Research Seminar: Cultures, Histories, Identities in Visual Studies Research Network 18 October 2023
Research Seminar: Cultures, Histories, Identities in Visual Studies Research Network September 20 2023
Colonial panorama to digital reality:
A Practice-based analysis of nineteenth century and contemporary
immersive arts
Philip Madill, Auckland University of Technology
Wednesday 20 September
Room F209, F Block, Otago Polytechnic, Forth Street, Dunedin: 5 – 7 pm
Philip Madill, Displacement of Accent, graphite on paper, 2023
This seminar will explore, through practice-based research, the evolution from pre-cinema to contemporary mixed-reality entertainment. Mixed reality in this context refers to the coexistence of overlapping virtual and physical spaces achieved by creating and experiencing immersive environments. It will also cover the historical role pre-cinema played, as a form of instructive entertainment, in the promotion and colonisation of New Zealand during the Nineteenth Century. The artistic phenomenon not only served to inform prospective immigrants but propagate ideas of ‘otherness’ through the selective use of imagery and the layout of the exhibition spaces. The discussion will conclude with an analysis of contemporary works by Janet Cardiff, William Kentridge, and Victor Burgin and their use of digital animation to explore the historical impact of pre-cinema entertainment.
Philip Madill is a Dunedin-based artist whose practice explores the historical relationship between photography and drawing. In 2014, he completed a master’s degree from the Dunedin School of Art and holds a bachelor’s degree in history from the University of Otago. Madill is also working towards a Doctor of Philosophy in Art and Design at the Auckland University of Technology.
Dunedin School of Art and University of Otago (Languages and Cultures)
Research Seminar: Cultures, Histories, Identities in Visual Studies Research Network July 19 2023
Research Seminar: Cultures, Histories, Identities in Visual Studies Research Network July 19, 2023
Room F209, F Block, Otago Polytechnic, Forth Street, Dunedin: 5 – 7 pm
Visual diffusion and spiritualist practice: a research project on three spiritualists in Aotearoa New Zealand. Minnie Chapman (1856-1949) Sophia Garland Allan (1867-1959) Berta Sinclair Burns (1893-1972)
Joanna Osborne
Image credit: New Zealand Truth, 8 May 1930
With an emphasis on the joys and pitfalls of primary research, Osborne shares some of her findings on the practice of ‘spirit drawing’ in early 20th Century Aotearoa New Zealand. Within a broader scope of new religious movements, histories of feminism and the arts, emerge questions that consider the international diffusion, material expression and interpretive complexities of this art as spiritual practice.
Joanna Osborne is an independent researcher in art history with interests in studies of religion and spirituality. She has a PhD from the University of Otago, was the Dunedin Public Art Gallery 2020 Creative New Zealand Toi Aotearoa Curatorial Intern and has published on the work of Allie Eagle (1949-2022) and Joanna Margaret Paul (1945-2003). She currently works as an academic literacies tutor and quality assurance specialist for an international student support company.
For further information email: visual-studies@otago.ac.nz
CALL FOR ABSTRACTS
CALL FOR ABSTRACTS
Special Issue of the Journal of New Zealand Studies
Art and Aotearoa | New Zealand:
Cultures, Controversies and Histories
Edited by
Edward Hanfling, Hilary Radner, and Mark Stocker
This proposed special issue is an expression of our desire to provide a forum for scholars focusing on New Zealand art history, while highlighting the importance of their research to our understanding of history and culture more generally.
Culture, and the ideas and attitudes that it generates and supports, form a complex ecosystem in which the arts play a critical role. Our topic “Art and Aotearoa | New Zealand: Cultures, Controversies and Histories” acknowledges these complexities, asking prospective authors to focus on moments of difficulty and disagreement in order to tease out the stakes in the ever-evolving conversations about art over time––as well as the impact of these conversations on the directions that artists have, or have not, taken.
We invite submissions from scholars engaged in research on New Zealand art, including the wide range of forms and media often marginalised within existing histories. The final output will be a scholarly article on New Zealand art history of 5,000–8,000 words. In the first instance, we ask that interested authors submit an abstract on their proposed topic of 200–300 words for review by the editorial board (blind) with regard to the scope and coherence of the proposed issue. Abstracts are due 14 July, Friday 5pm at visual-studies@otago.ac.nz. [See further details below.]
Abstracts will be accepted provisionally, being subject to a further double-blind review per JNZS practices by two referees once the full article is completed. The completed article (5,000–8,000 words) is due 15 December 2023. Notifications will be sent to authors by 11 August 2023 (abstract), by 28 February 2024 (article). Publication is scheduled for December 2024.
