Browsing by Department "Art and Art History"
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Item Abstraction, expression, kitsch: American painting in a critical context, 1936-1951(2007) Price, Justine Dana; Shiff, RichardThis following is a study on abstract painting: the critical reception and analysis of painterly practice--performative, experimental, dissenting--in New York from 1936 to 1951. By metonymy, this study also looks at the figure in the political realm via the critiques offered by socially-oriented critics at this time (some of whom were also art critics). As the boundless secondary literature on this period has noted, the painting of the New York School would "triumph" with "stunning success" by the late 1950s. In other regards, the subject of this dissertation is that of failure. The revolution (or, "the idea of Revolution") that had been hoped for by so many left-wing radicals in the 1930s never quite came to pass or, later, went horribly wrong: first in Spain and then elsewhere. "Modern art, like modern literature and modern life," Clement Greenberg concluded in a 1948 essay on the Old Masters "has lost much." Greenberg's essay on the Old Masters appeared in the same number of Partisan Review as Hannah Arendt's essay, "The Concentration Camps." This is the generation of critics, intellectuals and artists who bore the brunt of articulating the unspeakable horrors of the Camps and the Bomb--manmade places and events that were "beyond human comprehension." This study is also about belief, of kinds: a Modernist belief in the agency of the artist, in the discernment of the critic, and of a "superstitious regard for print," to which Greenberg referred with irony in a 1957 essay (artists didn't always believe what they read, he would conclude). Irving Howe, the founder of Dissent in 1954, supposedly once quipped that, "when intellectuals can do nothing else, they start a magazine." The dissertation at hand contains a number of kinds of critical statements: ones of ambiguity and of skepticism, and others of crisis and disinterest, directed towards art objects and elsewhere, and expressed by writers at mid-century, some especially subtle and acute. Modernist belief, even if betrayed too often, allowed these critics often to escape velleities, or other empty gestures, in their writing.Item Against the "subject" of video, circa 1976 : Joan Jonas's Good night good morning and an archive of "narcissism"(2010-08) Williams, Robin Kathleen, 1981-; Reynolds, Ann Morris; Tejada, RobertoThis thesis analyzes the relationship between Joan Jonas’s 1976 videotape Good Night Good Morning and the existing historiographical discourse on video art from the 1970s. I begin with a careful analysis and historical contextualization of Rosalind Krauss’s seminal 1976 essay on video art, “Video: The Aesthetics of Narcissism.” I then compare her essay with a number of present-day interpretations of video art that are in part motivated by a departure from Krauss and identify a range of presuppositions that have persisted through the art historical discourse on video art from the mid-1970s forward. Finally, I demonstrate that the terms of this essentially medium-specific discourse are too limited to offer a satisfying analysis of Good Night Good Morning and argue that understanding Jonas’s work requires an intermedial analysis.Item ‘Ain Ghazal Token Catalogue, by Type and Subtype(Ex Oriente, 2013) Iceland, Harry‘Ain Ghazal Token Catalogue, by Type and SubtypeItem ‘Ain Ghazal “Monumental” Figures: A Stylistic Analysis(Ex Oriente, 2013) Schmandt-Besserat, DeniseThis final part of the chapter devoted to the ‘Ain Ghazal plaster statuary excavated in 1983 and 1985 focuses on the style. The analysis includes: (1) a definition of the genre, (2) its evolution between 6750-6500 bc, (3) a comparison with other anthropomorphic representations at the site, (4) a comparison with similar contemporaneous assemblages in the Levant, (5) a review of the possible origin of the PPNB statuary. The paper also assesses the three common interpretations of the statues—ancestors, ghosts, or deities. Finally, the conclusion evaluates the significance of monumental plastic art.Item Animal Figurines(Ex Oriente, 2013) Schmandt-Besserat, DeniseThe excavations at ‘Ain Ghazal generated an assemblage of 151 animal figurines, most of which depict horned animals such as bulls, goats, rams, and gazelles. The artifacts were cursorily made of coarse clay in a style that combined stylized withers and legs with highly naturalistic horns. The disposal of some figurines under house floors or in domestic hearths and their repetitious style suggest that the objects were not simply whimsical representations, but that they instead had a specific function. This chapter reviews how later Mesopotamian magical texts may provide an insight into the ritual use of these prehistoric figurines.Item Anton Perich presents and TV party : queering television via Manhattan public access channels, 1973-1982(2010-12) Carmack, Kara Elizabeth; Reynolds, Ann Morris; Tejada, Roberto; Cvetkovich, Ann; Smith, Michael; Guernesy, JuliaThough largely overlooked in academia, Manhattan public access television became a forum that allowed a variety of behaviors, sexualities, and genders to invade a highly controlled hegemonic apparatus in the 1970s and early 1980s. In this thesis, I argue that Anton Perich’s Anton Perich Presents (1973-c.1978) and Glenn O’Brien’s TV Party (1978-1982) worked to actively queer the form and content of television. Since these shows grew from rather exclusive underground