Digital Commons Network^™

Leonard Freed's Black In White America, Jennifer Cherry Wilkinson

Theses and Dissertations

Through a dynamic range of photographs and texts from the 1960s, Leonard Freed’s Black in White America is an exceptional artwork that both illustrates the numerous ways the photo book format creates meaning and provides an alternate history of the Civil Rights movement and the lives of those impacted by it.

Gertrudes Altschul And The Foto Cine Clube Bandeirante: Modern Photography And Femininity In 1950s São Paulo, Paula V. Kupfer

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis presents the work of German-born Brazilian photographer Gertrudes Altschul, who developed a body of modernist photography within the Foto Cine Clube Bandeirante (FCCB) in São Paulo in the 1950s. It underscores her female and immigrant perspective during the transition from Pictorialist to modernist photography in the postwar years.

Edwin Fischer And Bach Performance Practice Of The Weimar Republic, Bradley V. Brookshire

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Edwin Fischer (1886-1960) provided a synthesis of approaches to Bach pianism that resolved dialectical tensions of long standing between schools that opposed one another throughout the nineteenth century. I argue that Fischer’s synthesis––which permits exegetical interpretation while maintaining a preservationist stance toward the integrity of the text––resembles both Felix Mendelssohn’s bifurcated approach to Bach’s music and Moses Mendelssohn’s description of a similar duality within modern Judaism. Such resemblance may not be coincidental or superficial, given that Fischer married into the Mendelssohn family at the height of its cultural influence in Weimar-Era Berlin. Although pieces of the Mendelssohnian construct were in …

“Vital Glowing Things”: The Art Of Women’S Writing, 1910-1935, Elizabeth C. Decker

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The rising field of new modernisms continues to breathe new life into the literature of marginalized writers of the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century. By imagining modernism as a series of modes and strategies, and expanding the axes upon which we map modernism’s boundaries, we make way for writers who were shut out by the often imbalanced, limited modernism of the past and illuminate the field with new possibilities. This dissertation takes part in this exciting, vibrant conversation by identifying a mode of modernism present in the literature of three early twentieth-century women writers, who all used visual art techniques to …

Building In Public: Critical Reconstruction And The Rebuilding Of Berlin After 1990, Naraelle Hohensee

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Reconstructing Berlin’s ruined contours after 1990 was one of the most important ways that reunified Germany made a public display of its relationship to the violence wrought by both the Nazis and East Germany during the twentieth century. By integrating historical forms into new buildings in the city’s commercial center, Berlin’s urban planners hoped to show the world that the nation had transcended totalitarianism and was worthy of a prominent place in the new global order. In order to achieve this vision, they adopted an approach called “Critical Reconstruction,” which required architects to follow rigid design standards based on traditional …

Broadcasting The Crisis: Spanish Television As Critique, Eva Velasco Pena

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Television is often thought of as monolithic and totalizing, controlling viewers and upholding the status quo. This project will propose different understandings of the mass-medium. In order to historically contextualize my study, I will begin with a brief discussion of the role of television in democratic Spain (from c.1978-present). The thesis will primarily consist of an analysis of two sides of contemporary Spanish TV: fiction and politics; and will explore the way that certain programs, alternately catalyze critical thought and actions or enable spectators to, following John Ellis, “work through” traumatic events. I furthermore propose that imaging a concept might …

Art As Display, Frank M. Boardman

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Art is essentially a type of display. As an activity, art is what we do when we display objects with certain intentions. As a set of objects, art is all of those things that are displayed for those purposes. The artworld is the social atmosphere that surrounds this particular activity of display. And a history of art is an evolving narrative of change in the practice of this sort of display.

Specifically, to focus for convenience on art as a set of objects, this is what we can call the “displayed-object thesis”:

x is a work of art iff: (a) …

Provisional Capital: National And Urban Identity In The Architecture And Planning Of Bonn, 1949-1979, Samuel L. Sadow

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation explores the physical transformation of Bonn in the postwar period, with a particular focus on the 1960s and 1970s, as the city accommodated the West German federal government. Bonn’s long campaign in the 1960s to redraw its municipal borders and the federal government’s construction of several high-rises in the city and its neighbor, Bad Godesberg, were the most concrete markers of Bonn’s evolution as a capital city in this period. The complex political processes and sometimes bitter conflicts behind each of these developments paralleled the gradual and successful entrenchment of democracy in the Federal Republic of Germany. At …

Windows On The World: The Aesthetics Of Difference In Neoliberal New York, Nicholas Gamso

