An Investigation Into Painting's Transformation and Regeneration Through Post-Photographic Intervention in the Digital Archive
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An investigation into painting's transformation and regeneration through post-photographic intervention in the digital archive. TRISH BARNETT M.F.A. (QUT); B.Sc. in Ed. (Art K-12) (SMSU); B. A. (Griffith University); B. Litt. (Hons) (Deakin University); Dip. Fine Art (QCA) Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2012 Art and Design Creative Industry Faculty Queensland University of Technology ABSTRACT: This PhD practice-led research inquiry sets out to examine and describe how the fluid interactions between memory and time can be rendered via the remediation of my painting and the construction of a digital image archive. My abstract digital art and handcrafted practice is informed by Deleuze and Guattari’s rhizomics of becoming. I aim to show that the technological mobility of my creative strategies produce new conditions of artistic possibility through the mobile principles of rhizomic interconnection, multiplicity and diversity. Subsequently through the ongoing modification of past painting I map how emergent forms and ideas open up new and incisive engagements with the experience of a ‘continual present’. The deployment of new media and cross media processes in my art also deterritorialises the modernist notion of painting as a static and two dimensional spatial object. Instead, it shows painting in a postmodern field of dynamic and transformative intermediality through digital formats of still and moving images that re-imagines the relationship between memory, time and creative practice. i KEYWORDS: practice–led; archive; digital archive; Gilles Deleuze; Felix Guattari; becoming; becoming-painting; becoming digital-painting; becoming painting-in-the-digital; rhizome; difference; networks; multiplicity; evolutionary; abstraction; time; memory; anamnesis; handcraft; perforation; Gerhard Richter; Jackson Pollock; Lucio Fontana; Goshka Macuga; Christian Boltanski; Bernd and Hilla Becher; Ann Hamilton; Janet Laurence ii STATEMENT OF ORIGINAL AUTHORSHIP: The work contained in this thesis has not been previously submitted to meet requirements for an award at this or any other higher institution. To the best of my knowledge and belief the thesis contains no material previously published or written by another person except where due acknowledgement is made in the text. Signed: Date: 10-10-12 iii DEDICATION I dedicate this project to the loving memory of my brother, Jon. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: First and foremost I sincerely thank my principal supervisor Dr. Daniel Mafe for his continual encouragement and academic guidance throughout my candidature. I am grateful for his generous investment of time, supportive feedback and professional advice over the years. As a mentor he has been greatly influential to the evolution of my painting practice. His enthusiasm and input has also been particularly invaluable in providing constructive criticism to my writing process where he has helped me maintain ‘a big picture’ focus. I am also deeply indebted to my assistant supervisor Dr. Mark Pennings for his considerable commitment of time, invaluable editing skills and incisive commentary in honing my exegesis. His friendly encouragement and ongoing support for my scholarship has been greatly appreciated. I would also like to thank Mark Webb for his overwhelming support of my painting practice and invaluable professional feedback during the formative stages of my research. As well I acknowledge the helpful and professional assistance and support of Dr. Victoria Garnons Williams in the preliminary framing of my research question. Most importantly I am grateful to my family, especially my husband Bobby and daughter Madison, for their understanding, enduring patience, boundless encouragement and exceptional support. To them I express my heartfelt thanks for providing me the space in which to creatively wander. v TABLE OF CONTENTS: Abstract i Keywords ii Signed statement of originality iii Dedication iv Acknowledgements v Table of Contents vi Table of Figures ix Prologue: Personal motivations xi CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION 1 1.1: Synopsis of my past practice 1 1.2: Current focus of my practice 1 1.3: Research problem 5 1.4: Research findings and contribution 7 CHAPTER TWO: METHODOLOGY 11 2.1: A performative paradigm 11 2.2: Entwined practices 11 Visual journal process 12 Contextual review process 13 Digital archiving process 16 Exegetical process 22 Final exhibition 22 2.3: A centralised reflexive position 23 CHAPTER THREE: CONTEXTUAL REVIEW 26 3.1: Rhizomics and ‘becoming’ 27 3.2: The connection between transience and the condition of ’becoming’ in my creative practice 31 vi 3.3: Anamnesis 34 