communities, I argue that the broadcasting of these fringe personalities, genders, sexualities, and behaviors to a broader, cable-viewing public formed unique queer counterpublics. I situate Anton Perich Presents and TV Party in relation to the norms of broadcast television in order to establish the limits, norms, and codes of these diverse genres and in order to ascertain viewer’s expectations of them. By positioning Anton Perich Presents and TV Party in conversation with mainstream television shows, I identify a queerness these public access shows lent to television and its viewers through their deliberate manipulations of the medium.Item Arctic-adapted art education : looking at the art education experiences and efforts of Inuit artist Andrew Qappik(2009-08) McCuaig, Adria Cowell; Bolin, Paul Erik, 1954-; Melinda, MayerThis thesis presents a qualitative case study based on interviews I conducted with contemporary Inuit artist and art educator Andrew Qappik. I traveled to Pangnirtung, Nunavut Territory, Canada in order to ask the 45-year-old "master printmaker" about the art education he received as a child and adult while living in a mostly Inuit town of approximately 1,300 in the eastern Canadian Arctic. Additionally, I interviewed Qappik about the art-teaching activities he has been providing to children and adults, in Pangnirtung and beyond, for the past fifteen years. My research sheds light not only on Qappik's personal experiences, but, by extension, on the nature of the art education models recently and currently operating in his local and regional communities. In this thesis, I present information about the "arctic-adapted" nature of art education within a unique borderland society--a location in which the traditions, values and contemporary practices of the indigenous Inuit culture are intertwined with those of the dominant, mainstream, Canadian culture.Item Art History Visiting Lecture Series: Ivor Miller, 'Mambo Abakuá: initiation-coded social organization in the Arts of the African Diaspora(Art History Visiting Lecture Series: Ivor Miller, 'Mambo Abakuá: initiation-coded social organization in the Arts of the African Diaspora, 2008) John L. Warfield Center of African & African American StudiesItem Art learning in the home: a survey of households in Austin, Texas(2009-12) Wilky, Megan Marie; Bolin, Paul Erik, 1954-; Ulbricht, Jarvis W.The purpose of this study was to determine how much art activity is taking place within households in Austin, Texas. By way of a questionnaire, the parents or guardians of children attending schools within the Austin Independent School District were surveyed regarding art activity within their homes. The objective of this investigation was to provide answers to questions such as: In what ways do children participate in art making within the context of the family household? To what extent does it appear a parent’s/guardian’s level of schooling, number of children in the family, and amount of electronic entertainment available to the child correspond with the amount of art activity that takes place in the household? Professional and personal motivations led to this investigation. There is an ever increasing amount of electronic entertainment available to children. Has this recent growth of technology had an effect on the amount of time children spend with art activities in the home? Through my own experiences growing up, and through conversations with others, it was brought to my attention that the number of children residing in a household might have an effect on the amount of art activities taking place within the home, as well as the parent’s or guardian’s level of education. Through the data collected by this investigation, I was able to reach a conclusion regarding the relationship found between the amount of art activities taking place in the households surveyed and the three variables studied in this investigation: (a) the parent’s education, (b) the amount of electronic entertainment available to the children in the home, (c) the number of children residing in the home. Support from the data indicated a significant pattern representing that the parent’s/guardian’s education is related to the amount of art activity taking place within the household. However, there was no pattern found regarding the variable of electronic entertainment devices found in a home and the amount of art making within that home. There was also a significant relationship found regarding the numbers of children residing in the household, and the amount of art activity those children are engaged in. The data collected indicated that a household in which fewer children reside is more likely to participate in more art activities.Item The artist, the atom, and the Bikini Atoll : Ralston Crawford paints Operation Crossroads(2010-08) Gorski, Susanna Brooks; Henderson, Linda Dalrymple, 1948-; Clarke, John R.This thesis explores Ralston Crawford’s canvases painted after witnessing the events of Operation Crossroads at the Bikini Atoll in 1946. Commissioned by Fortune, the artist provides the viewer with a unique and captivating view of the destruction wrought by atomic weaponry. Through a careful look at Crawford’s relationship with Fortune, Edith Halpert’s Downtown Gallery, and Crawford’s artistic contemporaries, this thesis positions the paintings within the art historical and cultural context of the mid-twentieth century and asserts their importance to the history of the Atomic Age. The thesis traces Crawford’s artistic development and his use of an Americanized Cubist language. In addition, the