Guidelines for Abstract Submission: Two Pages
- Page #1–information page: the title of the proposed article, name of the author, institutional affiliation, position (as appropriate), and contact information at the top of the page, left justified.
- Page #2–abstract (200–300 words, excluding title and bibliographic information): the title of the proposed article, a description of the proposed topic, and a sentence or two indicating how the topic will intersect with the special issue’s stated focus.
- Format: An attached two-page Word document (200–300 words, excluding bibliographic information, title, contact information, etc.) sent via email, double-spaced, in Times New Roman or similar font.
- Submission: via email to visual-studies@otago.ac.nz by 14 July 2023.
FOR PDF OF CALL FOR ABSTRACTS, CLICK HERE.
Publications by Network Members: July 2022–June 2023
Fox, Alistair. Melodrama, Masculinity and International Art Cinema. London/New York: Anthem Press, 2022. [236 pages]
Fox, Alistair. “‘They Came to Me in the Night’: A Midnight Sanctuary by the Torchlight of Memory.” In Wesley John Fourie: They Came to Me in the Night, edited by Alistair Fox and Hilary Radner, NP. Published on the occasion of the exhibition “Wesley John Fourie: They Came to Me in the Night,” 27 August–24 September 2022, RDS Gallery, Dunedin.
Freschi, Federico. “Editorial: ‘multi.’” In Junctures 22 (2022): 6-9. https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9515-3303
Freschi, Federico. “Not Just Another Travelogue: Silence, Nostalgia and Pathos in Rachel Hope Allan’s Photographs of Japan.” In Rachel Hope Allan: Not Just Another Shinjuku Love Hotel, edited by Alistair Fox and Hilary Radner, pp. 5–10. Published on the occasion of the exhibition “Not just Another Shinjuku Love Hotel,” 13 May-18 June 2022, RDS Gallery, Dunedin.
Freschi, Federico. “Between Palimpsest and Pentimento: Abstraction and Painterly Process in Michael Greaves’s ‘The Promise and the Fall.’” In The Promise and the Fall, edited by Michael Greaves, pp. 5–7. Published on the occasion of the exhibition The Promise and the Fall, May 2022, Olga Gallery. Dunedin: Otago Polytechnic, 2022.
Hanfling, Edward. Review of Robert P. West, “Exact Air.” Art New Zealand 186 (Winter 2023): 55.
Hanfling, Edward. Review of Kirsten Carlin, “Yellow Ground.” Art New Zealand 184 (Summer 2022): 58.
Hanfling, Edward. Review of Deborah Rundle, “Tomorrow Is Today Now.” Art New Zealand 183 (Spring 2022): 65.
Hanfling, Edward. “Behind the Fortress Walls: A Conversation with Grahame Sydney.” Art New Zealand 182 (Winter 2022): 52–61.
Hanfling, Edward. Review of Felix Harris, “Magical Thinking.” Art New Zealand 182 (Winter 2022): 51.
Lonie, Bridie. “Felix Harris.” In Felix Harris: Silence in Paradise, edited by Alistair Fox and Hilary Radner, NP. Published on the occasion of the exhibition “Felix Harris: Silence in Paradise,” June 2023, Olga Gallery, Dunedin.
Lonie, Bridie. “Ecological Thought in the Paintings of James Robinson, Jenna Packer and Ayesha Green.” In The Dialogics of Contemporary Art Painting Politics, edited by Simon Ingram, Gregory Minissale, Caroline Vercoe, Victoria Wynne-Jones, pp. 205-217. Bielefeld/Berlin: Kerber Art, 2022.
Lonie, Bridie. “‘Mind Wandering’: the Art of Wesley John Fourie.” In Wesley John Fourie: They Came to Me in the Night, edited by Alistair Fox and Hilary Radner, NP. Published on the occasion of the exhibition “Wesley John Fourie: They Came to Me in the Night,” 27 August–24 September 2022, RDS Gallery, Dunedin.
McLean, Thomas. “Beyond the Frame,” North & South, June 2023, pp. 50–55.
McClean, Thomas. “Engraving and More: The Curious Career of Rona Dyer (1923-2021).” Art New Zealand 185 (Autumn 2023): 84-88.
McLean, Thomas. “Gorse! What is it good for?” North & South, February 2023, pp. 67–69.
McLean, Thomas. “Gorse Is People.” In The Making and Remaking of Australasia: Mobility, Texts and ‘Southern Circulations, edited by Tony Ballantyne, pp. 183-196. New York/London: Bloomsbury, 2022.
McLean, Thomas. “Beyond Steampunk,” North & South, November 2022, pp. 80–1.
