Art Practice Commons^™

Art Foundations, Cesia Ortiz

Curricula

No abstract provided.

Curating Massive Media, Dave Colangelo

School of Film Faculty Publications and Presentations

The European Union’s media art initiative Connecting Cities and New York-based Streaming Museum are two recent examples of curatorial models that operate through large, networked, digital displays. This growing exhibition category combines expressive media architecture and telecommunication elements to engage ‘trans-local’ sites and diverse publics in complex media spaces. By investigating the confluence of exhibition making, public art and urban experience, this article explores the relationship between spectacle and criticality with respect to shifting notions of space, identity and ‘the common’.

Note: At the time of writing, Dave Colangelo was affiliated with Ryerson University.

Temporary Shelter, Renae Barnard

CGU MFA Theses

My work considers the ways in which gender performance, desire and objectification are inter-related through power structures. I’m interested in indulging in the pleasure and tactility of making while exploring the network of interactions between perception, time and the inadequacy of language.

Many of my sculptures are worked within inches of collapse and reflect my attraction to the imperfect and the aged. These folded, twisted, and sewn objects are both destroyed by and reinforced with the repetitive gestures by which they are made. These works wrestle with demonstrations of femininity and normative methods of valuation while investigating concerns like anxiety, …

Reference Frames And Movement, Michael S. Russell

CGU MFA Theses

The subjects I investigate are often symptomatic of society’s nervousness and its shortage of self-criticality. I search for phenomena that at one time felt strange and new, but have since been accepted and reduced to being commonplace and unchallenged. My drawings take a position of political ambiguity and exemplify the condition of cultural fatigue that arises out of our instant media climate. By not passing judgment on issues that may be present, such as violence, race, our faith in technology, or even the art world, my drawings point to conversations greater than themselves. This level of detachment allows for the …

Hangs Brightly, Yirui Ding

CGU MFA Theses

My works are inextricably related to my life. They create an imaginary world that reflects my actual experiences, emotions, and memories. Also, I never expect every viewer to could discover, but wait for careful viewers to discover it and to free up their own minds and to draw their own conclusions.

Tiktak, Fang Li

CGU MFA Theses

TikTak

My works present the inherent nature of space and light. A chemical process is approached in a way, which has similarly quality to a natural process. I’m interested in how the material can change itself and how I can manipulate that change. Transparency, reflection, pattern, harmony, and movement are engaged.

I use a wide range of materials as much as to match my ideas and the form. They are presented in simple, unified or repeating forms. There is a physical, innermost satisfaction in the activity of working with simple materials. I materialize them and allow them to be both …

Tiktak, Fang Li

CGU MFA Theses

TikTak

My works present the inherent nature of space and light. A chemical process is approached in a way, which has similarly quality to a natural process. I’m interested in how the material can change itself and how I can manipulate that change.

I use a wide range of materials as much as to match my ideas and the form. They are presented in simple, unified or repeating forms. There is a physical, innermost satisfaction in the activity of working with simple materials. I materialize them and allow them to be both real and imaginative: visually compelling, intellectually intriguing and …

2406, Farnaz Sabet

CGU MFA Theses

This paper is experimentation with clay and how it relates to body specially with changes in clay comparing to body and how we adapt to our surrounding.

Storytelling In Art Museums, Hayley P. Trinkoff

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Storytelling, in the context of art museums, is a method of communicating the qualities and attributes of art through a story. It helps the visitor bring the work of art to life and understand something the eye cannot see, a compelling narrative. It is important for visitors to discuss art and share stories on tours and through virtual media. We learn and form our own meanings from stories. These interactions will help build more relationships within communities. It is the museum’s job to take visitors on a journey and introduce them to new objects and perspectives.

This thesis addresses what …

Imagining New Possibilities Through Social Practice, Sarah O. Hull

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

In my practice, I have significantly questioned the role of the arts in social change. I have explored various forms of social practice, especially political art,public art and community art. Social practice lives in-between the world of art and social action and can add an important voice to both. Still, social practice, (like all forms of art) is limited and cannot be the sole source of social change. It is by working with others already organizing for social change, but bringing in the unique skills and perspectives of an artist that social practice is most effective. In this thesis, I …

Ritual Embodiment: The Body Remembers Through Ritual, Ayesha Mohyuddin

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

Ritual externalizes religious belief through physical embodiment and codified performance that allows it to be shared through a community. In a post 9/11 American society where Muslims are subject to increased scrutiny,. In a secular society that regulates religion to the private sphere so as not to conflict with the identity of the state, externalized religious identity can become problematic, especially as a Muslim living in post 9/11 United States. Ritual thenritual becomes a way to otherize a community based on shared practices. an identity under increased scrutiny. However, looking beyond the framework that the specific rules of ritual creates …