thesis looks closely at the rich cultural fabric of the postwar era and evaluates Crawford’s position in the American Art scene.Item Between the river and the Pampa: a contextual approach to the rock art of the Nasca Valley (Grande River System, Department of Ica, Peru)(2007) Nieves, Ana Cecilia, 1971-; Bourget, Steve, 1956-; Grieder, TerenceThis dissertation applies the contextual approach, as outlined by Patrick Carmichael, to the rock art of the Nasca Valley (Grande River System, Department of Ica, Peru). This approach uses different sources of information so as to construct a basic, indigenous framework within which to view and interpret the subject matter of an art object for which there is no written information due to its age. In this dissertation, I used information about the local environment and archaeology, as well as the art historical methods of formal and iconographic analyses. Comparative information was provided through ethnographic analogy to Andean myths and practices. Data for this study was gathered in a rock art survey that was carried out during the spring of 2000. This survey covered the lower part of the Nasca valley, downriver from the site of Cahuachi and southwest from the Nasca Pampa, site of the greatest concentration of geoglyphs in the south coast. Information about the location, orientation, and the relationship to archaeological and natural features, gathered in the survey, are examined in order to provide informed hypotheses about Nasca Valley rock art's function and use. The study reveals that rock art sites may have marked points of transition in the natural and cultural landscape. A concern for water is also suggested by the location and orientation of the rock art, and petroglyphs that display evidence of liquid pouring may also relate to local water sources. Using a study of form and iconography, rock art motifs in the Grande River System are separated into types and groups according to similarities to datable, portable art and to geoglyphs, providing a tentative time frame for their making. In the Nasca Valley, one period of petroglyph making activity is contemporary to Paracas Cavernas and another dates to the Early Intermediate Period (Nasca). On the upper valleys such as Palpa, Aja, and Santa Cruz, petroglyph-making activity seems to be largely associated to Paracas Necropolis and there does not seem to be Nasca rock art at those locations. With this contextual information at hand, I provide a re-evaluation of the Nasca Mythical Killer Whale motif, which is depicted in two Nasca Valley rock art sites. I propose using a new name for this motif: The Aquatic Composite Being. The location and iconography of this motif's petroglyphs provide additional information that contributes to our understanding of the meaning of this motif in Nasca art.Item Beyond buddhist and brahmanical activity: the place of the Jain Rock-Cut Excavations at Ellora(2006) Owen, Lisa Nadine; Leoshko, JaniceThe practice of carving interior spaces into a mountainside to be used for devotional activities is an important and long-enduring tradition in India. This is particularly true in western India, and out of the many rock-cut sites in this region, the most spectacular is Ellora. Ellora is noteworthy not only for its large number of cave-temples, but it is also the only site on the subcontinent to contain monuments for three of India's indigenous religions: Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism. The cave-temples at Ellora, which date from the late sixth through tenth centuries CE, therefore provide us with the opportunity to view the development of rock-cut excavation across time and across religious affiliations. While past scholarship has looked at limited aspects of the Hindu and Buddhist caves, less attention has been paid to Ellora's Jain excavations. My dissertation examines the Jain caves which are among India's richest examples of Jain rock-cut architecture, sculpture, and painting. Excavated in the early ninth through tenth centuries CE, these monuments are an important visual record of Jain artistic and devotional activities in early medieval India. In this project, I not only explicate the distinctive nature of Jain art and practice at Ellora but I also consider the Jain caves within the context of the Hindu and Buddhist excavations at the site. This approach not only highlights the understudied Jain caves, but it also allows us to formulate questions about the artistic and devotional activities associated with all three religious traditions at Ellora. By considering the site's multi-religious nature, we can then begin to understand the dynamics of Ellora in terms of religious interaction, devotional practice, and patterns of patronage. In addition, Ellora's Jain monuments can serve as a foundation for understanding the transition towards structural temple building and the development of Jain imagery in the tenth through thirteenth centuries.Item Beyond The Acropolis: New Installations Of Greek Antiquities In Athenian Museums(2010-06) Papalexandrou, Nassos; Papalexandrou, NassosItem Big Boys Dicks(Colophon, 2015) Goodman, MarkTHE MAKING OF BIG BOYS DICKS/Mark Goodman—a personal essay about punk rock scene photographs taken in Austin, Texas during the summer and fall of 1980, the making of a limited edition artist’s book in 2008, and its revised Blurb print on demand version in December 2015. Plus five work-in-progress book dummies from 2008—June 3 & 26, July 18 & 30, November 4—and, a sixth, the next to last Blurb version from October 2015.Item Communal politics and architectural