Novero, Cecilia. “Striking (Up) Multispecies Friendships: Creative Collaborations with Crows and Hawks.” Società Italiana Antropologia Applicata, Verona, Italy, 14-17 December 2022. Refereed Conference Presentation; Libro del Convegno, pp. 84-87.
Novero, Cecilia. “Messmates at the Table: From Companion Pieces to Companion Species.” In Kate Fitzharris: Companion Piece, edited by Alistair Fox and Hilary Radner, NP. Published on the occasion of the exhibition Companion Piece, October 2022, RDS Gallery, Dunedin.
Novero, Cecilia. “Avant-Garde Cli-Fi Avant-la-Lettre: Döbin’s Mountains Seas and Giants (1924).”Centro Studi Arti della Modernità, Turin, Italy, 14-18 May 2022. Refereed Conference Presentation.
Osborne, Joanna. Reviews of “Te Whanaketanga / Something is Happening Here,” Robin White; “Len Castle”; “Ka Kore Kua Kore,” Aidan Taira Geraghty (Kāi Tahu, Ngāi Tūāhuriri) & Moewai Marsh (Kāi Tahu, Kāti Huirapa, Ngāti Kahungunu ki te Wairoa), ODT, 15 June 2023.
Osborne, Joanna. Reviews of “Nirun,” Sorawit Songsataya; “The Wandering Womb,” Pleun Gremmen (Netherlands) and Menahem Wrona (Brazil); “For the Love of Birds: The artistic depiction and classification of New Zealand birds,” Dunedin Public Libraries, ODT, 25 May 2023.
Osborne, Joanna. “Sandra Bushby and Natalie Guy in Conversation with Margaret Johanna Paul,” NP. Published on the occasion of the exhibition “Blue Fleur,” Olga Gallery, May 2023, Dunedin.
Osborne, Joanna. Reviews of “Noise Collector,” Sujii Park; “Kā Kaihōpara,” Peter Robinson; “Tintypes,” Bridget Reweti, ODT, 27 April 2023.
Osborne, Joanna. Reviews of “Te Mai Peita,” and “Kare ā-Roto,” Angus Tahere Hayes, both at Tini Whetū Project Space; “Irreplaceable,” Kirstin O’Sullivan Pere; “Leaf,” Jae Hoon Lee, ODT, 30 March 2023.
Osborne, Joanna. “Allie Eagle (1949-2022).” Art New Zealand 183 (Spring 2022): 55-57.
Radner, Hilary. “The Cat’s Tale: Two Paintings by Felix Harris.” In Felix Harris: Silence in Paradise, edited by Alistair Fox and Hilary Radner. Published on the occasion of the exhibition “Felix Harris: Silence in Paradise,” June 2023, Olga Gallery, Dunedin.
Radner, Hilary. “The Greening of Aotearoa: Art and the Death of the Earth.” In Wesley John Fourie and Ngā Roma Poa: Green-screened, edited by Alistair Fox and Hilary Radner, NP. Published on the occasion of the exhibition Green-screened, February 2022, Wave Project Space, Dunedin.
Radner, Hilary, “Kate Fitzharris: Companion Piece.” In Kate Fitzharris: Companion Piece, edited by Alistair Fox and Hilary Radner, NP. Published on the occasion of the exhibition Companion Piece, October 2022, RDS Gallery, Dunedin.
Radner, Hilary. “I don’t want your golden apple.” In I don’t want your golden apple, edited by Anita De Soto, NP. Published on the occasion of the exhibition I don’t want your golden apple, August 2022, De Novo Gallery, Dunedin. Dunedin: Otago Polytechnic, 2022. doi.org/10.34074/cata.220826
Radner, Hilary and Michael Greaves. “In Conversation with Michael Greaves, February 2022.” In The Promise and the Fall, edited by Michael Greaves, pp. 11-13. Published on the occasion of the exhibition “The Promise and the Fall,” May 2022, Olga Gallery. Dunedin: Otago Polytechnic, 2022. doi.org/10.34074/cata.220512
Raghav, Radhika. “Seeing is Believing: A Study of the Hindu Diaspora’s Visual Culture in North America.” In “The Politics of Representation in South Asian Visual Culture: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives,” panel organised by Radhika Raghav. Popular Culture Conference, the Society for Cultural Studies, Kulturwissenschaftliche Gesellschaft (KWG), Saarland University, 27–30 September 2023. Refereed conference presentation and panel. [Presenter and panel organiser; panel and paper accepted.]