Fame Gone Wild (2015: An Era Of Self-Invention), Stephanie E. Kang

Graduate School of Art Theses

Entertainment has become one of the fueling fires of society. In today’s world of nonstop broadcasting and streaming, many begrudgingly trudge through their 9 to 5’s only to live for their few post-work hours of leisure, which have been reserved for this week’s latest items on the viewing queue. Netflix and Hulu have become the opium of the masses. Consequently, this obsession with constant entertainment has now morphed into a shared yearning for the people that are watched and followed religiously through the screen – the celebrities. In this cultural moment, the concept of fame has become a vital element …

Contemporary Family Portrait: The Hidden Uncomfortable Truth Of Family Dynamics, Ji Won Park

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

This thesis examines the hidden aspect of family dynamic and questions the idealized convention of family portraits. Based on Erving Goffman’s theatrical theory of community, family as a relaxing intimate group in the backstage, the underlying tensions, conflicts, and power play are discussed. This thesis draws upon the familial issues and treatments of Leon J. Saul and Rhee Dong Shick to evaluate the family dynamic present in our domestic settings. As the lineage of family portraits from history changed reflecting the differing family values and uncomfortable truths, the idealized family portraits are re-evaluated and questioned to offer a truer description …

The Girl Who Didn’T Know She Wasn’T Singing, Rebecca M. Lothan

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

I am interested what is obscured by the mundane, diurnal nature of objects that surround us which uphold a comfortable rhythm that easily resists close observation. My thesis work examines states of flux, a body of work that is neither here nor there, but hovers in an in between area: in existing between painting and sculpture, in revealing transcendent qualities of the everyday, raising questions about value, and fundamental acts of seeing and considering artwork. context becomes key in framing the experience of the work, each piece is perceptually contingent on external factors; in viewership and the individual viewer experience …

Process As Practice : Expressions Of The Numinous, Morgan Dowty

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

This statement explores the ways in which language and art making approach description of spiritual and largely ineffable experiences. Through the lens of Rudolf Otto’s discussion of the numinous, visual languages, including darkness, scale and silence, are explored as methods for expression of the spiritual. Throughout the exploration of material and process, an emphasis is placed on exploring a relationship between the transcendental and the everyday, between the physical and spiritual world. The making process is highlighted for its ability to create space and time to reflect on these questions. Printmaking as a translator of both object and image plays …

Pressing: Where The Objective Meets The Subjective, Mariana Parisca

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

Through this essay I describe the theoretical and anthropological ideas that led to the creation of the Cushing Series. An interest in the obsession with photography in popular culture leads to an understanding of the permeation of structured reasoning beyond scientific research and into everyday life. Taking evidence from photography, and philosophy of science I establish the limitations of structured reasoning, both as a way of perceiving the world and as an understanding of identity, and define surface and frame as its physical representation. Using Sartre’s existential theory and phenomenological anthropology I then describe the infinite subjective existence of …

Ghosts In The Garden: Cultural Critique Through The Lens Of The Absurd, Andrew T. Catanese

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

The primary lens by which I deconstruct my work is the absurd and “lucidity” of the absurd as developed by Camus in The Myth of Sisyphus. Camus’ absurd grows out of the tension between human desire for establishing order with the impossibility of doing so in a universe that continually resists our abstractions. The absurd then becomes a means to understanding the criticisms in my work of consumerism, behavior, and spaces which attempt to control or constrict people. I approach my art as an “other” or “outsider” from the system of Protestant moral dichotomy in which I grew up. …

Black Culture: A Societal Problem, Quamesha Brown

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

American society, regardless of what history has been told, has never been a society that is truly free of social prejudices especially for its black community. The many depictions of black people in America has caused a number of psychological and physical difficulties for black communities. In this paper, the main topic is the ways in which black culture is portrayed in American society and how that representation has affected the black community and the black experience. Although there are common experiences shared between people in the black community, the black experience is highly individualized; there is no singular definition …

Talking To Boxes, Hugging Robots, Vita Eruhimovitz

Graduate School of Art Theses

Relationships between humans and technology are at the core of my artistic research. Human-machine communication is defined by the technological level of the machines, but even more so by the way they are perceived by humans. Concepts of artificial life and artificial intelligence gradually have become part of the everyday life of growing numbers of people, and while there is an ongoing effort to design an increasingly anthropocentric technology, our minds also adapt to the new technological reality. Through immersive installations and sculptural objects my practice explores this reality. My artwork is designed to communicate with and stimulate the viewers, …

Art And..., Dayna J. Kriz

Graduate School of Art Theses

Almost anything goes in this time of contemporary artistic production as long as an artist can ‘back’ their ideas and the position they operate from. This expanding territory of production and engagement is an exciting potential for working artists, providing freedom to self-determine ones modus operandi within an expanding support system to engage the world with. While this is an exciting growth it is also potentially dangerous. The un-named and historically ambiguous position that Art1 operates from has created a rootless position to the production of culture. This rootlessness or, universal position has historically established itself as the gatekeeper and …