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation seeks to refine critical methods for interpreting global cities and their cultures, charting an aesthetic history of neoliberal New York — from the 1929 regional plan to the present. Surveying a range of literature, art criticism, and planning discourse, I argue that the global has served as the dominant motif of spatial production and political power during this watershed era. I trace this argument through analyses of midcentury planning’s global spatial imaginings, gentrification and imperial metaphor, transnational encounter in World literature, and the city’s contemporary waste and recourse imaginaries. While I follow the Marxist account of the New …

Toilet Talk, Michael Blake

Theses and Dissertations

Toilet Talk explores both formal and autobiographical themes related to desire, sexuality, and the relationship between public and private space. My work and research aims to reposition and queer the industrial object and its promotion of hyper masculine ideals.

Sanitation Celebrations: Mierle Laderman Ukeles’S Performative Monument With/For/By Sanmen, Diya Vij

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis argues that Mierle Laderman Ukeles’s work teaches us something new about what monument-making can be when it is socially engaged. The durational process and motivating desire to elicit gratitude for the DSNY labor force of Ukeles’s residency in the Sanitation Department raises pressing questions about the conventional nature of how monuments are typically conceived and executed and to whom these works are directed. Analysis of her three-part performance Sanitation Celebrations: Grand Finale of New York City’s First Art Parade, just one engagement within her long-term performative monument, explicates the intricacies of Ukeles’s process-based performative practice in terms …

A Fearsome Beauty: Material And Cultural Exchange Between Venice And The Islamic Near East, Tahera H. Tajbhai

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis will explore the relationship between Venice and the Islamic Near East. By examining works from various media, this paper argues that Venetians viewed the Islamic Near East as being ‘awesome,’ and that this view was twofold, as Venetians were both enamored with and fearful of this rising power.

Dag Hammarskjöld And Modern Art: An Inquiry Into The Aesthetic Values Of The Second Secretary-General Of The United Nations, Shantala M. Dugay

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis presents original research and previously unpublished information that breaks new ground in the legacy of United Nations Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld. By providing a new historical perspective of Hammarskjöld’s aesthetic values, this study forges a place for him in art history as a patron and collector of modern art.

Magazine Politics: Edgardo Antonio Vigo’S Diagonal Cero And Hexágono ‘71, Francisco Javier Rivero Ramos

Theses and Dissertations

This research looks at the magazines Diagonal Cero (28 issues, 1962 – 1968) and Hexágono ‘71 (14 issues, 1971 – 1974) edited by Edgardo Antonio Vigo (La Plata, Argentina 1928 – La Plata, 1997) in order to examine the forms of political commentary incorporated into the magazines.

The Artist And The "Information" Machine: Conceptualism, Technology, And Design In 1970, Jeremiah William Mccarthy

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores the dialectical relationship between conceptualism and design in the year 1970, by focusing on Kynaston McShine’s landmark exhibition Information, held at the Museum of Modern Art. Specifically, it centers on the understudied “information machine,” a film apparatus designed by Ettore Sottsass, Jr., for use within the exhibition.

Photographing The "Uncelebrated" Truth: The Newspaper Pm, New York 1940-1942, Nancy Wechter

Theses and Dissertations

The left-liberal NYC newspaper, PM, used photography with unprecedented transparency as a crucial element in its mission to inform ordinary working people, teach them to be literate about the photographic message, and encourage them to be a participating audience during the tense period just before World War II.

David Alfaro Siqueiros’S Pivotal Endeavor: Realizing The “Manifiesto De New York” In The Siqueiros Experimental Workshop Of 1936, Emily Schlemowitz

Theses and Dissertations

The Siqueiros Experimental Workshop, initiated by David Alfaro Siqueiros (1896–1974) in 1936, is often considered a pivotal moment for the artist. This thesis unveils new documentation about the Workshop, illuminating heretofore-unobserved aspects of the group’s governance, political aims, and theoretical framework put forth by Siqueiros in his critical “Manifiesto de New York.”

The Photographic Universe: Vilém Flusser’S Theories Of Photography, Media, And Digital Culture, Martha Schwendener

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Despite accelerated changes in the way we create, view, and experience photographs, critics and scholars in North America continue to read and assign an accepted canon of photography theory, often predicated on old concepts and technologies. This dissertation seeks to remedy that situation. It focuses on the work of Czech-Brazilian philosopher Vilém Flusser (1920-1991), author of such books as Towards a Philosophy of Photography (1983), Into the Universe of Technical Images (1985), and Does Writing Have a Future? (1987), which develop a theory of technical images that reaches beyond photography to include film, television, video, computer, and satellite images. Rather …

The Moving Image In Public Art: U.S. And U.K., 1980–Present, Annie Dell'aria

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation examines the work of artists who use moving images in contemporary public art. Specifically, these works are understood through their interactions with spectators and the practices of media consumption and public interaction these passersby negotiate when they encounter a work of moving image-based public art. To this end, I argue, through an analysis of public art, that screen spectatorship is an inherently situated experience.