planning at Siena's Palazzo Pubblico(1990) Johns, Ann Collins, 1955-; Not availableItem The Controversies of Deaccession in Museums: The Pre-Columbian Collection at the University of Texas at Austin(2019-12) Sharp, Abigail; Guernsey, JuliaExamination of the legal, ethical, and social context and implications of deaccession in museums. Case study on the orphaned pre-Columbian collection at the University of Texas at Austin, deaccessioned from the Texas Memorial Museum.Item Creative catalysts : a narrative investigation of pivotal learning experience through conversation with six contemporary artists(2010-08) Curry, Kendra Wynne; Bolin, Paul Erik, 1954-; Mayer, Melinda M.This thesis is a narrative study that examines significant life experiences of six living artists that were pivotal in their decision to pursue careers in the arts. Although the examples found in these conversations are not exhaustive—many factors play into the individuals sense of identity and agency—they serve to give voice to the multiplicity of the learning experience, underscoring that creative education occurs in the home, the community, and among social groups as frequently as it does in the classroom. Through direct, open-ended conversations with artists, research explores the setting of upbringing and education, the pivotal experiences—catalysts—that propelled these individuals into art careers, and impact of their experience on both creative practice and notions of art learning. Interviews encompass artists whose work is located in public spaces, natural landscapes, and urban environments as often as it appears in the traditional exhibition settings, whose work is both collaborative and socially constructed. They comprise Rick Lowe, artist and founder of Project Row Houses in Houston, Texas whose community-centered social sculpture expands on our cultural assumptions about the artist and Anne Wallace, a public artist whose early work as a human right activist and bi-cultural experiences translate into videos about the complexities of the United States/Mexico border. It includes Vincent Valdez, a self-described “hyper-realist” who depicts his home city and composite life experiences of his family through allegorical paintings and drawings; Marie Lorenz, an artist explorer whose interest in urban waterways brings her work into the waters of forgotten canals and rivers; of Robert Pruitt, who critiques ever-changing political landscapes, conceptions of history, and globalism through hybrid drawings and sculptures; and Franco Mondini-Ruiz who fuses aesthetics of high and low in installations and creative economy widely accessible to people both within and outside the confines of the art world. Through narrative conversation, this thesis enriches overlapping theories that encompass our understandings of education and learning—mentorship, experiential learning, the aesthetic experience, place-based learning, communities of practice—through lived example, underscoring learning as a socially constructed phenomenon. Experiences of learning, unique and wholly individualized, contribute to a one’s sense of self and agency; in the case of the six artists featured in this study, creative experiences contribute to their identity as “artist” and motivated their pursuit of lifework and career.Item Creative eco-effectiveness(2010-05) Rios Velasco Urrutia, Clara Cecilia; Catterall, Kate; Hall, Peter A.My research is focused upon what industrial designers can contribute in order to mitigate environmental problems often caused by their designs. The intent is to propose a procedure to integrate eco-effectiveness at the beginning of the design process, to consider it at each stage of the product’s lifecycle, and to measure that product’s environmental performance in order to make informed design decisions. At each stage the designer can follow this flexible process, which is intended to work in conjunction with individual creative methods while prioritizing the need for eco-effectiveness. The goal is to develop a procedure that is simple enough for designers to use every day and that could also provide means of verification, rather than relying on assumptions and good intentions. I acknowledge that efforts from a single discipline are not enough. In order to address the environmental challenges we face today, collaboration among disciplines will be necessary, as well as a change of behavior and attitudes towards consumption. This is my contribution.Item Cultivating the orchard : a Franciscan program of devotion and penance in the Verger de soulas (Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, fr. 9220)(2001-12) Ransom, Carol Lynn; Holladay, Joan A.Item Deep end(2010-05) Berg, Sonya Carol; Sutherland, Dan, 1966-; Mutchler, LeslieThis report describes the processes, working habits, materials, and multiple iterations of my work over the past three years. I reflect more in depth on my final series of work in which I have incorporated images of empty pool structures into paintings and large drawings. I consider the pool images metaphors for containment, control of the landscape, the unknowable, and in both a material and psychological sense, the void. The objects I exhibit, drawings, paintings and prints, are generated using a convoluted process. Rather than working in a systematic way, I negotiate rapid impulses, subjective goals, and thematic consistency. When I use figure/ground reversal and gestural drawing, I look to create a hand-touched surface that generates a sense of uneasiness in the composition, and a subjective disruption in the landscape.