This dissertation is a study in representation. More specifically, it is a study in the
representation of art and of art history as melancholy representation. The latter is
produced or opens up, because objects of art â pictures, images, or Bilder (read
âlikenessesâ) â have a tendency to withdraw or turn away from view. Objects of art,
which may be thought of as âthinking objectsâ or âliving imagesâ, that is, as quasisubjects,
negate complete ownership. Like living things, objects of art are infinitely
incomplete; they arise out of an ongoing process of becoming and disappearance. As
such, our relationship with them may be said to be one of âmutual desireâ, want and lack.
Moreover, as Michael Ann Holly (2002) has argued, the study of art history is bedevilled
by lost, obscure, or obsolete objects; cloudy, shadowy, ghostly, even corpse-like objects
that deny total acquisition or last words. It is in this sense that one can say art history â
perhaps like any history â is a melancholic science. It is also from this melancholy
perspective that this dissertation reflects, in various ways, on the imaging of history as
catatastrophe or as catastrophic loss â as this is figured in the work of Walter Benjamin,
Anselm Kiefer, and William Kentridge.
How then do we write about art and the history of art, when the objects of our study are
both too close and too far away, mutually absent and present â fleeting, yet seemingly
permanent? How can one âimageâ the catastrophic debilitation of melancholic disavowal
or death of self, without succumbing to its debilitating attractions? Following on from
Max Penskyâs (2001) tracing of the historical image of melancholia as dialectical, the aim
of this dissertation is to delineate a discursive space for perception and reflection; a
critical space within which to think of the melancholic im-possibility of representation
qua possession, as essentially negatively dialectical: futile and heroic, pointless and
necessary.
Finally, this dissertation asks: how can one write about the imaging of history as
castastrophe, as this is figured from within different historical frameworks: that of an early twentieth century German-Jewish philosopher, a late twentieth/early twenty-first
century German artist, and a late twentieth/early twenty-first South African-Jewish artist?
How can one hope to relate their essentially melancholy work without becoming culpable
of ahistoricity or even pastiche? No easy answers have been forthcoming during the
writing of this dissertation. However, it is my delicate contention that reading and
picturing their work in and as a melancholy constellation whose parameters shift
depending on oneâs point of view, as opposed to submitting their similarities and
differences to rigorous systematic analysis, has revealed surprising and enlightening
elective affinities. In the final analysis, visual and philosophical analogy has the last say.
And this seems fitting, especially where one encounters a writer and two artists whose
thinking in images tirelessly challenge our thinking âlogicallyâ in words alone.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:ufs/oai:etd.uovs.ac.za:etd-02262009-114723 |
| Date | 26 February 2009 |
| Creators | Schoeman, Gerhard Theodore |
| Contributors | Prof DJ van den Berg |
| Publisher | University of the Free State |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | en-uk |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.uovs.ac.za//theses/available/etd-02262009-114723/restricted/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to University Free State or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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