Other Film and Media Studies Commons^™

Not Just Another 2000 Word Written Mfa Thesis, Taylor Cleveland

Art Theses and Dissertations

This thesis challenges the standardized academic expectations placed upon studio-based MFA programs, using the process of writing itself as a site of institutional critique. Emerging from a 27,000-word working draft titled Aesthetics of Real, this final text adopts the permitted format of an “extended artist statement” to expose contradictions within institutional frameworks. It resists the assumption that professionalism and compliance equate to intellectual rigor, arguing that true artistic inquiry demands risk, failure, and confrontation with systemic norms. Through works like 3MUSTANGS, Facades of Dallas (Hall), SuperPOD0043: An American Painting, and Babel’n On, this thesis reveals …

Free Fall, Mariam Bolkvadze

Theses and Dissertations

Free Fall, a mixed media project, addresses the horrifying cases of infant abduction experienced in the country of Georgia over the last 40-50 years, and how the nation's systemic issue became one of the causes of illegal child trafficking in the country. The project features an infant room setting with video projections, TV screens with interviews, and custom sound effects. The setting of Free Fall is a visual metaphor of the experiences of those affected by the abductions and illegal child trafficking drawing from the iconography of early childhood. Ultimately, my installation seeks to advocate for justice and support …

Creating An Ofrenda, Sara Hinojos

Open Educational Resources

You do not need to be Mexican to celebrate Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead). What you need however is a deep and thoughtful cultural understanding of the practice. This lesson plan teaches students what Dia de los Muertos is, the influence of colonialism (past and present), how mainstream media understands the celebration in the U.S., and how local communities honor the celebration. This approach is from a media studies perspective and a particular focus on art, specifically altar making or making an ofrenda. Writer, philosopher, tejana Gloria E. Anzaldúa details that altars are “‘the sanctuary of the …

A Taste For The Distasteful: The Aesthetics Of Gore In The Giallo And Horror Films Of Mario Bava, Thais Casado Bignardi-Engstrom

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis analyzes the Italian experience with horror in cinema in both psychoanalytic feminist and cognitive Marxist critical film theories through a study of visual renderings of excessive violence and sex in gothic and thrillers known as giallo films created by the film director Mario Bava. This is an art historical study that looks at Bava’s work against the Italian cultural landscape in the post war period.

Transcendence: Exploring The Connections Between Transgender/Gender Non-Conforming Identities And Experiences Of Nature Through Art, Mc Jackson

Undergraduate Theses

“Transcendence: Exploring the connections between transgender/gender non-conforming identities and experiences of nature through art” is the written portion of a creative thesis revolving around an immersive art installation and short film. Transcendence, the installation, was created to promote connection by exploring the overlap between transgender and gender non-conforming (GNC) experiences and experiences of nature. Part of this installation is a short film of interviews conducted with transgender and GNC individuals about nature, their gender experiences, and the transcendent nature of the two. The written thesis analyzes existing literature on nature as a restorative, therapeutic, spiritual setting, offers insight into …

Nightmares And Hand Grenades: Dreams As A Storytelling Tool, Olivia Felber

All Theses

Dreams and nightmares feature prominently in art, story, and religious practice and tradition throughout history. In this paper I will discuss their prominence throughout these facets in daily life, and the various ways that we, as humans, have tried to elucidate meaning from them. I will study the nature and definition of dreams and nightmares through a scientific, cultural, and historical approach. I will also discuss folklore and the interpretation of nightmarish imagery in the context of an otherworldly adventure through a nightmare. These topics and themes will be shown, explained, and discussed through the methodology of my project- a …

Making The Subconscious Conscious - Showcasing Unresolved Childhood Trauma Through Animation, Alexis Hunter

All Theses

The focus of this work is to shed light on unresolved childhood trauma that can contribute to mental hardships - whether people are aware of its presence in their lives or not. In this paper, I will discuss childhood trauma, its impact on adult life when left unresolved, self-parenting as a method to manage it, and how it is portrayed in various media. Drawing inspiration from my research on trauma and visual storytelling, I will present a proof-of-concept for a 2D animated short film, Strongholds, which visualizes the internal mental struggles through the character dynamics of the personifications of the …

Me, Myself, And My Muppets, Sara Jones

Emerging Writers

In this personal narrative, the author explores her relationship and upbringing in relation to Jim Henson’s Muppets. She illustrates her experience at puppet camps, on long Muppet-filled road trips, and the special connection her mother and her share with the Muppets. Find out how the Muppets have shaped the author’s life, morals, and aspirations, as well as how Jim Henson’s creations have influenced and brought joy to past generations and future generations to come.