Clairvoyant Learning: The Strangeness Of Playing Games, Jeremy Shipley

Graduate School of Art Theses

In retelling multiple stories of my research, this document serves as a quest to archive my interest in games as evolved systems of play that continue to manipulate the way we view literacy. In describing the subtly of these terms while examining the folkloric histories that contextualize the language of this media, I have doubly manipulated the form of my paper to be like a choose-your-own-adventure tale, reflecting the estrangement of time and authorship unique to the narrative space in games. Unlike the formal structures found in literature or cinema, games animate collaborative and nonlinear systems that return the craft …

It Begins With You And Me, Sea A Joung

Graduate School of Art Theses

This thesis conceptualizes the conditions of the Korean division, including the realization of the political and cultural gap between North and South Korea, lack of education about the Korean division and the role of media. The Korean War, also known as the “Forgotten War,” is erased from the consciousness of contemporary societies. This thesis describes a history about how the artificial division created during the Korean War continuously affects the lives of modern Koreans. For more than sixty years, North and South Korea did not have any form of communication except through government negotiations and regulated media. As a result, …

Beauty Within Destruction, Julia Rindal Kron

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

Beauty within Destruction represents the culmination of my body of work for my Senior Honors Thesis. My paintings are an exploration of the environmental impact and visual beauty of petroleum. Petroleum is a versatile substance, and comes in many types serving a variety of applications. My thesis focuses on petroleum because of its impact on my childhood home, using acrylic paint (a petroleum byproduct).

When I was a sophomore in High School, my family was notified that our neighbor’s oil tank had leaked 1,000 gallons of petroleum underneath our home. This incident turned into a five-year legal and emotional battle …

The Misconception Of Knowing, The Invention Of Time; Curiosities & Introspections Of Vernacular Photography, Patricia D. Drummond

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

The Misconception of Knowing, the Invention of Time; Curiosities & Introspections of Vernacular Photography is a body of work that combines photography, artist books, and alternative processes in a series of pieces that explore the synergy between the act of creating vernacular or common photography, the photograph in its many forms, and the interaction with the photographic image at all the stages of its existence. It also exists in conjunction with this written monograph, which supports and gives insight into the work. Through the use of poems, sketchbook musings, the history of photography, critical theory and social norms within photography, …

Digital Innovations, Environment And Fashion, Avery Gray

Renée Crown University Honors Thesis Projects - All

Digital Innovations, Environment and Fashion is the title of my senior Capstone thesis project for the Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Fashion Design at Syracuse University. For this project, I designed a collection of six complete outfits that explore the theme of the natural environment and technology. The thesis project was presented in a public fashion show at Syracuse University at the end of April 2015.

In this creative reflective essay, a brief history of technology in fashion design will be explored. In chapter two, my inspirations and research in fashion design, art, and photography all support my decisions …

Critical Mass: An Exhibition Competition, Allison Kirsch

Renée Crown University Honors Thesis Projects - All

I organized Critical Mass: An Exhibition Competition for my Honors Capstone Project. This was a juried art exhibition for undergraduate visual artists in the College of Visual and Performing Arts at Syracuse University. Ten artists were selected from student applications to represent a broad range of artistic achievement.

Standing Still, Young Tseng Wong

CGU MFA Theses

I am drawn to the in-between — to movement at the corners of the eyes, to the moments between one breath and the next. When we want to catch such moments we stand still, we pause, we wait, "with bated breath." At such moments, I believe, the potential exists for taking on different perspectives and for finding other points of view.

Standing still, in a state of stillness, is an action that encapsulates many of my concerns. My work takes form in objects and architecture that collaborate with bodies moving inside them. The space is structured, not as a system, …

Transmogrify, Yehsiming S. Jue

CGU MFA Theses

Teeth are unique to the individual just like fingerprints. I paint human sets of teeth and their stages of mutations to explore the connections between our own naturally occurring inner mutations and our science-enduced rebuilding of these structures from stem cells. These duplicated and mirrored forms originate from teeth stem cells and their ability to regenerate our teeth. I also use teeth in my work because they represent us as a whole yet erase the boundary line of gender; while they still follow a naturally occurring, common process. So we can all relate to teeth, yet they are very personal …

Unknown, Gabrielle E. Valdez

School of Art, Art History, and Design: Theses and Student Creative Work

As somebody who spent a considerable amount of time coming to terms with my own identity, I would often look to other people to try and see what makes them who they are. This is obviously impossible to ascertain from a quick glance or brief observation I make in a public space. I know almost nothing about the subjects of my paintings — and the viewer of my paintings is provided the limited information that I take away from this interaction. These brief encounters are documented as photographs taken with my phone. This body of work is a progression. As …

The Experiences Of African-Born Women Faculty And Administrators At Colleges And Universities In The United States, Oyibo H. Afoaku

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to document the experiences of African-born women faculty and administrators at colleges and universities in the United States. The study explored the factors that motivated African-born women to immigrate to and extend their stay in the United States beyond completion of their education; factors they perceive as constraint on their quest for self-empowerment and identity as foreign students, college instructors, and/or administrators, and parents; and factors that have enabled them to adapt to their host culture and achieve their educational and professional goals even though they had to contend with multiple challenges associated with …