Raghav, Radhika. “Honour and Masculine Pride for the Country: How the Bollywood Sports Biopic 83 Furthers India’s Nationalist Cause,” theconversation.com. 24 January 2022.https://theconversation.com/honour-and-masculine-pride-for-the-country-how-the-bollywood-sports-biopic-83-furthers-indias-nationalist-cause-174783 .[Translated by Geneviève Sellier and published in French as “Kabir Khan 83: Bollywood au service du nationalisme hindou,” genre-ecran.net, 7 April 2022,https://www.genre-ecran.net/?__83__ ]
Research Seminar: Cultures, Histories, Identities in Visual Studies Research Network 3 May 2023
Research Seminar: Cultures, Histories, Identities in Visual Studies Research Network 3 May 2023
Room F209, F Block, Otago Polytechnic, Forth Street, Dunedin: 5 – 7 pm
“Digit Painting – brown/purple over pink, 2022, by Noel Ivanoff”
Ed Hanfling, Dunedin School of Art
Noel Ivanoff, Digit Painting – brown/purple over pink, 2022, oil on plywood panel, 740 x 560 mm
This talk is an attempt to come to terms with one abstract painting by Auckland artist Noel Ivanoff, attending to the “touch” of the painter and (perhaps) having recourse to the seemingly unremarkable (but possibly contentious) notion of the artist’s personal sensibility, and (with some trepidation) placing Ivanoff’s work in relation to an unfurling tradition of abstract painting in New Zealand by male artists, notably Milan Mrkusich and Ian Scott.
Ed Hanfling is an art historian, critic and occasional curator, and a lecturer in art history and theory at the Dunedin School of Art. His research focuses on issues of judgement and value, modernist abstraction and twentieth-century art in Aotearoa New Zealand. He is a co-author of 250 Years of New Zealand Painting (Bateman 2021), and has published books and/or articles on a succession of male abstract artists – Milan Mrkusich, Ian Scott, Morris Louis, Mervyn Williams, Roy Good, et al.
Research Seminar:Cultures, Histories, Identities in Visual Studies Research Network April 05, 2023
Room F209, F Block, Otago Polytechnic, Forth Street, Dunedin: 5:30 pm–7:00 pm
Painted Visions of Propriety: Raja Ravi Varma and the Feminine Ideal in Indian Visual Culture
Radhika Raghav, University of Otago
Raja Ravi Varma (1848–1906) Damayanti and the Swan, (c.1880s), oil on canvas.
In nineteenth-century India, against the backdrop of colonial industrialisation and rising Hindu nationalism, a new set of images was finding its way into the visual realm—lithographic prints by artist Raja Ravi Varma (1848–1906). The colourful prints were reproductions of Varma’s hugely popular academic-style oil paintings of the Vedic heroines depicted as virtuous consorts of the mythical Hindu ancestors. Thereafter, Varma’s female models were sustained across industrial arts, including cinema, and shaped the visual prototype of ideal (Hindu) femininity. This seminar frames the iconographical development and commercial distribution of the canonical heroines painted by Varma vis-à-vis the question of a woman’s beauty and duty in modern India. Furthermore, it sheds light on how Varma’s female model continues to enjoy supremacy over other modes of womanhood in the visual culture of twenty-first century India.
Radhika Raghav currently teaches in the School of Social Sciences and Humanities at the University of Otago, Dunedin. She holds a PhD in Visual Studies and a master’s degree in Art History. Her research interests revolve around the representations of gender and sexuality in South Asian popular culture and media.
Dunedin School of Art and University of Otago (Languages and Cultures)
Wesley John Fourie and Ngā Roma Poa: Green-sceened
Wesley John Fourie and Ngā Roma Poa: Green-screened
Published on the occasion of the exhibition of the same name held 3-24 February 2023 at Wave Project Space, RDS Gallery Publications (Dunedin: 2023).
Occasional Essays Series, edited by Alistair Fox and Hilary Radner.
For a PDF of this issue, click HERE!
Call for Articles and Creative Work to be published in a special volume on Surrealism with an emphasis on its activities and reception in German-speaking countries.
This volume on Surrealism is part of the book series Otago German Studies, edited by August Obermayer, Cecilia Novero and Peter Barton, University of Otago, Dunedin — New Zealand.
On the Series:
This book series was conceived and founded in 1980 by Dr August Obermayer who has also been editing it until the present day. Prof E. W. Herd joined in 1981 as co-editor and carried out this function until his death in 1997. The series has so far published 30 volumes. Dr Cecilia Novero became co-editor, in 2015. Dr Peter Barton joined the team, in 2017.