Artistic Representation And Self Esteem, Brianna Davis

Honors College Theses

Dependent upon the constructs of the perception of self and the viewpoint of others, humans base the value of their self esteem on outer perspectives rather than internal ones. For this thesis in particular, the outer perspective to be examined is representation in the field of the arts. This thesis project explores the process of self esteem, artistic representation in the arts, how one affects the other, a history of the correlation between the two, and ways to inform and educate the masses with the tools necessary to advance representation in the arts thus raising the self esteem of its …

It Won’T Be Easy, Allison Arkush

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

Interdisciplinary artist Allison Arkush engages a wide range of materials, modalities, and research in her practice. In It Won’t Be Easy, Arkush places and piles her multimedia sculptures throughout the gallery to create installations that overlap ­with her writing and poetry, sometimes layering in (or extending out to) audio and video components. This approach facilitates the probing exploration of prevailing value systems through a flattening of hierarchies among and between humans, the other-than-human, and the inanimate—though no less lively. Her work meditates on and ‘vendiagrams’ things forsaken and sacred, the traumatic and nostalgic. The exhibition title acknowledges that the …

The Disappearance Of The French New Wave, Emir Kulluk

CISLA Senior Integrative Projects

The French New Wave is considered to be one of the most influential waves within cinema history, starting from the end of the 1950s, going all the way through the 1960s. Thanks to the directors of this era, there have been a myriad of movies that challenged the norms of filmmaking, redefining the techniques used and the stories told within cinema. However, if this era was so fruitful and is deemed to be so valuable for cinema in general, then why did it not continue? In this paper, I will be taking a look at French society, external influences, as …

Noah Fidlin Senior Art Portfolio, Noah J. Fidlin

Senior Art Portfolios

An art, photography and design magazine that combines analog and digital media.

Race Book, Robert Dejesus

Theses and Dissertations

Race Book is a satiric animated short film about how social media influenced people during the 2020 presidential election.

Reworking The White-Masculine Ideal, Steven H. Gonzalez

Art Theses and Dissertations

This text functions as an exploration of self through artistic practice, a designated space for reflection on contemporary Queer experience. In looking specifically at the permeation of the idealized-white-masculine figure as found within Western visual culture, social media and gay pornography become isolated as sites where these figures are commonly found. This line of inquiry defines how the ideal is reified through these differing digital platforms and the social implications the homogenized male form has on raced individuals. In addition to determining the image of the perfect masculine physique through research, this text expands on how its' imaged representation becomes …

The Flow Of Art: A Study On The Human Experience And Nature, Matthew R. Schott

Undergraduate Honors Theses

Through all of human history, artists and other creators have been able to access the extraordinary state of flow to achieve amazing feats. Whether it be for a divine purpose, or simply making someone’s day a little better, art has been used to lift the spirits and nourish humanity. In our attempt to cope with the world in which we live, we have found this great mental resource, that has allowed for achievements that not one person could not attain on their own. In my observation, I have seen this euphoric cycle of flow change the lives of so many …

In-Between: The Spaces Of Modernity, Elisa Fabris Valenti

LSU Master's Theses

During the past three years as a graduate student, I have experienced loneliness. Having recently emigrated from Italy, I have often asked myself why I am experiencing such hard times adjusting to a different country. My thesis explores this question. Referring to Marc Augé’s idea of non-place, I have chosen a geographical and spatial starting point to approach my work. Italian cities are built around the central piazza where social, political, and economic life revolves. In my thesis, I depict American spaces that lack specific location and create solitude within the urban corridors. Private feelings, such as loneliness, are paradoxes …

El Arte De "Lágrimas En La Lluvia", Todd K. Mack

Alambique. Revista académica de ciencia ficción y fantasía / Jornal acadêmico de ficção científica e fantasía

Uno de los elementos destacados de Lágrimas en la lluvia, la excelente novela de ciencia ficción de la madrileña Rosa Montero, es la genial inclusión de obras de arte con fines simbólicos dentro de la obra. Entre estas obras de arte se incluye el famoso cuadro de Johannes Vermeer, Una señora escribiendo una carta con su criada. En este artículo, el dr. Todd Mack muestra cómo este cuadro presagia el principal dilema de la protagonista de la novela. Bruna Husky es una replicante, y por eso sabe exactamente cuánto tiempo vivirá. El conocimiento de su inescapable fin hace …

The Blue That Blew Bloo, Daniel Ray Martinez

Art Theses and Dissertations

My work is a combination of videos, objects, and performances with a multidisciplinary practice that engages with the formal language of sculpture, photography, video/cinema, and drawing while being in dialogue with concepts and concerns about the image, the surface, and the space of representation. I am interested in the poetics and phenomenology of life; and the way one interacts in an environment; and the way digital/virtual media has shifted our experiences in life. Rethinking the way one finds boredom to get away from virtual capitalist spaces is a concern for me. I find inspiration in the wandering through spaces. I …