The project of this dissertation is two-fold. First, I outline a typology of moving image-based public art by dividing significant practices into three categories—the enchanting spectacle, the ludic interface, and the illumination of place. …

Shadows And Light. Ernie Gehr Exhibitions At The Museum Of Modern Art, Sean M. Fuller

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis examines exhibitions and media installations of Ernie Gehr’s work at The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), beginning with the pivotal 1970 show Information, which presented four films by Gehr. Wait (1968), Transparency (1969), Reverberation (1969), and History (1970) were screened alongside work by other avant-garde filmmakers and video artists in a circular viewing booth in the gallery space, in a show featuring works now considered masterpieces of conceptual art. It also considers the two site-specific video works, MoMA on Wheels (2002) and Navigation (2002), which Gehr created for the lobby space at MoMA QNS, …

Response And Responsibility: The War Veterans’ Art Center At The Museum Of Modern Art (1944–48), Laurel Humble

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

From 1944–48 the Museum of Modern Art, New York (MoMA) offered free art classes to World War II veterans through an experimental educational initiative called the War Veterans’ Art Center. This project was run by Victor D’Amico, who served as the museum’s first Director of Education from 1937–69. Building on an existing institutional ethos of experimentation and civil service, D’Amico and his colleagues explored the role of creative engagement in facilitating the transition from military service to civilian life. As they experimented with new pedagogical approaches, they also worked to articulate and share their innovative methods with other professionals and …

Export / Import: The Promotion Of Contemporary Italian Art In The United States, 1935–1969, Raffaele Bedarida

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Export / Import examines the exportation of contemporary Italian art to the United States from 1935 to 1969 and how it refashioned Italian national identity in the process. I do not concentrate on the Italian art scene per se, or on the American reception of Italian shows. Through a transnational perspective, instead, I examine the role of art exhibitions, publications, and critical discourse aimed at American audiences. Inaugurated by the Fascist regime as a form of political propaganda, this form of cultural outreach to the United States continued after WWII as Italian museums, dealers, and critics aimed to vaunt the …

The Bauhaus Wall Painting Workshop: Mural Painting To Wallpapering, Art To Product, Morgan Ridler

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The wall painting workshop at the Bauhaus was established in fall 1919, the first semester of the famed and influential German school of art, architecture, and design. Over the course of the next thirteen years, the workshop experimented with many techniques, philosophies, and strategies for painting, coloring, and covering wall surfaces. This dissertation analyzes the evolving approaches of the Bauhaus wall painting workshop. Early Masters of Form, Oskar Schlemmer and Wassily Kandinsky, oversaw abstract and figurative murals like those developed for the 1923 Bauhaus exhibition, and the student wall painters used color to form and mold architectural spaces in, for …

Nature And Nostalgia In The Art Of Mary Nimmo Moran (1842-1899), Shannon Vittoria

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation is the first comprehensive study dedicated to the work of American painter-etcher Mary Nimmo Moran (1842-1899), an innovative printmaker and influential interpreter of the American landscape. She began her career in 1863, studying drawing and painting with her husband, artist Thomas Moran (1837-1926). Throughout the 1870s, she exhibited works at both the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and the National Academy of Design, and published wood engraved illustrations in books and popular monthly magazines. Yet it was in the medium of etching that she achieved her greatest recognition: between 1879 and her untimely death in 1899, she …

Transparent Interiors: Detective And Mystery Fiction In The Age Of Photography, Melissa D. Dunn

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation is a meditation on the mutable boundaries that define interior life in the age of photography. I probe these boundaries through selected readings in two literary genres that share conceptual links with photography—detective fiction and mystery fiction. Photography plays an important role in a radical reconsideration of the boundaries between public and private, engaging two dominant and often conflicting cultural values that shape American life at the turn of the twentieth century—the mandate to define and protect privacy and the simultaneous call for greater transparency in public and personal life. Photography, through its perceived transgressions against private life, …

Nothing Behind The Sun, Sebastian Fierro Castro

Theses and Dissertations

painting as a containment exercise, and as such, a tool that allows us to interiorize the world