On the Editorial Board are Prof. Christian Grawe, Dr Norbert Griesmayer, Prof. Bernhard Greiner, Prof. Tim Mehigan, Prof. David Wellbery and Prof. Hansgerd Delbrück
CALL:
Otago German Studies is seeking contributions for a peer-reviewed volume to be published in February 2024 for the centennial of Surrealism. The volume is devoted to the notion of the OUTMODED in Surrealism.
When we speak of the “outmoded,” we intend it as art historian and critic Hal Foster once put it, namely as “the uncanny return of past states” such as the “repressed historical as well as psychic materials,” which Surrealism recovers and puts to “anarchic” use. As noted by Foster, following Walter Benjamin, “these recoveries are intended as a disruptive return but sometimes they intimate a transformative working-through too.” (Compulsive Beauty 157) Hence, in tackling the “outmoded” we are interested in its potential “revolutionary and collective charge” rather than the “parodic” or affirmative qualities the “outmoded” could also conceal.
On the one hand, our volume would like to return to the question of whether the Surrealists’ “outmoded” successfully functioned as a means to imagine alternative “modes of life” in their time, by playing “upon the tension between cultural objects and socio-economic forces, between mode as fashion and mode as means of production” (Ibid.).
On the other, and most important, the volume would also like to put this very question to Surrealism’s own practices of resistance and refusal (Surrealist Sabotage), including the “outmoded,” from our contemporary perspective. In other words, we would welcome scholarly as well as creative interpretations of how what appears outmoded in Surrealism itself from today’s perspective, in fact, irrupts with new momentum into our “rationalized” lives, and –as the “outmoded” for the Surrealists– might now have the power to disrupt our every day in uncanny ways. Foster argues that „artisanal relics“, „old images within bourgeois culture“, „outdated fashions“ and „outdated spaces“ are citations from capitalism that subtly attack „the socioeconomic complacency of its present moment“. If this is so, where might we today find collective forms of the ‚outmoded‘ such that they bear the power of the utopian and the nonsynchronous, without being redemptive or nostalgic?
We welcome essays or other creative work (photographic essays, poems, short stories, etc.) that deal with the “outmoded” both as a concept and an engagement with or an experience of space, objects, texts, myths, and images beyond the original surrealist use of the term are welcome. Please make explicit reference to the emergence and adoption of the “outmoded” within the Surrealist movement. In addition, we are particularly interested in contributions that may consider the “outmoded” and/or any of its interpretations in work by Surrealism-inspired authors/artists in the German-speaking world, whether active today or in the past.
Please submit your 300-500 word abstracts with 5 keywords by February 15, 2023 to:
Otago German Studies, attention of the Editors: cecilia.novero@otago.ac.nz; peter.barton@otago.ac.nz
Final contributions (5000-6500 words more or less, including works cited and footnotes) for peer-reviewing are due June 30th, 2023. Final versions following the peer review are due no later than November 1, 2023. The volume is scheduled to appear online in 2024. Online, peer-reviewed, open-access publication.
Call for Papers: CAMERA STYLO 5
Approaching Extinction: Anthropological and Environmental Encounters in Literature and Cinema
Sydney University and Online, 12–14 July, 2023
Deadline for submission: 15 March, 2023
The Sydney Literature and Cinema Network welcomes proposals for single papers, audio-visual essays and pre-constituted three-person panels on the topic of ‘Anthropological and Environmental Approaches to Literature and Cinema’.
In the wake of the global environmental crisis, we welcome contributions that address the capacity of art to illuminate, challenge, and inspire researchers and practitioners to address the existential threat of our climate emergency.
We invite responses to this theme across the broad spectrum of aesthetics, politics, philosophy, and practice-based research.
The Sydney Literature and Cinema Network was created in 2015 and has convened four successful international conferences and several symposia. It brings together researchers from Australia, the US, the UK and across the globe to examine the interconnections between mediums, technologies, expressive modalities and representational forms.
The Sydney Literature and Cinema Network is seeking a variety of applications to present on the themes of the conference that may include:
- Eco-politics
- Eco-philosophy
- Eco-aesthetics
- Eco-fiction
- Post-humanism
- The Anthropocene
- Technological Futures
- AI and the Environment
- Cultural Anthropology
- Environment and Culture
- The Sovereignty of Environmental Communities
Guide for Authors:
We welcome 20-minute papers, video lectures and essays, pre-organised panels (can be longer than twenty minutes), forums and other presentations on these themes and more.
- Please submit a 300-word abstract and a short biography by Wednesday March 15th 2023 (AEDT) to camerastylo5conference@gmail.com
- Panels should include a short abstract addressing a common theme in addition to individual abstracts
Presenters at CS5 will be invited to submit papers for the inaugural special issue of the international journal Camera-Stylo: Intersections in Literature and Cinema.