Remembering Virtual Worlds: Painting And Video Games, Nathaniel M. St. Amour

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

Video games create the feeling of great achievement and place the player into a role that turns them into a great hero. These experiences feel significant because they require great time and emotional investment. The monumentality of these experiences, however, are at odds with the transience of the electrical virtual worlds. The medium of oil painting helps overcome the sense of transience because of oil painting’s durable permanent way of image making and stillness. Painting’s inherent nod to history also creates a dissonance between the newness of the video game medium and the antiquity of painting, a contrast exacerbated by …

Man/Boy., Nick Hartman

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Verisimilitude, or the appearance of being true, is a concept I turn upside down; relating it to a guise I wear as a contemporary male in a society dictated by learned social behavior and gender norms. Cultural iconography and expected gender norms are tropes I confront within my artwork. Drawings of seemingly everyday objects act as meditations or a fetishized repetition of supposed unobtainable objects and ideals that deal with masculine societal norms. Manliness, machismo, masculinity… it is all a culturally learned and expected pose placed on all men. Coming to the realization that I do not necessarily fit …

“Why (Not) Philosophy Of Stand-Up Comedy?”, Sheila Lintott

Faculty Contributions to Books

Stand-up comedy has been largely ignored by analytic philosophers of art, including those interested in comedy and humor. This is somewhat surprising, given the immense popularity of stand-up comedy and the rock star status enjoyed by some comedians today. I suspect that philosophers are just as likely to enjoy stand-up comedy as anyone else; in some cases (i.e. for some philosophers and some comedians), probably more likely. Here I offer some reasons philosophers of art should take the time to consider stand-up comedy and possible explanation for why philosophers of art have paid far less attention to stand-up comedy than …

French Women In Art: Reclaiming The Body Through Creation/Les Femmes Artistes Françaises : La Réclamation Du Corps À Travers La Création, Liatris Hethcoat

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

The research I have conducted for my French Major Senior Thesis is a culmination of my passion for and studies of both French language and culture and the history and practice of Visual Arts. I have examined, across the history of art, the representation of women, and concluded that until the 20^th century, these representations have been tools employed by the makers of history and those at the top of the patriarchal system, used to control women’s images and thus women themselves. I survey these representations, which are largely created by men—until the 20^th century. I discuss pre-historical …

Art And Rebellion In Medea And Pleasantville, Annika Phillips

CIE Essay Writing Contest

No abstract provided.

The Art Of Death: Murder According To Poe, Hitchcock, And De Quincey, Jeanine Bee

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

This paper examines the works of both Edgar Allan Poe and Alfred Hitchcock in light of Thomas De Quincey’s series of essays entitled “On Murder Considered as One of the Fine Arts.” In his essays, De Quincey presents murder as an art form that can be criticized and appreciated just as any other fine art. While De Quincey’s essays faced some negative reaction when they were originally published, both Edgar Allan Poe and Alfred Hitchcock seem to have found something worthwhile in De Quincey’s ideas about the art of murder; Poe and Hitchcock both present murder as an art form …

Seeking Solace: Regret, Grief, Anxiety, Rebecca Schroeder

Honors Projects

Seeking Solace: Regret, Grief, Anxiety is a triptych video and artifact piece inspired by the abstract analysis of my dreams. It recognizes worries held within my subconscious and brings them to life through graphic design, photography, and video. The process of creating provides a new perspective of looking at both art and occupational therapy as methods of solving emotional distress.

I have recorded over 80 of my dreams in the past year. In these dreams, regret, grief, and anxiety are common themes. These themes are represented in three triptychs that cycle through past, present, and future problems. The cycling of …

The Immersive Medium: Art, Flow, And Video Games, Christopher M. Yalen

Oglethorpe Journal of Undergraduate Research

In this article, the question of whether or not video games could be considered art is explored, as well as what this means for video games as cultural products. Using an interdisciplinary approach, I suggest that there are some games we can consider “art”, and that these games are not only different aesthetically speaking, but are also different from a media-effects standpoint. The article consists of three main sections, an aesthetic review, a content analysis, and a pilot study. In the aesthetic review, I employ different perspectives from aesthetic philosophy in order to come up with criteria for what an …

Women And Video Games: Pigeonholing The Past, Allison Perry

Scripps Senior Theses

Academic work dealing with the overlap between video games and female representation is limited in both volume and proper research. Most texts agree on three supposed flaws with video games: they alienate female participants, there are no games for female players, and female players cannot relate to female characters. This thesis sheds light on these points, not only citing specific counter-examples, but also showing how many of these issues reflect on a larger societal problems.