by considering his calligraphy as paratextual experiments, based on medieval examples, in combining graphic and discursive meanings with rhetorical and social dimensions. The varied and less ambitious agendas of those printers who followed Morris’s Kelmscott Press, however, limited Morris’s legacy in the book arts. The full significance of his illuminations’ meaningful interplay between text and image, and the social intent of these innovations applications in print, has received little critical attention. The opening chapter frames Morris’s visual work in light of his philosophies and introduces the major concerns of material art, the role of history, the limits of language, and the question of meaningful labour. The second chapter surveys select predecessors of Morris’s developing conception of the Gothic, the significance of architecture as its defining form, and the irreplaceability of the physical past. The third chapter considers the role of the illuminated manuscript in Pre-Raphaelite art, tracing Morris’s calligraphic experiments chronologically while identifying medieval inspirations and examining his artistic development. These experiments led to his final collaborative manuscript, the illuminated Æneid which is the fourth chapter’s focus. The sophistication of its paratextual elements is discussed in light of its unique physicality and limitations. The fifth chapter asserts the Kelmscott Press’s role in balancing craftsmanship and aesthetic paratextual strategies with reproducible models. The Kelmscott Chaucer is the culmination of these strategies, and it is compared to the visual rhetoric of its predecessors. The final chapter compares the philosophies and calligraphic elements of major private presses that followed Kelmscott’s legacy. This evolution of aesthetic, social, and practical considerations is also identified in the work of selected Canadian printers, and a final note considers the implications of the rise of immaterial digital text (radiant textuality) for the continuation of material paratextuality’s role in the future.

My dissertation, Pen and Printing-Block: William Morris and the Resurrection of Medieval Paratextuality, considers William Morris’s influence on the rise of paratextual awareness, his negotiation strategies for Victorian England’s social identity, and his rhetorical construction of an idealized past through textual artifacts. The effect of Morris’s growing social awareness on his transition from illumination to print is reframed by considering his calligraphy as paratextual experiments, based on medieval examples, in combining graphic and discursive meanings with rhetorical and social dimensions. The varied and less ambitious agendas of those printers who followed Morris’s Kelmscott Press, however, limited Morris’s legacy in the book arts. The full significance of his illuminations’ meaningful interplay between text and image, and the social intent of these innovations applications in print, has received little critical attention. The opening chapter frames Morris’s visual work in light of his philosophies and introduces the major concerns of material art, the role of history, the limits of language, and the question of meaningful labour. The second chapter surveys select predecessors of Morris’s developing conception of the Gothic, the significance of architecture as its defining form, and the irreplaceability of the physical past. The third chapter considers the role of the illuminated manuscript in Pre-Raphaelite art, tracing Morris’s calligraphic experiments chronologically while identifying medieval inspirations and examining his artistic development. These experiments led to his final collaborative manuscript, the illuminated Æneid which is the fourth chapter’s focus. The sophistication of its paratextual elements is discussed in light of its unique physicality and limitations. The fifth chapter asserts the Kelmscott Press’s role in balancing craftsmanship and aesthetic paratextual strategies with reproducible models. The Kelmscott Chaucer is the culmination of these strategies, and it is compared to the visual rhetoric of its predecessors. The final chapter compares the philosophies and calligraphic elements of major private presses that followed Kelmscott’s legacy. This evolution of aesthetic, social, and practical considerations is also identified in the work of selected Canadian printers, and a final note considers the implications of the rise of immaterial digital text (radiant textuality) for the continuation of material paratextuality’s role in the future.

