I thought I was well prepared, but I had missed the real learning behind which was to collaborate with other students! I did not feel confident in the ideas that I was bringing to the meeting, as I found the theoretical concepts interesting but I felt I only just understood them myself, as soon as somebody asked me to explain the concepts even when I tried, I could see that I had not made myself understood, and in no way had I sparked a glimmer of interest :) I had worked quite hard to get the information together, but on reflection I would have been better off trying to make contact with the other students in the group. As our lecturer pointed out, how can we cover the subject of philosophy as method with four individuals each doing five minuites. In the meeting I found myself far more interested in her ideas about Arthur Schopenhauen and Joseph Campbell then my own ideas. I suppose this is what makes collaboration interesting.

We decided to divide the presentation up into: Schopenhauer; Joseph Campbell; Artists/Pictures; Paul Graham.

We had a not of discussion about the order...we started with Schopenhauer, but a group member felt that it was very important to start with context first. I need to read up on Schopenhauer, Campbell and Graham and am hoping I will have a better understanding of why it is important to start with context.

The concept of ‘the sublime’ historically dates back to Burke’s 1757 Philosophical Enquiry, if not even earlier in time, and to Kant’s discussion on the term, illustrated in the first part of his Critique of Judgment, 1790. 

25.11.20

After a few online meetings my group ‘history’ have decided to work our presentation around Avant Garde Russian revolution photography. This is an area that I have not looked at before so it will be interesting g for me to work with my group to discover what I can find. We decided to take a part of the presentation each, my part is an exhibition’ Masters of Soviet Photographic Art’ The exhibition took place in 1935 and was well accepted as an important exhibition of its time.

11.11.20

For the Advanced Research Methods seminar presentation group work, we got given the task to elaborate on the method of Art Theory. Upon meeting with our Tutor, we chose to focus our work around Conceptual Art. We split the theme into different sections, so each one of us would mention different aspects of this movement, as well as the different artists that took part or got influenced by it.

My part of the presentation was about the historical and political dimension of the movement, so i ended up picking a Chilean Art collective that went by the name of COLECTIVO ACCIONES DE ARTE (C.A.D.A.).

This collective was mainly active from 1979 to 1985, after the dictatorship that oppressed most Chilean Art from 1973 went down. Their work was mainly revolved around the dictatorship years and the effects of it on the newly democratic Chile. Their pieces were usually public displays of art or performances which the general public could participate in, and they were highly political and disruptive.

To showcase their work, I started by mentioning the history behind the collective, and the social and political situation at the time, followed by three examples of their most famous pieces : “No Mas” (), “Para no morir de hambre en el arte (Not to Die of Hunger in Art)”,and “¡Ay Sudamérica!”.

While researching for the presentation I found a lot of new information about not only Chile but other South American Countries and how conceptual art took form there. There were major similarities to the art that was coming from the US but adapted to a different way of living. This example was most clear in the second work that I analyzed, where the bottle of milk was a symbol of human rights and social necessities. This can be compared to works from American artists that used products and consumerism to make similar statements.

Being the collective active a little after conceptual art sprawled out as a movement, due to the oppression of art during the dictatorship years, is also interesting as we can see their works as responses to American Artists that pioneered conceptual art.

Overall, I think the seminar group work was very productive, as it challenged us to put together different types of artists (in our case every artist was from different nationalities) with different perspectives of what conceptual art meant as a medium for them. Furthermore, how history, social and the political situation of the artists country influenced their work. 

In Teemus lecture he mentioned how there were many women in the art movement of surrealism and for the time it will have been a lot harder for women to progress and get recognised in the male dominated field of art. Neil in a previous lectures has also discussed the work of Lee Miller, a key female figure amongst the surrealists whom collaborated with many other artists of the time.

We were doing about all the different types of abstract. I was doing an abstract of art.

Abstract photography is the view of an object where the entire shape is hidden from view.

Fine Art photography overlaps the same notion. Yet, fine art focuses on a conceptual look at a subject and its surroundings.

Fine art photography has the ability to work across many photographic themes. The photographer and their vision are more important than the photographed subject.

Abstraction can be a simple macro image without much concept or idea behind it. It is another viewpoint and perspective of an object we might know inside out.

Artists use geometric shapes to create works. The most common is the composition-oriented task. The proportions are symmetrical. This work can easily be applied to other tasks because it is simple to look and understand and inspire creative work in many ways, whether it's fashion. Architecture & Product Design 

Geometric abstract. The drawing of a geometric pattern focuses on the composition. The proportions are symmetrical or are not symmetrical, making it easy to apply to other tasks.

Free shapes abstract. This abstract art does not have a fixed element, but the artist's mind to draw the media to the viewer to interpret the meaning of the figure. It will emphasise the amazing appearance rather than geometric shapes.

Miros group - psychoanalysis as methodology

Miros group presentation on a psychoanalytical way of analysis images really stood out for me, the aspects I found most interesting were the examples of William Klein and artists from the surrealism.

Their group explained that psychoanalysis unlocked the reason why an image is taken, I thought this was a really clear and simple way of putting what I’d always thought to be a daunting topic to approach. The example of William Klein was related to Freudian theories around trauma, Klein went back to his home town to photograph it and expose it for how he saw it. He was expressing his psyche, showing how he saw the world he grow up in. Revisiting his home town and exploring his psyche also acted as a meditative process, much like the work of Jo spence mentioned in a previous blog post. Both examples are using photography to cope and make sense of whats going on in their brains.