3.4: The concept of the archive 36 3.5: Influential archival artists 38 Goshka Macuga 39 Christian Boltanski 42 Bernd and Hilla Becher 45 3.6: The digital archive 48 3.7: Artistic exemplars: 52 Gerhard Richter 52 Richter’s abstract painting 57 Jackson Pollock 59 Lucio Fontana 64 Ann Hamilton 67 Janet Laurence 71 CHAPTER FOUR: DESCRIPTION OF MY PRACTICE 75 4.1: Painting: A post medium focus 75 4.2: Abstraction 80 4.3: Connecting to Wollheim’s concept of ‘twofoldness’ 82 4.4: My understanding of the concept of memory and time in my work. 86 4.5: Final exhibition: Exhale II, The Block, QUT, 2012 88 4.6: Exhibition format 88 4.7: Conceptual framework for final exhibition 89 4.8: Consolidation and development of my ideas in my archive. 90 CHAPTER FIVE: CONCLUSION 105 5.1: Summary of research 105 5.2: The correlation of evolving memory and the digital archive 107 vii 2004 - 2005 107 2005 - 2006 108 2006 - 2008 109 2008 - 2010 110 2010 - 2011 112 5.3: The implication of rhizomic thinking strategies in guiding my creative practice 113 5.4: The correspondence between open-ended inquiry and performative methodologies in my practice-led research 114 5.2: Significance of the research findings 114 APPENDIX 1: List of creative works in Exhale II, final PhD exhibition, 25-29 June, The Block, QUT, 2012. 118 APPENDIX 2: Mapped folders in the digital archive 2004-2011 121 BIBLIOGRAPHY: 133 viii TABLE OF FIGURES: Figure 1. T. Barnett. Preliminary concept mapping of the key ideas and early processes of development of my digital archive on a wall chart in my studio. May, 2006. ..................................... 16 Figure 2. T. Barnett. Detail of the preliminary concept mapping of the early processes of development of my digital archive on a wall chart from the lower right corner of the map from figure 1. May, 2006. ....................................................................................................................................... 17 Figure 3. T. Barnett. Detail of the preliminary concept mapping of the early processes of folder development of my digital archive on a wall chart from the middle section of the map from figure 1. May, 2006. ........................................................................................................................................... 18 Figure 4. T. Barnett. Detail of the preliminary concept mapping of the early processes of folder development of my digital archive on a wall chart from the middle section of the map from figure 1. May, 2006. ........................................................................................................................................... 18 Figure 5. It broke from within, Installation view, Walker Art Centre, Minneapolis, Minnesota. Goshka Macuga, 2011. ..................................................................................................................................... 41 http://www.walkerart.org/calendar/2011/goshka-macuga-it-broke-from-within ............................. 41 Figure 6. ‘Menschlich’, Installation view, Kunstmuseum, Wolfsburg, Christian Boltanski, 1994. ........ 43 http://www.kunstmuseum-wolfsburg.de/exhibition/112/83/Ich,_zweifellos._1309_Gesichter/ ...... 43 Figure 7. Des Archives du Coeur, Christian Boltanski, 2005 –The island of Ejima, Japan Future location of Les Archives du Cœur. Image courtesy of the artist and Marian Goodman Gallery, Paris/New York .................................................................................................................................... 44 http://www.serpentinegallery.org/2010/07/christian_boltanskithe_heart_a.html ........................... 44 Figure 8. ‘Blast Furnace Heads’, Bernd and Hilla Becher, 1996 .......................................................... 47 http://www.christies.com/LotFinder/lot_details.aspx?intObjectID=4004340.................................... 47 Figure 9. Gerhard Richter, Atlas, Zeitungs- & Albumfotos Newspaper & Album photographs, 1962, Atlas Sheet: 5 & 6. ............................................................................................................................... 53 www.gerhard richter.com/art/atlas.php?1158 ................................................................................... 53 Figure 10. Gerhard Richter, Atlas panels. Installation Dia Centre, New York, 1995. http://www.mediaartnet.org/works/atlas/images/2/ ........................................................................ 54 Figure 11. Gerhard Richter, Abstraktes Bild (1992) 100 cm x 100 cm, Oil on aluminum..................... 58 http://www.gerhard- richter.com/exhibitions/detail.php?exID=572&show_per_page=32&page_selected=1&paintID=7983 ............................................................................................................................................................. 58 Figure 12. Jackson Pollock, Full Fathom