Late Twentieth Century accounts of art history reveal crises across different artistic disciplines. More recently, the deepest recession since the Great Depression has destabilised the globe. These combined instances of turbulence and conflict shape the context of this research. Using different concepts of instability this study attempts to locate specific images, in art and in a wider cultural sphere, which demonstrate a strong connection to the concerns and processes of my own art practice. In order to do this I explore recurring examples of collapse through assorted definitions of its 'image'. A description of collapse involving the English comedian Tommy Cooper, together with its transposition into a stilled photographic image, forms the fundamental basis of this study. I utilise this image of Cooper's collapse to articulate a form of instability, both in terms of its physical appearance and the less apparent meanings made visible as a consequence. Examined in relation to uncertainty through illustrations of symbolic and 'real' death the signatures of collapse are then further explored in a variety of image studies throughout this thesis. These examples are then used to ascertain how meanings are constructed, transmitted and repeated through the image. Combining phenomenal accounts with first-hand interview material, a detailed case study of the artist Mike Nelson is used to advance this enquiry and to situate a comparative assessment of my own practice. These findings help to support a transferable system of image reproduction across different representational categories as the formula for a fragmented compositional strategy in my work. The results uphold the theory of a shift from art-history into image-history, whereby artworks in different mediums take on some form of equivalence. This then is the definition of my working processes, realised through the reproduction of different 'image forms' manifest as interspersed arrangements of (art) objects and other image components.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:646037 |
| Date | January 2013 |
| Creators | Anderson, Robert |
| Publisher | Ulster University |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
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