Art History (377) Dissertation Findings Title: Photographing the dead (Joel-Peter Witkin) Pub No: 3125614 Author: Hogan, Nancy Grier Degree: PhD School: THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO Date: 2004 Pages: 204 Adviser: Gilman, Sander Source: DAI-A 65/03, p. 732, Sep 2004 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377) Abstract: This thesis explores the way in which both public and private photographs of the dead may be interpreted in light of Hans-Robert Jauss's three stages of interpretation. There are a myriad of different photographs of the dead. I have chosen to concentrate on the work of Joel-Peter Witkin, the website Ogrish.com, and private, Victorian photographs. In particular, with regard to Witkin's work, I discuss the way in which taboo, as formulated by George Bataille, is relevant to Witkin's carefully arranged photographs of the dead. In order to put Witkin's photographs of the dead into some kind of perspective, I explore the broader scope of his work as a whole. Witkin's photographs can be divided into three general categories: the homoerotic, the amputee, and the dead. Each of these categories may reach its audience in three different ways: as disgusting and shocking, as neutral, and as sensual and beautiful. As one explores the reactions to each category, it is important to bear in mind the range of reactions to Witkin's photography. Without a doubt, all of his subject matter is potentially sensual—or sexual—in some form. I then turn to the aesthetic interpretation of Ogrish.com, a website devoted entirely to photographs of the dead, in light of the theory of aesthetic reception discussed above. It is important to note that Ogrish.com is, by its very nature, a very public forum for viewing photographs of the dead. Unlike Witkin's photographs, which are accessible only via tabletop artbooks, museum or gallery showings, or in private collections, Ogrish.com is available to anyone able to access the internet. In this way, Ogrish.com reflects a very postmodern approach to death. I then examine the way in which private photographs of the dead are contrasted with postmodern funerals and their coercive politics, particularly in light of Michael Foucault's exhaustive analysis of biopower and docile bodies. The “policy of coercion” applicable to the body, and referred to by Foucault in his discussion of the role of discipline, aptly applies to the ways in which the dead body is “preserved” in certain modern, cultural norms. The body remains both restrained and without power. Certainly, the mere tradition of removing the dead body from the home constitutes a “policy of coercion that acts upon the body,” thereby restraining it from the intimacy of the home. In point of fact, the policy of “preservation” powerlessness for the dead who is removed from the family unit and, moreover, whose natural process of decay is shielded from the viewer's gaze. In its entirety, this thesis examines a wide range of perspectives for understanding photographs of the dead, be they pathological or interpretive. Jauss provides a paradigm for interpreting both artistic and private works. At its core, photographs of the dead confront us with our own mortality; the interpretation of these photographs is open-ended and relies, ultimately, on the resourcefulness of the viewer and his or her historical perspective. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: The art of war: Historical accuracy of military art from the French Revolution and Napoleonic Era Pub No: 1420134 Author: Long, Donald W. Degree: MA School: CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, DOMINGUEZ HILLS Date: 2004 Pages: 81 Adviser: Jeffers, Jim Source: MAI 42/06, p. 1902, Dec 2004 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377); HISTORY, EUROPEAN (0335) Abstract: Throughout history, populations have allowed themselves to believe the images portrayed in and by various mediums as the accepted truth. Evidence suggests the historical accuracy of these works is suspect, especially with regard to military images. The contention is that accurate and complete images are sacrificed to satisfy the requirements of patrons who commission the works and perhaps to enhance or glorify the “warrior caste.” Exploring historical accuracy and written with a pronounced emphasis on the military aspects of the subject matter, this study utilizes printed sources supplemented with Internet information pertaining to works of art on combat or military personalities and events prolifically generated during the French Revolution and Napoleonic Era. This document provides thorough background information, research methodology, and recommendations for further academic exploration. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Race-ing for cybercultures: The performance of minoritarian cultural work as challenge to presumptive whiteness on the Internet Pub No: 3127466 Author: McGahan, Christopher Degree: PhD School: NEW YORK UNIVERSITY Date: 2004 Pages: 331 Adviser: Munoz, Jose Esteban Source: DAI-A 65/03, p. 744, Sep 2004 Subject: MASS COMMUNICATIONS (0708); ART HISTORY (0377); SOCIOLOGY, ETHNIC AND RACIAL STUDIES (0631) Abstract: In this dissertation I examine selected examples of the minoritarian cultural work in the U.S. and England that seeks to draw critical focus to issues and concerns related to the cultural politics of cybercultures. Cybercultures are defined here as cultural formations centering on the use of new media technologies within the context of computer mediated communication. The analysis is devoted to elucidating the ways that this cultural work contributes to reframing and reconceptualizing prevailing understandings of how racial and cultural identity intersects with and plays out through particular sites of information technology located on the Internet. The particular cultural workers whose productions are addressed are the performance and installation artists Guillermo Gomez-Pena and Roberto Sifuentes, the new media arts collective Mongrel, the conceptual artist and composer Keith Obadike, and the multimedia artist Keith Piper. My thesis is that through their projects of engaging with particular information technologies and technologics attached to the Internet from minoritarian perspectives, these cultural workers succeed in demonstrating the degree to which the social functionings of these technologies are imbricated with racial politics in ways that often go unacknowledged by the participants in and commentators on cybercultures. In this regard, I will focus on three points in particular: first, that cybercultural discourses and practices sometimes depend on the tacit understanding that the ‘color- blind’ contexts for social interaction that cyberspace anonymity provides are actually to remain within the compass of presumptive whiteness; second, that the related notion that cybercultures somehow possess the power, by enabling the formation of relatively novel forms of social collectivity, to displace historical race and ethnicity with a newly fabricated “virtual ethnicity” is an erroneous one; and third, that tropes employed to explain the social and cultural impact of Internet-related phenomena are in certain instances racializing in their effect. Throughout the course of the dissertation, there will be an attempt to show that the cultural workers discussed here address points of intersection between various kinds of technologic undergirding the operation of ICTs and issues liable to be of especial importance to minoritarian subjects in the U.S. and Europe. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Digital display: Canadian art on the World Wide Web and on CD-ROM Pub No: MQ89030 Author: Broadbent, Patricia Stephanie Degree: MA School: CARLETON UNIVERSITY (CANADA) Date: 2003 Pages: 153 Adviser: Bell, Michael ISBN: 0-612-89030-9 Source: MAI 42/05, p. 1419, Oct 2004 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377); INFORMATION SCIENCE (0723) Abstract: This thesis contends that Web sites and CD-ROMs are a means for cultural institutions to engage in poststructuralist practices for presenting art in three areas: the content, the reception and the voices. These practices include: providing many access points to a variety of information in diverse formats; using curatorial and educational strategies that favour an engaged and active role for the visitor/user; and introducing many individual voices. Four Canadian art multimedia exhibition catalogues, virtual exhibitions, and educational materials (1997–2003) are examined in depth: Browser. Artropolis 97, CyberMuse; George Legrady: From Analogue to Digital. Photography and Interactive Media; and To the Totem Forests: Emily Carr and Contemporaries Interpret Coastal Villages. These projects succeed to varying degrees in adopting the qualities of digital environments and approximating the model of the post-museum. Therefore, the author identifies effective strategies for art professionals to experiment with digital media by developing the useful characteristics of technology. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Six generations of Hopi pottery: A stylistic analysis of Nampeyo family designs Pub No: 1413697 Author: Chervnsik, Holly Elizabeth Degree: MA School: UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON-CLEAR LAKE Date: 2003 Pages: 83 Adviser: Atwater, Vivian Source: MAI 41/06, p. 1542, Dec 2003 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377); ANTHROPOLOGY, CULTURAL (0326) Abstract: The purpose of my thesis is to document, interpret, and bring to light a private collection of Southwestern Native American pottery owned by Dr. Craig Oettinger, Professor at the University of Houston - Clear Lake. The thesis consists of two major elements: The first is a comprehensive three hundred-page catalog of the collection now available on the World Wide Web at http://www.chervnsik.com/onaac.html/, that is formatted to allow updating of the data. The second part consists of an interpretive analysis of major stylistic trends and techniques apparent in examples drawn from the collection. It was during a field trip undertaken as part of the Humanities Text & Images series that I fell in love with Hopi pottery and recognized the uniqueness of Dr. Oettinger's collection. Much more than a collector's cache of market trophies, it brings to life in a vivid, generational way the legacy of one of the most historically significant Hopi artists, Nampeyo of Hano, a Tewa potter born in 1860, who essentially revived ancient Hopi traditions. Through individual pieces in the Oettinger collection, it is possible to see the genesis, continuity and transformation of Nampeyo-inspired patterns, motifs and techniques right up to the present day, and it is this aspect that I chose to emphasize in the interpretive part of the thesis. Dr. Oettinger intends to bequeath his works to the Hopi Foundation, and my larger purpose in forming and interpreting the catalog data is to provide the essential scholarly foundation to make possible future studies of this memorable collection.* *This dissertation is multimedia (contains text and other applications not available in printed format). The CD requires the following system application: Internet Browser. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Police photography: Visual representation, scientific evidence and the construction of the criminal Pub No: 3102272 Author: Finn, Jonathan Mathew Degree: PhD School: THE UNIVERSITY OF ROCHESTER Date: 2003 Pages: 195 Adviser: Cartwright, Lisa Source: DAI-A 64/08, p. 2679, Feb 2004 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377); SOCIOLOGY, CRIMINOLOGY AND PENOLOGY (0627) Abstract: This dissertation, “Police Photography: Visual Representation, Scientific Evidence and the Construction of the Criminal,” examines the use of photographic representation and photographic technologies in modern and contemporary American and Canadian law enforcement and criminal identification practices. I combine approaches from visual studies, particularly the history of photography, and from science and technology studies to position the photograph as an inscription, as a material representation at work in the construction of scientific evidence. I argue that the production, archiving and exchange of photographic representations in law enforcement and criminal identification practices function in the construction of identity. The dissertation addresses three identification practices fundamental to modern and contemporary law enforcement: fingerprinting, DNA analysis, and information databases. I stress that each is dependent on photographic representation. I argue that the specific collaboration of photography and the theory of fingerprint identification at the close of the nineteenth century gave rise to law enforcement practices based on the collection and use of latent identification data. This transformed the subject of law enforcement from the individual, physical body to a larger, aggregate social body. I trace the development of DNA analysis in law enforcement at the close of the twentieth century to examine the development of power and authority associated with the control of inscriptions. I argue that the FBI constructed a dominant position in the field of DNA analysis through the development of control over the visual representation of DNA, the autoradiograph. The dissertation concludes with an examination of two digital archives used in current law enforcement and criminal identification practices, the National Crime Information Center 2000 and the Combined DNA Index System. The theoretical possibilities associated with the collection and use of latent identification data announced at the close of the nineteenth century have become a reality in 2003. I suggest that contemporary law enforcement practices are driven by the collection and archiving of identification data and argue that this practice functions in the redefinition of criminality and the body. I argue that the body in the twenty-first century digital archive is constructed as a site of potential criminality. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Becoming photographs: Aesthetics of immanence Pub No: NQ85454 Author: James, Joy Degree: PhD School: THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (CANADA) Date: 2003 Pages: 290 Adviser: Gunew, Sneja ISBN: 0-612-85454-X Source: DAI-A 64/11, p. 3878, May 2004 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377) Abstract: Potential rolls in to roll on, in an experiential openness of clutter and invention. Brian Massumi, “Introduction,” A Shock to Thought, (2002). The “eventfulness” of the photograph—the force of its becoming and its continued potentiality—is the primary concern of this dissertation. My work is informed by recent philosophical discussions regarding processes of thinking and seeing, and by the multiple histories and theories of photography that have arisen since its invention as a reproductive technology. I work with a small selection of photographs, all of them portraits of one sort or another, dating from the end of the nineteenth century through the first few decades of the twentieth century, and produced in diverse geographical, cultural and political settings. From the moment when I first encountered each of these photographs, they appeared to exceed any signification that can be attributed to them by current theories of photography. In the course of my analysis, I argue that this is because all of the images are “atypical” in a way that, according to Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari in their interpretation of minor literatures, heralds potentiality. These photographs were implicated in political economies of transformation. I propose that, at the time they were made, all of these pictures were futural: the stuff of collective becomings. The images present as multiples: how they were seen was dependent on who was doing the looking. The “atypical expression” that I claim for each photograph emerges only at distinctly marked sites and under exceptional conditions of “seeing.” Here my findings intersect with, and modulate, concepts of “seeing photographically” that have recently been put forward by a number of scholars, most notably by Celia Lury in Prosthetic Culture: Photography, Memory and Identity (1998). Deleuze and Guattari both did and did not extend their understanding of atypical expression to include photographs. Whereas, in A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia (1987), they suggest that the photograph is closer to a “tracing” than to a “map” (21), in Kafka: Toward a Minor Literature, they show the ways in which that author figures photographs as maps of the most potent kind I believe that Deleuze and Guattari's theory of expression, as most recently elaborated by Brian Massumi in his introduction to A Shock to Thought: Expression after Deleuze and Guattari (2002), can be productively engaged to revitalize our perception of what these photographs did. An investigation of how these photographs functioned is important for the way in which it opens on to another tremor in the shock to thinking/seeing, the move into virtual reality and digital imaging. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Real performance on the pseudo network: Franklin Furnace and the Internet as an open medium Pub No: 3089326 Author: Sant, Anthony Degree: PhD School: NEW YORK UNIVERSITY Date: 2003 Pages: 189 Adviser: Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, Barbara Source: DAI-A 64/05, p. 1440, Nov 2003 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377); THEATER (0465); MASS COMMUNICATIONS (0708) Abstract: This dissertation sets out to document a significant moment in performance history: the early years of live art on the Internet as presented by Franklin Furnace, a New York-based nonprofit arts organization. In the process I also aim to create some awareness to the fact that access to the Web as a creative medium may soon be taken over by governmental and commercial interests to be regulated and controlled like radio and television broadcasting. Since 1998 I have closely observed the performances presented online by Franklin Furnace and others. I present the key issues related to the potential of webcasting as a creative medium with the aim of explaining what is really at stake for independent webcasters. I examine what led Franklin Furnace to start presenting live art on the Internet in 1998 offering a unique overview, which links performance art to live art on the Internet through artists' books. Web content creators can reach an audience without a controlling intermediary, broadcast their work and ideas to audiences they could not previously reach through other means. This dissertation's broader investigation into how the new technology transforms power relations, resounds with the many efforts of avant-garde artist throughout the twentieth century who explored interactive art while questioning the role of the artist in relationship to their audience. Two critical issues raised by webcasting—long-term distribution of digital works, and digital rights management—are relevant for making webcasts available on demand immediately after they are created, and even more so during efforts for long term preservation and dissemination. While Franklin Furnace is the first to admit that it has far from found a solution to the critical issues, which threaten its mission to foster the dissemination of artists' ideas, it firmly believes that the best way to move forward is to align itself with a larger organization that is already making headway in its endeavors to preserve the Internet as an open medium. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: From the aesthetic state to virtual reality: The Gesamtkunstwerk in an age of mass culture Pub No: 3074322 Author: Smith, Matthew Wilson Degree: PhD School: COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY Date: 2003 Pages: 222 Adviser: Huyssen, Andreas; Meisel, Martin ISBN: 0-493-94308-0 Source: DAI-A 63/12, p. 4154, Jun 2003 Subject: THEATER (0465); ART HISTORY (0377); LITERATURE, COMPARATIVE (0295) Abstract: Prefigured by the Romantics and first realized in theory and practice by Richard Wagner, the Gesamtkunstwerk has exerted tremendous influence on Western culture in the twentieth century. It has inspired a wide range of theatre artists (E. Gordon Craig, Max Reinhardt, Vsevolod Meyerhold, to name but three), diverse spectacles (Riefenstahl's Triumph of the Will , for instance, but also Eisenstein's October), and political movements (Nazism is inseparable from it, but so are elements of certain socialist aesthetics). Moreover, it is the aesthetic form that best explains much of contemporary digital culture, especially virtual reality and multimedia performance. The Gesamtkunstwerk, I argue, is an artistic tradition whose Romantic roots have found fertile soil in the technological transformations of modernity. My dissertation begins with a discussion of the “aesthetic state” in Schiller's Letters on the Aesthetic Education of Man (Chapter One), proceeds to a discussion of Bayreuth and Disneyland (Chapter Two), continues with a discussion of the Bauhaus Totaltheater and Andy Warhol's Factory (Chapter Three), then analyzes the relationship between Brecht, the Gesamtkunstwerk, and mass culture (Chapter Four), and ends with a reading of virtual reality in the light of the Gesamtkunstwerk (Chapter Five). Overall, the dissertation has the following objectives: to discuss the philosophical origins of the relationship among the Gesamtkunstwerk, technology, and mass culture; to introduce a critical vocabulary for discussing that relationship; and to present close comparative readings of a number of different works that exemplify that relationship. I argue that the Gesamtkunstwerk requires elaborate systems of mechanical reproduction in order to manifest itself as natural, and demands rigorous separation of labor and art in order to manifest itself as whole. Though I pay special attention to German and American sources, my sources traverse European and American performance practices between the mid-nineteenth and late twentieth centuries. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: The Virtual Museum of Canada: Evaluating the potential of the digital environment for the display of art Pub No: MQ83431 Author: Bauer, Kimberly A. Degree: MA School: CARLETON UNIVERSITY (CANADA) Date: 2002 Pages: 150 Adviser: Bell, Michael ISBN: 0-612-83431-X Source: MAI 42/02, p. 349, Apr 2004 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377) Abstract: The Canadian Heritage Information Network (CHIN) has long been at the forefront of providing the museum profession, and latterly, all Canadians, with access to information about collections of heritage material. With the launch of the Virtual Museum of Canada (VMC)—a meta-museum—in 2001, CHIN broke new ground in the presentation of art and the shaping of knowledge. This thesis considers the implications of the VMC for the display of art objects in the digital environment of the World Wide Web. By using a semiotic square (alter Greimas and Jameson), it is possible to demonstrate that the ‘virtual’ object digitally displayed is a simulacrum, and not a poor reproduction of the ‘real’ artwork. When used in ‘virtual’ exhibition projects Chat exploit the inherent properties of the digital environment—procedural, participatory, spatial, and encyclopaedic—simulacra are effective instruments to shape knowledge about art. The effectiveness is demonstrated by an evaluation of two projects in the VMC: Group of Seven (2001) by the Tom Thomson Memorial Art Gallery and Panoramas: The North American Landscape in Art (2001) CHIN. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Decorative motifs on Chinese porcelain sherds from Portuguese shipwrecks of the South African coast, 1552-- 1647: A cultural historical study Author: Esterhuizen, Laura Valerie Degree: DPhil School: UNIVERSITY OF PRETORIA (SOUTH AFRICA) Date: 2002 Adviser: Harris, K. L.; Bergh, J. S. Source: DAI-A 63/08, p. 2977, Feb 2003 Subject: HISTORY, MODERN (0582); ART HISTORY (0377); DESIGN AND DECORATIVE ARTS (0389) Abstract: This study focuses on aspects regarding the Ming blue- and-white porcelain sherds recovered on South Africa's coastline from Portuguese shipwrecks during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Thirteen carracks have faltered on the rocks off the east coast of South Africa in the period between 1551 and 1647 AD. Porcelain sherds from nine of these wrecks still wash up on the shoreline. For this research, it was necessary to compile a system in order to capture all the information needed regarding these shards. This was done with the help of the Department of Information Technology at the University of Pretoria. The research compromised the study of more than 80 000 sherds. The Portuguese wrecks on the South African coast, offer vast research opportunities for research purposes. The recovering, identification and the dating of the wrecks can contribute a great deal with regard to the study of dating the motifs and style of the Chinese porcelain cargo carried. This research is vital as there has been a lack of material evidence to support precise dating and classification from the Jiajing-period (1522–1566) through to the end of the Ming dynasty in 1644 and the early years of the Qing dynasty. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: ATLANTIS: A bridge for an introduction to architectural history Pub No: 3077733 Author: Fernandes, Richard J. Degree: EdD School: PEPPERDINE UNIVERSITY Date: 2002 Pages: 142 Adviser: Stimac, Michele ISBN: 0-493-98234-5 Source: DAI-A 64/01, p. 1, Jul 2003 Subject: ARCHITECTURE (0729); EDUCATION, ART (0273); ART HISTORY (0377) Abstract: The purpose of this dissertation was twofold: to assess design, presentation, and content by a panel of experts and to pilot with end users the presentation and content of the Alternative Teaching, Learning, And New Technology Instructional Systems (ATLANTIS) product. The objective was to determine if ATLANTIS is an engaging and meaningful learning tool for an introduction to architectural history course. The pilot phase of the study elicited feedback about the various facets of ATLANTIS and how they pertain to an introduction to architectural history. The questions addressed in this study were: (1) Does ATLANTIS provide a viable means of content delivery according to students' perceptions? (2) Do students perceive ATLANTIS helping their content retention? (3) Do students perceive ATLANTIS creating a learning community? (4) According to students, what are the strengths and weaknesses of ATLANTIS? (5) Do the panel of experts and students perceive the ATLANTIS learning tool as meeting the college/university requirements for an introduction to architectural history course? The panel of experts completed a Panel of Experts Questionnaire, which focused on design, presentation, and content of ATLANTIS. Student participants completed an ATLANTIS Pilot Survey, which focused on presentation and content. A group of 28 architectural community college students and 11 interior architecture university students participated in the study. Population ages ranged from 18 and higher at Citrus Community College located in Glendora, California, and California State University Long Beach located in Long Beach, California. ATLANTIS was assessed and pilot evaluation results varied. Experts and student participants thought ATLANTIS provided relevant material that fostered discussions and debate with student participants. ATLANTIS was easy to use, entertaining, and maintained the attention of student participants. A replicated larger scale study, expanding the sample of architectural students, the geographical area of the population, and exploring the demographic variables is recommended. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Emblems in the digital age Pub No: MQ85864 Author: Kotb, Mohamed Degree: MA School: MCGILL UNIVERSITY (CANADA) Date: 2002 Pages: 107 Adviser: Daly, Peter; Richter, Horst ISBN: 0-612-85864-2 Source: MAI 42/04, p. 1082, Aug 2004 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377); EDUCATION, LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE (0279); LANGUAGE, LINGUISTICS (0290); COMPUTER SCIENCE (0984) Abstract: This thesis deals with the representation of emblem literature in digital media in the modern age. A discussion of issues related to new media such as the advantages and disadvantages of digital media as well as copyright issues is presented. There follows a discussion of different technologies related to modern means of publishing, notably Acrobat technology, HTML, XHTML, and XML, and how they could be best used to serve the goal of dealing with emblems by means of digital media. A discussion of digitizing and indexing emblems as well as CD-ROM technology is also presented. This leads to an evaluation of some Internet web sites and a CD-ROM edition. The thesis concludes with a summary evaluating the success of modern attempts of presenting emblem literature in modern digital media. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Images of the Holocaust. Meaning, memory, incrimination Author: Liljefors, Max Patrik Andreas Degree: PhD School: LUNDS UNIVERSITET (SWEDEN) Date: 2002 Pages: 196 ISBN: 91-89638-00X Languange: SWEDISH Source: DAI-C 63/04, p. 610, Winter 2002 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377) Abstract: This thesis examines the visual representation of the Holocaust, the Nazi genocide of European Jewry. Each of its three parts focuses on a particular aspect of Holocaust representation. Part 1, “Meaning” (chapters 1–3), considers first the important role played by documentary photos from the concentration camps for the public knowledge of the Holocaust. It then proceeds to study the work and reception, between 1945 and 1998, of five artists who have used these atrocity photos as a basis for their art: Corrado Cagli, Gerhart Frankl, Rico Lebrun, Boris Lurie and Robert Morris. In some of them, the motif of the mass grave is found to take on new cultural meanings in the passage from documentary- to artistic image. In others, the atrocity imagery instead undermines the conventions of meaning in art. The author interprets these processes through Julia Kristeva's psychoanalytic theory of abjection. Part 2, “Memory” (chapters 4–5), first considers the visualisation of Holocaust memory in the forms of video interviews with Holocaust survivors, Holocaust monuments (Buchenwald and Berlin), and photographs of Jewish life before and during the Holocaust. These are analysed with regard to the understanding of Holocaust memory as either “traumatic” or “constructed”. The thesis then proceeds to examine Holocaust memory in digital media, such as the Internet and CD-rom, which seem to foster ideas about memory as programmable and re- programmable. The author detects a shift from “historical” to “virtual” Holocaust memory, when interactive technology are combined with a pedagogy that stresses empathetic insight and identification. Clashes between competing collective memories over official Holocaust monuments are contrasted to the simultaneous individualisation and universalisation of Holocaust memory in the new media. Part 3, “Incrimination” (chapters 6–8), examines the visual representation of Nazism, and forms an antipole to the focus on processes of meaning and identification in the previous parts of the book. “Incrimination” is here understood as a kind of cultural, negative signification of a secondary order, a “counter-meaning” always consisting of the destruction of a pre-existing positive meaning or identity. From this perspective, the author discusses various forms of the visualisation of Nazism, including both Nazi easel art and today's post-modern appropriations of Nazi aesthetics and iconography. From the conflict within Nazism over German Expressionism to the censoring of contemporary artists like Melvin Charney, Zbigniew Libera and Ronald Jones, this study points to the problems of representing Nazism in visual culture. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Lurking and looking: Media technologies and cultural convergences of spectatorship, voyeurism, and surveillance Pub No: 3067705 Author: Murphy, Sheila Colleen Degree: PhD School: UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, IRVINE Date: 2002 Pages: 194 Adviser: Friedberg, Anne ISBN: 0-493-87231-0 Source: DAI-A 63/10, p. 3401, Apr 2003 Subject: CINEMA (0900); MASS COMMUNICATIONS (0708); ART HISTORY (0377) Abstract: This dissertation theorizes “lurking” as a mode of visuality. Within the textual Internet discourse of newsgroups, lurking refers to the practice of unseen observation prior to active participation in an online community. Online, lurking is an explicitly invited, encouraged, and acceptable practice. I have extended this notion of lurking in order to theorize the emergence of a mode of looking at remote, banal images through mediating electronic technologies. In doing so, lurking is understood as a mode that combines spectatorship, voyeurism, and surveillance in new ways that begin to occur with the introduction of television into American culture. Looking back at earlier moments in the history of mass media and computing, one can begin to understand how the “cultural installation” of different mass media impacted American life in regular, consistent, and significantly unnoticed, or at least under-theorized, ways. Lurking is the unseen, often remote viewing of seemingly “live” or “real-time” banal situations by a subject who can potentially become an active participant in the scene s/he is watching. Lurking is mediated by electronic technologies that accommodate the lurker's desire for invisibility and anonymity while distributing information and images to the lurker. The theory of lurking I put forward here is an interdisciplinary theory of contemporary cultural and technological experience that draws upon media theory, cultural studies, critical theory, media history, art history, and digital media studies methods and texts. Primary sources include television series, films, and websites. Each chapter traces out the emergence of lurking while also reconsidering theories of spectatorship, voyeurism, and surveillance. Television viewing introduces a new spectator, the TV viewer, whose relation to media is more interactive and less focused than the film spectator. Utilizing Andy Warhol's prolific film work, I demonstrated that lurking is a productive process and one that scrambles a lurker's negotiation of the passive and active aspects involved in using and consuming visual media. Finally, in the online discourse of the world wide web, lurking is a de facto position for computer users who both embrace anonymity and are involuntarily becoming more visible through online information systems. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Study about materials and criteria in the compensation for losses in mural painting. Application in the frescoes of Antonio Palomino in the Santos Juanes Church of Valencia (Spanish text) Pub No: 3138674 Author: Sanchez Pons, Mercedes Degree: Dr School: UNIVERSIDAD POLITECNICA DE VALENCIA (SPAIN) Date: 2002 Pages: 320 Adviser: Bosch Reig, Ignacio ISBN: 0-493-55036-4 Languange: SPANISH Source: DAI-A 65/07, p. 2405, Jan 2005 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377); FINE ARTS (0357); ARCHITECTURE (0729) Abstract: This thesis studies the meaning of compensation for losses in the conservation and restoration of wall paintings, particulary frescoes. It's a revision of materials and criteries that have been applied in the past and in present time, and also has an study about the new technological possibilities, especially in the use of digital printing. The investigation context is a Project I+D+ I (“Digital treatment of images tranferred in a stable support for the restoration of the frescoes of Santos Juanes Church in Valencia ”) of the Conservation and Restoration Department of the Universidad Politécnica de Valencia, support by the CICYT (Interministerial Commission of Science, and Technology). This Project wants to recover the perception of the interior (architecture and wall painting) of this church. In 1700 Antonio Palomino, a king Carlos II's baroque artist, painted the barrel vault (1200 m2) with the technique of fresco. Now this paint is absolutely ruined because of two factors: a big fire in 1936, during the Spanish Civil War, and a restoration process made between 1958 and 1963. With the fire it lost about 30% of the paint. The restoration was also bad; with the Italian technique of strappo, half of the paint was extracted from the barrel vault, attached into wood panels and again put on the vault, but the work was not finished because the results were not good. Now the Boveda has a part with a bad restoration and a part ruined by the fire. This investigation wants to recover the wall painting, making a new restoration, and its image by the use of a black and white photography of 1926, (made before the fire), and new technologies in digital treatment of images and digital printing systems. With a diversity of phyical and chemical tests we have known what kind of materials have been employed in the ancient restoration and its influence in the actual conservation. We also have made some tests to evaluate the resistence of different digital printing inks and its supports (ink- jet, laser color, termography) to different agents: light fastness, temperature, hR and solvents. In conclusion we have developed methodology to restore again this wall painting in the best conditions using the more accurate digital printing of photography. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Emerging from flatness: Murakami Takashi and superflat aesthetics (Japan) Pub No: MQ79035 Author: Steinberg, Marc Aaron Degree: MA School: MCGILL UNIVERSITY (CANADA) Date: 2002 Pages: 117 Adviser: Lamarre, Thomas ISBN: 0-612-79035-5 Source: MAI 41/06, p. 1543, Dec 2003 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377) Abstract: This thesis is an examination of the concept and the term “superflat” as it is elaborated by the Japanese artist Murakami Takashi in his writings, in the exhibition he curated under the same name, and in his own art. Its aim is to contextualize Murakami's project on one hand in terms of a similar attempt to define a Japanese national aesthetic in the early 20 th century, and on the other in terms of the 1990's tendency to return to Edo Japan to find the “origins” of Japan's postmodernity. Murakami's own art is then turned to in order to both elaborate on and test the aesthetic of Japanese art he calls the superflat. This examination of Murakami's art permits the formulation of an aesthetics of Japanese contemporary art and animation even as it will afford an understanding of the “cultural logic” of the digital age that informs Murakami's argument. Questions important to this project are: Is the articulation of a local aesthetics possible in this globalizing age? What are the aesthetic traits of the digital age? How should the superflat—as both idea and project—be interpreted? ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Portraiture and characterization in computer animation Pub No: 1407219 Author: Camenisch, Andrew Taylor Degree: MFA School: MISSISSIPPI STATE UNIVERSITY Date: 2001 Pages: 35 Adviser: Chartier, Guillaume ISBN: 0-493-47161-8 Source: MAI 40/04, p. 803, Aug 2002 Subject: FINE ARTS (0357); ART HISTORY (0377); COMPUTER SCIENCE (0984) Abstract: Persons have served as both the inspiration for and the subject of art throughout history. Through virtually every medium, portraiture has highlighted what it is to be human by exploring those characteristics which make an individual unique and specific. Animation, though historically abounding with characters, has tended to relegate the concerns of mimetic characterization to other media, namely film, bowing to the fantastic and conceptual roots of animation and ignoring the goals of portraiture in favor of simple characterizations submitted to the movements of narrative action. Motivated by an interest in human individuality and by a sincere desire to further an exploration into the potential of computer animation, I have sought to create an animated portrait with the intent of illuminating, through the character's specific human qualities, truths concerning the general human condition of which the viewer and artist partake.* *This dissertation includes a CD that is compound (contains both a paper copy and a CD as part of the dissertation). The CD requires the following applications: Corel Photohouse; Quick Time Movie player; Winzip; Internet Access. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Gerardo Suter's 'TransSitus': Navigating memory's labyrinth in an artistic exploration of identity across virtual borders (Mexico) Pub No: 1409154 Author: De Armendi, Nicole Degree: MA School: VIRGINIA COMMONWEALTH UNIVERSITY Date: 2001 Pages: 138 Adviser: Hobbs, Robert C. ISBN: 0-493-64869-0 Source: MAI 40/06, p. 1321, Dec 2002 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377) Abstract: Gerardo Suter is one of Mexico's leading contemporary artists. In 1998, he employed the Internet as the principle component in TranSitus, a project developed around the theme of the US-Mexico border. Although TranSitus marks a significant shift in Suter's artistic career and demonstrates the use of new technologies by current Mexican artists, few published materials are readily available for dealing with this innovative piece of Mexican art. In TranSitus Suter transforms the Internet, a product of the Information Age, into a contemporary symbol for memory. Gerardo Suter's TranSitus: Navigating Memory's Labyrinth in an Artistic Exploration of Identity across Virtual Borders is a close examination of this Internet piece in light of its exploration of memory, iconography and historical context. The issue of memory, a major theme underlying Suter's work, is discussed in terms of its labyrinthine qualities and way of shaping personal and collective identity. In so doing, this thesis explores the relevance of TranSitus in understanding the shared border of Mexico and the United States that provides the modus operandi for this work, and the universal search for self-awareness via collective memory, which appears to be one of its major goals. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Collaborative interface: Writing the Web with interactive multimedia and virtual reality Pub No: 3014374 Author: Mackey, Thomas Patrick Degree: PhD School: STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK AT ALBANY Date: 2001 Pages: 231 Adviser: Byrd, Don ISBN: 0-493-24318-6 Source: DAI-A 62/05, p. 1821, Nov 2001 Subject: LANGUAGE, RHETORIC AND COMPOSITION (0681); ART HISTORY (0377); INFORMATION SCIENCE (0723); EDUCATION, LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE (0279); EDUCATION, TECHNOLOGY (0710) Abstract: This dissertation argues that writing the web is a process of interactivity among participants through a collaborative interface of word, image, and sound. The Web is discussed in this project as a hybrid medium for writing in various forms. This interactive environment is also theorized as a medium for the production of original student projects in collaboration with other authors. As such, we need to re- think our understanding of writing beyond print, text, and hypertext, to account for the visual, aural, virtual, and interactive elements of the Web. This critical inquiry into the pedagogical aspect of digital media is examined through five inter-related frameworks: interfacing, orality, visuality, virtuality, and textuality. This project takes an interdisciplinary approach that explores prior precedents in multimedia and virtual reality in twentieth century collage on paper and canvas. Nineteenth century developments in photography will also be examined. For instance, the diorama and daguerreotype are discussed as nascent virtual realities that challenged cultural expectations concerning the nature of representation and truth. These early artistic and technological developments are examined within a contemporary context of the World Wide Web, which is theorized as a collage-like fictive space for composition. This dissertation examines web based multimedia in detail including several examples of Internet Art featured in the Whitney Biennial 2000. While this digital medium is unique and innovative, the component parts of the Web can be better understood in relation to a history of oral tradition, literature, print, painting, photography, and technologies of code, such as the telegraph. This is an important perspective to consider as we utilize web-based multimedia, networked hypertext, and virtual reality interfaces in education. Technology continues to be a major force in educational environments, yet teachers often struggle with how to effectively teach with new media in ways to support writing and literacy. We gain insights about how to write with and teach with this medium by avoiding uncritical assumptions concerning the expectations of technology to automatically resolve pedagogical issues. While this project takes a theoretical and historical approach to these issues, the central concern of this dissertation relates to the role of teachers in this writing process. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Art in the information age: Cybernetics, software, telematics, and the conceptual contributions of art and technology to art history and theory Pub No: 3041311 Author: Shanken, Edward A. Degree: PhD School: DUKE UNIVERSITY Date: 2001 Pages: 339 Adviser: Van Miegroet, Han; Mitchell, W. J. T. ISBN: 0-493-54651-0 Source: DAI-A 63/01, p. 7, Jul 2002 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377); HISTORY OF SCIENCE (0585) Abstract: This dissertation argues that the artistic use of technology demands greater recognition. Scholarship on twentieth century art generally has ignored or disparaged the artistic current otherwise known as Art and Technology. Art History has failed to recognize and incorporate into its canons the rich historical and theoretical underpinnings of this tendency. This oversight is especially conspicuous in the literature's inability to grasp how the sciences and technologies particular to the Information Age have shaped the formal and conceptual development of art since 1945. The research presented here employs a synthetic method drawing on diverse disciplines, archival research, correspondence, and personal interviews. The work of British artist Roy Ascott and American art critic Jack Burnham furnish central practical and theoretical frameworks and are discussed in detail. Their contributions support the dissertation's thesis that the cultural manifestations of the late twentieth century can be better understood by closely analyzing the scientific and technological developments that have played a central role in shaping society. This study does not privilege science and technology as the engines of discovery that drive subsequent cultural developments, but demonstrates how artists have integrated art with science and technology in a praxis that interrogates key aspects of western epistemology and aesthetics. The dissertation examines how this praxis seeks to challenge conventional models of communication, such as aesthetic exchanges in which an authorial message is embedded in an object by an artist and decoded by an audience. By contrast, many works of Art and Technology (and artists' theories about them) explicitly propose that richer forms of meaning can arise from a multi- directional flow of information in discursive networks. Such works stress the processes of artistic creation and audience participation. They emphasize the dematerialized forms of ideation and collaboration rather than the materiality of concrete art objects. The dissertation problematizes these aesthetic theories, but maintains that artistic meaning in the Information Age is not embedded in manipulation, and distribution of information. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: The effect of surrogation on viewer response to expressional qualities in works of art Pub No: 3016967 Author: Taylor, Bradley Leland Degree: PhD School: UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN Date: 2001 Pages: 219 Adviser: Drabenstott, Karen M. ISBN: 0-493-28501-6 Source: DAI-A 62/06, p. 1972, Dec 2001 Subject: INFORMATION SCIENCE (0723); LIBRARY SCIENCE (0399); ART HISTORY (0377) Abstract: Panofsky's three levels of meaning in art and Walter Benjamin's “aura of the original” form the theoretical bases for an empirical study that examines the human response to works of art presented in different viewing formats—oil on canvas paintings, color slides, digital images, pictures from books and glossy photos. Key contributions of the study are a critical analysis of library and information science contributions to the image studies literature over the past thirty years, the development of a new methodology for the study of image-based materials, and insight into the perceptions and behaviors of non-expert viewers, a group almost entirely excluded from previous studies. Study results reveal three important ways in which subjects differentiate the experience of viewing original works of art from surrogates—in the intensity of the emotional response evoked, in the superior ability of the oil on canvas format to convey feeling and emotion, and in an overall ranking of the various formats' abilities to convey feeling and emotion. Qualitative comments attest to the pivotal role of the gallery in the way original works of art are received. Even assuming additional enhancements to digital imagery, museum visitors still perceive the richly-hued gallery walls, gilded frames, other visitors, and personal memory as integral parts of the picture-viewing experience. While considerable effort has been invested in the technology of facilitating access to images online, much less attention has been paid to how such technology may distort our reading of the documentation it purports to reproduce. This study reminds those involved with the digitization of museum collections and picture archives that expression is the primary means artists use to communicate with the outside world. Since the process of reproduction compromises the expressive power inherent in works of fine art, digitization efforts will quickly need to find means to cope with the resulting loss of critical informational content. The answer may lie in using emerging technologies to emulate the gallery experience for online audiences and in using the linking ability of the web to create an informational environment that deepens the gallery experience for on-site visitors. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Music, image, gesture: The graphical score and the visual representation of music in cinema and digital media Pub No: 3054816 Author: Tobias, James S. Degree: PhD School: UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA Date: 2001 Pages: 339 Adviser: Kinder, Marsha ISBN: 0-493-70139-7 Source: DAI-A 63/05, p. 1601, Nov 2002 Subject: CINEMA (0900); ART HISTORY (0377); MASS COMMUNICATIONS (0708); MUSIC (0413) Abstract: This study of music and musicality as represented in audiovisual media proceeds as a comparison of musical design in cinematic forms and new media forms, motivated by the cinema's usefulness as the heretofore most thoroughly theorized object of analysis in studies of sound-image relations. The notion of the graphical score as an organizational strategy for time-based media is followed from cinema through interactive media, covering a roughly historical trajectory. Eisenstein's graphical score for Alexander Nevsky (1936) provides an example of the theorization of sound-image relations according to a musical model. The synaesthetic world of visual music animation, as seen in the films of Oscar Fischinger, is contextualized against the graphical scores of Hans Richter and Ernst Bloch's philosophy of musical “carpet motifs”. Hanns Eisler's challenge to the practice of close synchronization between sound and image is examined in his film scoring practices, as applied to his documentary film music, specifically A Child Goes Forth (1941) and Night and Fog (1955). Jazz cinema and jazz visual culture of the 1970s allow a comparison of mediation and performance between the recording industry and the cinema, with attention to Larry Clark's portrayal of the recording struggles of Black jazz improvisers in Passing Through (1976). Finally, visual representations of music in interactive work accessed on the world wide web are considered against musical interfaces by Steina Vasulka in works of the 1980s and 1990s, where the question of audiovisual isomorphics returns in a new configuration of interactive performance. The notion of the graphical score provides this study of time-based audiovisual works with a non- teleological theoretical arc and aims it at further production and practice: all of these cultural productions can be understood as prototypes for future reference, design, and development. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: A semiotic content analysis and exegesis of World Wide Web advertising: A multi-methodological search for the legacy of early 20th century modern art movements and the contextual understanding of digital design Pub No: 9995048 Author: Pritchard, William Thomas Degree: PhD School: BOWLING GREEN STATE UNIVERSITY Date: 2000 Pages: 194 Adviser: Rentner, Terry; Foust, James C. ISBN: 0-493-03379-3 Source: DAI-A 61/11, p. 4219, May 2001 Subject: MASS COMMUNICATIONS (0708); ART HISTORY (0377); BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION, MARKETING (0338); DESIGN AND DECORATIVE ARTS (0389) Abstract: This study used both quantitative and qualitative research methods to decipher if early 20th century art movements so influential to the genesis of traditional print advertising still exert their influences within World Wide Web advertising, and to compose one of the first multi-methodologically astute understandings of the larger environment of digital advertising. A random sample of 100 Web advertisements was coded for fine art content and analytical categories for semiotic discussion also were extracted. Findings from both a semiotic content analysis and a semiotic exegesis of the Web advertisements suggest that techniques and values associated with one early 20th century art movement—Constructivism/Bauhaus/DeStijl—are most prominent within Web advertisement designs. Such findings, it is concluded, seem to point to the inherent limitations of on-line design in comparison to traditional print design, and present the workings of a new culture of advertising defined by, among other characteristics, a universal equity among large and small advertisers and a palatable straying from traditional professional advertising codes. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Exploration of Chinese art using a multimedia CD-ROM: Design, mediated experience, and knowledge construction Pub No: 9983012 Author: Yang, Guey-Meei Degree: PhD School: THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY Date: 2000 Pages: 240 Adviser: Efland, Arthur ISBN: 0-599-91530-7 Source: DAI-A 61/08, p. 2960, Feb 2001 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377); EDUCATION, TECHNOLOGY (0710); HISTORY, ASIA, AUSTRALIA AND OCEANIA (0332) Abstract: This study consisted of two phases: (a) research instrument development, and (b) research instrument implementation and exploration of its effects. In the first phase, the researcher designed and produced the research instrument—the Chinese Dragons multimedia program. The Chinese Dragons program provided a constructivist, case based, and situated multimedia learning environment. When interacting with the program, users actively engaged in virtual tasks by playing the role of a news reporter assigned to write an article about Chinese dragons. They did research by exploring three artworks with the Chinese dragon motif. Since the Chinese dragon is the most pervasive symbol in Chinese culture it can serve as entry points to different venues of Chinese history and culture. Three artworks, a Han dynasty silk banner, a Qing dynasty dragon robe, and a Tang dynasty bronze mirror, were chosen to represent the different meanings of Chinese dragons. In the second phase, the researcher studied the interactive learning experience and knowledge construction affected by the program. Fourteen students (third to ninth graders) were recruited to participate in this research. Data were collected through interviews, observations, and written documents. The data suggests that, computers, like any other previous technology, not only facilitates students' learning experiences but also fundamentally reshapes and transforms that experience. The Chinese Dragons program, which is constructivist, situated, and case based, evidently engaged and immersed the learners in simulated contexts to build up a complex understanding of Chinese dragons through multiple cases of exploration. In addition, the organizational structure of the program appeared to impact the learners' structure for constructing their articles. Evidence of cognitive equilibration (accommodations) of the learners was observed in versions of the participants' articles about Chinese dragons (through changes in titles or content). Among the four types of knowledge transfer (i.e. duplicate, paraphrase, integration, and application, generalization and synthesis) identified in the participants' articles, the integration transfer was the least observed. In conclusion, the researcher shared and reflected on her experience of designing and implementing the Chinese Dragons program. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Art, myth and magic: The status of the object in a virtual world Pub No: 9952442 Author: Byce, Joann Marie Degree: PhD School: UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES Date: 1999 Pages: 116 Adviser: Preziosi, Donald ISBN: 0-599-56324-9 Source: DAI-A 60/12, p. 4215, Jun 2000 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377); FINE ARTS (0357) Abstract: Art works and artifacts have value and meaning for their audiences beyond their value as commodities. Art has been an indicator of national or ethnic identity and has been an object of aesthetic contemplation. The qualities attributed to art are often non-rational, and “fetish” is the word most used to describe those qualities. However, fetish has negative connotations that derive from its history, and is unable to explain many of the positive values of art. In this dissertation, I propose “aura” as an analogous descriptive term to describe more precisely the characteristics of art works that communicate meaning and value. Walter Benjamin was a twentieth-century cultural theorist who wrote about the importance of aura for unique art objects and its supposed loss through reproductive technology. I place Benjamin's writings in the context of the history of aura and analyze his writings to determine the relevance of his descriptions to valuations of art within an art historical context. Through a further analysis of fetish, I then place the two terms in an analogous relation to demonstrate how both are used to construct identities for viewers through the viewers' determinations of meaning in the art works characterized by either of these terms. I examine how these terms can be used to characterize unique, material objects as well as reproductions or digitized art works. As Benjamin defined it, aura fails to describe adequately the positive, non-rational qualities attributed to art works that fetish can only describe negatively. Benjamin romanticized the history of art, and also failed to take into account the value that reproductions, mass-produced objects and digital images may have for viewers. However, my examination of aura helps to deconstruct the layers of significance art works have and provides insight into the processes involved in the attribution of value and meaning to art and artifacts. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: The use of text in art, 1988--1999 Pub No: 1398599 Author: Gerstheimer, Christian John Degree: MA School: MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY Date: 1999 Pages: 74 ISBN: 0-599-68628-6 Source: MAI 38/04, p. 811, Aug 2000 Subject: ART HISTORY (0377); MASS COMMUNICATIONS (0708) Abstract: Previous studies of text art do not take into account identity politics or the technology of the internet. The studies of Jessica Prinz, Russell Bowman, and Andreas Hapkemeyer with Peter Weiermair contain several interpretive similarities, some differences and omissions. The books The Return of the Real, 1996 by Hal Foster and Avant-Garde and After, 1995 by Brandon Taylor and several other sources reveal two new factors influencing the use of text in art from 1988–1999; identity politics and the technology of the internet. Works by Lorna Simpson, Jimmie Durham, Xu Bing and Victoria Vesna will be discussed in order to substantiate the influence of these new factors and to indicate the need for their inclusion with the interpretations by Prinz, Bowman, and Hapkemeyer with Weiermair, thereby producing a critical synthesis. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: The compatibility of the Chinese, Arabic, and Latin writing systems with digital technologies Pub No: 1396708 Author: Halleck, Elaine Lillian Degree: MA School: EASTERN MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY Date: 1999 Pages: 139 Adviser: Aristar-Dry, Helen ISBN: 0-599-54539-9 Source: MAI 38/02, p. 329, Apr 2000 Subject: LANGUAGE, LINGUISTICS (0290); COMPUTER SCIENCE (0984); ART HISTORY (0377) Abstract: Looking at the Chinese, Arabic and Latin writing systems, this study examines the idea that image-based writing systems or strong cultural links to an age when writing was an artistic, image-related activity impede literacy and digital technologies. Thus, technologies that rely on ordering a manageable number of elements (movable type, dictionaries, computerized word processing, etc.) have been inhibited in Chinese- and Arabic-writing regions. But a sound-based writing system like Latin lends itself to digitized mechanization. Movable type, despite its invention in Chinese regions, developed in a Latin- writing region (abetted by historical occurrences such as the Renaissance and the Protestant Reformation). On the other hand, analog technologies (metal engravings, faxes, etc.), which have important artistic aspects, have not been inhibited in regions with image-based writing systems. Although Chinese-writing regions probably saw greater impediments to literacy and digitized mechanical processes, lesser impediments in Arabic regions are the residue of the pre-digital age; even though Arabic writing is sound-based, artistic traditions and conservative, religious strictures block change to the writing system (e.g. less-cursive writing styles which would probably encourage digital technology). Powerful digital computer technology may be able to neutralize some factors inhibiting it in Chinese and Arabic regions. Wide acceptance of large-character encodings like Unicode will probably be key in promoting computer technology in these regions. Increased use of existing sound-based writing systems in Asia is another avenue for encouraging digital technology in the region. But an end to impediments to digital technology could depend on the receptivity of governments and societies to accurate ideas about language and writing. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: The integration of the computer into the art world: Positive and negative effects Pub No: 1395153 Author: Heinz-Glaeser, Patricia Marie Degree: MA School: UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON-CLEAR LAKE Date: 1999 Pages: 102 Adviser: Atwater, Vivian ISBN: 0-599-34743-0 Source: MAI 37/05, p. 1275, Oct 1999 Subject: FINE ARTS (0357); ART HISTORY (0377); EDUCATION, ART (0273) Abstract: Since its introduction, the computer has wound its way into society. We have witnessed an increased dependence on technology. Many artists are starting to rely on computers in their work. This study synthesizes current trends that shed light on the enormous reliance upon technology in the arts. I choose to examine the losses and gains resulting from this tendency to address with greater precision the question: Will civilization experience a decline in energies as artists rely on the computer, or does it actually enhance creativity? In addition to analysis of current literature, data was collected from an Internet survey of the public and thirty practicing artists were interviewed. Their opinions underscored several areas of concern, including an awareness of the diminishment of communication skills; the commingling of diverse artistic modes; technology being used as a tool to enhance the arts; and a desire to retain knowledge of traditional art practice. ------------------------------------------------------------ Title: Merce Cunningham: Dance and technology Pub No: 1395944 Author: Zaks-Zilberman, Meirav Degree: MA School: THE AMERICAN UNIVERSITY Date: 1999 Pages: 58 Adviser: Prevots, Naima ISBN: 0-599-41456-1 Source: MAI 37/06, p. 1546, Dec 1999 Subject: DANCE (0378); ART HISTORY (0377); CINEMA (0900); BIOGRAPHY (0304) Abstract: At the end of the twentieth century, technology is changing at an explosive pace, changing with it the form and content of artistic expression. Nowhere is this connection more apparent than in the dance art of Merce Cunningham. In an attempt to gain insight into his creative process, his work with dance, film, video, and computer animation is traced from the early 1960s to the present. Resources consisted of textual and video materials as well as a first-hand study of the techniques of film, video shooting, editing, production, and computer-aided choreography. Cunningham's approach to choreography is seen to be changing constantly to accommodate the constraints as well as possibilities of emerging technological media, from the near-documentary Story (1964) to the virtual choreography of Hand-drawn Spaces (1998), which exists in cyber-space. The following pieces were studied in depth: Story (1964), Westbeth (1974), Locale (1979), Points in Space (1986), and Trackers (1991). ------------------------------------------------------------