Home is where the stuff is: Framing life- worlds in domestic space Lauren Woodlands Bachelor of Creative Industries (Visual Arts) (Hons Class 1) Bachelor of Education (Primary)/ Bachelor of Arts (Applied Ethics/Gender Studies) Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Supervisors: Dr Mark Pennings and Dr Daniel Mafe Visual Arts Creative Industries Faculty Queensland University of Technology 2015 Key Words Gaston Bachelard, Michel de Certeau, Pierre Bourdieu, practice-led research, creative practice, reflexivity, identity, artist books, collections, miniatures, craft culture, Regretsy, Martha Stewart, visual arts, auto-ethnography, visual ethnography, normative, mundane, narrative, domestic space, home environments, hoarding, objects, possessions, gender, play, humour, life-worlds, Mike Kelley, Tracey Emin, Portia Munson, Song Dong, David Shrigley, Richard Billingham, Henry Darger, Annette Messager. Page 1 ABSTRACT This PhD seeks to employ visual arts as a means through which to investigate concepts relating to normative behaviour and idiosyncratic relationships with domestic space, craft and collecting. My research seeks to examine the complexities of such experiences by examining the work of selected theorists and artists, as well as through my creative practice, which posits a humorous response to what would generally be considered mundane constructions of domestic life-worlds. This doctorate is represented by a 50,000 word exegesis and eight artist books. My research paradigm draws upon theoretical frameworks provided by Pierre Bourdieu’s notion of Habitus, Michel de Certeau’s The Practice of Everyday Life, and Gaston Bachelard’s The Poetics of Space. These theorists offer various perspectives about how to understand and interpret the ‘lived experience’ of the personal domestic realm and the forms of cultural production that emanate from that environment. In addition, I believe that contemporary artists, Mike Kelley, Tracey Emin, Portia Munson, Song Dong, Annette Messager, Henry Darger, Richard Billingham, and David Shrigley lucidly illustrate artistic treatments of the domestic sphere as a site for creative practice. Methodologically, this practice-led research employs approaches developed in new- ethnography that seeks to acknowledge the self-reflexive and self-examining nature of epistemology in relation to creative activity. This includes visual ethnography and auto- ethnography, which are reflexive techniques that I employ to open up my own personal creative engagement with the domestic environment as a strategy to contravene ‘idealised’ domestic practices. The result of this dialogue is provided in the form of eight artist books that record my experiences as an artist/researcher creatively responding to my domestic environment. Page 2 TABLE of CONTENTS Key Words ........................................................................................................................................... 1 ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................................... 2 List of Figures ............................................................................................................................... 6 Statement of Original Authorship ................................................................................................. 7 Acknowledgements...................................................................................................................... 8 Chapter 1: Introduction ................................................................................................................ 9 1.1 Description of project ............................................................................................................. 9 1.2 Research questions ................................................................................................................. 9 1.3 Development of the project .................................................................................................. 10 1.3.1 Resolving creative practice: unwrapping the artist ...................................................... 10 1.3.2 Reshaping and remaking the artist ............................................................................... 11 1.4 Thesis Outline ........................................................................................................................ 15 Chapter 2: Methodological Approaches ...................................................................................... 17 2.1 Practice-led research ............................................................................................................ 17 2.1.1 Research and the Rhizome: Roots, rats, maps and the iterative cyclic web ................ 19 2.1.2 Reflexive Practice .......................................................................................................... 21 2.2 ‘New’ Ethnography and Auto-ethnography .......................................................................... 22 2.2.1 Understanding ‘new’ ethnography .............................................................................. 22 2.2.2 Using auto-ethnography ............................................................................................... 23 2.3 Visual Anecdotes: “Thisness” and how the world can be said to be working ...................... 25 2.3.1 The role of photography ............................................................................................... 26 2.3.2 Books as storytelling devices ........................................................................................ 27 2.3.3 An overview of the artist books .................................................................................... 28 2.4 Contextual Review: An artistic audit ..................................................................................... 29 Chapter 3: Mapping the Mundane: Individual Experience in Everyday Life ................................... 33 3.1 Michel de Certeau: The Practice of Everyday Life ................................................................ 34 3.1.1 Resistance in movement: Walking in the City .............................................................. 34 3.1.2 Applying de Certeau to studies in Gender and Feminism............................................. 36 3.1.3 Storytelling and the everyday ....................................................................................... 37 3.2 Understanding de Certeau: Individualised Responses to Mass Culture ............................... 38 3.2.1 ‘Hacking’ consumer culture .......................................................................................... 39 3.2.2 Repurposing as a method of social resistance .............................................................. 41 Page 3 3.3 Pierre Bourdieu: The construction of life-worlds, habitus and culture ................................ 42 3.3.1 Capital ........................................................................................................................... 42 3.3.2 Field ............................................................................................................................... 43 3.3.3 Habitus .......................................................................................................................... 43 3.3.4 Modes of domination and influence: Symbolic Violence ............................................. 45 2.3.5 Taste, class and cultural worth ..................................................................................... 46 3.4 Understanding Bourdieu: How people shape and develop self ........................................... 46 3.4.1 Stereotypes, symbolism and habitus ............................................................................ 47 3.4.2 Cultural Taste and being Omnivorous .......................................................................... 49 3.5 Gaston Bachelard: Practicing the Poetics of Space at home ................................................ 51 3.5.1 Drawers, Chests, Wardrobes ........................................................................................ 52 3.5.2 Miniatures and Dreaming ............................................................................................. 53 3.6 Understanding Bachelard: domesticity and life-worlds........................................................ 54 3.6.1 Symbolism and storytelling within drawers, chests and wardrobes ............................ 55 3.6.2 The fantasy of the miniature......................................................................................... 56 3.7 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................. 58 Chapter 4: Crafting Culture ......................................................................................................... 60 4.1 Contemporary Domesticity: building a suburban habitat from consumer culture .............. 60 4.1.1. The suburban habitat .................................................................................................... 61 4.1.2 Domestic space as a field of operation ......................................................................... 62 4.1.3 Gender in domestic space ............................................................................................. 63 4.1.4 Collecting Things ..........................................................................................................