In our modern world, a signifi cant number of traditional values have been dramatically manipulated, taking on new meanings and definitions quite diff erent from their original or natural signifi cance. Moreover, these traditional values are being replaced by new ones deemed more suitable to today’s world. Ideas such as selfl essness, humility, and longing, among others, have seemingly lost value as a consequence of the frantic pace of modern life and replaced by self-centredness, greed,aridity, exteriority, which will have a direct impact on our surrounding environment. Let’s imagine a land in which selfi shness is not a priority. Instead, replace it with a society driven by humane preferences. Would the architecture of that society still look like ours does today? Would it be as unsociable as it is in our so-called advanced civilization? This thesis investigates this query through a juxtaposition of the traditional values of a Persian art with the demands of modern life. It is a study of the calligraphic art of Iran as a transcendental practice, highly intertwined with strong emotions, wherein the intention of the research is to discover the relationship between Persian calligraphy and architecture. Presenting calligraphy as a context for understanding architecture has the potential to get beyond ourselves in the spaces we author. This research aims to allow the essence of Persian calligraphy into modern space as a means to revive the true essence of architecture: reunion of feeling and space, a concept that is given too little attention in our current architecture.

In our modern world, a signifi cant number of traditional values have been dramatically manipulated, taking on new meanings and definitions quite diff erent from their original or natural signifi cance. Moreover, these traditional values are being replaced by new ones deemed more suitable to today’s world. Ideas such as selfl essness, humility, and longing, among others, have seemingly lost value as a consequence of the frantic pace of modern life and replaced by self-centredness, greed,aridity, exteriority, which will have a direct impact on our surrounding environment. Let’s imagine a land in which selfi shness is not a priority. Instead, replace it with a society driven by humane preferences. Would the architecture of that society still look like ours does today? Would it be as unsociable as it is in our so-called advanced civilization? This thesis investigates this query through a juxtaposition of the traditional values of a Persian art with the demands of modern life. It is a study of the calligraphic art of Iran as a transcendental practice, highly intertwined with strong emotions, wherein the intention of the research is to discover the relationship between Persian calligraphy and architecture. Presenting calligraphy as a context for understanding architecture has the potential to get beyond ourselves in the spaces we author. This research aims to allow the essence of Persian calligraphy into modern space as a means to revive the true essence of architecture: reunion of feeling and space, a concept that is given too little attention in our current architecture.

My dissertation, Pen and Printing-Block: William Morris and the Resurrection of Medieval Paratextuality, considers William Morris’s influence on the rise of paratextual awareness, his negotiation strategies for Victorian England’s social identity, and his rhetorical construction of an idealized past through textual artifacts. The effect of Morris’s growing social awareness on his transition from illumination to print is reframed by considering his calligraphy as paratextual experiments, based on medieval examples, in combining graphic and discursive meanings with rhetorical and social dimensions. The varied and less ambitious agendas of those printers who followed Morris’s Kelmscott Press, however, limited Morris’s legacy in the book arts. The full significance of his illuminations’ meaningful interplay between text and image, and the social intent of these innovations applications in print, has received little critical attention. The opening chapter frames Morris’s visual work in light of his philosophies and introduces the major concerns of material art, the role of history, the limits of language, and the question of meaningful labour. The second chapter surveys select predecessors of Morris’s developing conception of the Gothic, the significance of architecture as its defining form, and the irreplaceability of the physical past. The third chapter considers the role of the illuminated manuscript in Pre-Raphaelite art, tracing Morris’s calligraphic experiments chronologically while identifying medieval inspirations and examining his artistic development. These experiments led to his final collaborative manuscript, the illuminated Æneid which is the fourth chapter’s focus. The sophistication of its paratextual elements is discussed in light of its unique physicality and limitations. The fifth chapter asserts the Kelmscott Press’s role in balancing craftsmanship and aesthetic paratextual strategies with reproducible models. The Kelmscott Chaucer is the culmination of these strategies, and it is compared to the visual rhetoric of its predecessors. The final chapter compares the philosophies and calligraphic elements of major private presses that followed Kelmscott’s legacy. This evolution of aesthetic, social, and practical considerations is also identified in the work of selected Canadian printers, and a final note considers the implications of the rise of immaterial digital text (radiant textuality) for the continuation of material paratextuality’s role in the future.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, San Diego, 2008. / Title from cover. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 353-375). Also available via ProQuest Digital Dissertations.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, San Diego, 2008. / Title from first page of PDF file (viewed June 13, 2008). Available via ProQuest Digital Dissertations. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (p. 353-375).