The Artist in the Field: Investigating tourist performativity and ethnographic methodology through art practice Stuart A. Simpson A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of Nottingham Trent University for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy April 2008 The Artist in the Field: Investigating tourist performativity and ethnographic methodology through art practice Stuart A. Simpson, 2007 Abstract of the research This research centres on an artistic exploration of ethnographic methodologies whilst investigating tourist performativity and the presentation of self within tourist documentation. Central to this presentation is the performance of the documented smile. The materiality of this research comes from documentary evidence (video, sound, photography, interviews, fieldnotes and diaries) recorded during a fieldtrip around popular tourist destinations in Europe. Data gathering methods, such as participant observation, reflexive writing and informal interviews with tourists, were employed not just to capture the tourist experience of others, but also to explore the multiplicity and variability of the researcher self within the field. The representation of the researcher within the research findings has become one of the issues that this project has sought to address. Two practical outputs, a primary case study entitled Smile: Formaggio con Queso (a randomly configuring computer networked installation) and a secondary case study (an interactive kiosk), interface a database constructed from the field data. Both case studies support research into how ethnographic methods might be used to inform the production processes of an art project, and, additionally, how digital art practice might contribute to the presentation of post-paradigm ethnography. The practical issues of data collecting and the implications of using the self as part of the data source are highlighted. This will be of interest to artists working in field environments where the self and ‘other’ is synonymous. Furthermore, the primary case study challenges conventional representational ethnographic modes in order to facilitate new kinds of qualitative and ethnographic insights. A reflexive autoethnographic approach to writing the thesis has been utilised to validate my personal narrative as a line of inquiry. 2 Table of Contents: Table of Contents:..............................................................................................................................................3 Table of Tables:..................................................................................................................................................5 Table of Figures: ................................................................................................................................................5 List of Appendices: ............................................................................................................................................6 Author Declarations ...........................................................................................................................................8 Acknowledgements............................................................................................................................................8 Ethical Statement ...............................................................................................................................................9 Chapter 1: Introduction .................................................................................................................11 1.1 General introduction...................................................................................................................................11 1.2 Research aims and emergent questions......................................................................................................13 1.3 Research methods used ..............................................................................................................................15 1.4 Chapter outlines .........................................................................................................................................16 1.5 Connection to previous research ................................................................................................................17 Chapter 2: Overview of Literature................................................................................................21 2.1 Introduction................................................................................................................................................21 2.5 Tourism Studies .........................................................................................................................................21 2.6 The Performance of the Smile....................................................................................................................23 2.2 Digital Ethnography...................................................................................................................................24 2.3 The Researcher Self / Autoethnography.....................................................................................................26 2.4 Visual Ethnography....................................................................................................................................29 2.9 Brief Summary...........................................................................................................................................30 Chapter 3: A Manneken Pis moment .............................................................................................31 3.1 The origins, inspiration and brief introduction to the Smile project ...........................................................31 3.2 Tourist performances and embodiment......................................................................................................38 Chapter 4: Designing a field trip with particular emphasis for data gathering within art production ........................................................................................................................................44 4.1 Preparation and Research...........................................................................................................................45 4.2 Ethnographic research design.....................................................................................................................52 4.3 Artistic approaches and strategies for data collection ................................................................................55 3 Chapter 5: Artisans in transit: roles and relationships and the ‘polyglot facets of self’..............62 5.1 Issues relating to the construction of self and identity in the field .............................................................63 5.2 The Interpersonal Field: Fighting a Fear of Strangers................................................................................65 5.3 The Artists as Tourists................................................................................................................................70 5.4 Capturing the tourist smile: transactions and agreements in the field ........................................................72 5.5 Capturing the tourist smile: felt or social? .................................................................................................80 Chapter 6: Smile: Formaggio con Queso – Databases, Interfaces and Ethnographic Hypermedia ......................................................................................................................................85 6.1 Constructing a database of video, sound and spoken word........................................................................85 6.2 Contextualising the case study: databases and interfaces...........................................................................92 6.3 Smile: Formaggio con Queso as a multi-semiotic ethnography.................................................................96 Chapter 7 Conclusions..................................................................................................................102 7.1 General Introduction ................................................................................................................................102 7.2 Research Question 1.................................................................................................................................103 7.3 Research Question 2.................................................................................................................................105 7.4 Research Question 3.................................................................................................................................106 7.5 Concluding Remarks and Suggested Further Research............................................................................107 Appendices: ...................................................................................................................................110 Bibliography ..................................................................................................................................225 Enclosures: DVD demonstration of Smile: Formaggio con Queso, 4Walls, and The Slide Show 4 Table of Tables: Table 1: Principal sites for the final itinerary...................................................................................................49