Doctor of Philosophy

dissertationWith the introduction of Superman in Action Comics #1 (published June 1938), Americans became fascinated with superheroes. Following the immediate success of Superman, the comic book industry created hundreds of characters that defied and surpassed all human capabilities. Radio, television, advertising, traditional publishing, and the film industry recognized the monetary potential of superheroes and these characters very quickly began proliferating across American popular culture. The economic success of this genre might be unprecedented, but American interest in strong, charismatic, extraordinary figures prefigures the birth of the superhero. In both the political and social arenas of the 1930s and 1940s, not only in the U.S. but also globally, citizens were curious about the human potential to control and transcend physical limitations. As a response to the fascism that threatened to overtake European countries, the United States produced their own strong leaders in mythic, fantastical, serial narratives. Embodying and evoking the sublime, superheroes astounded and terrified. They interact with a sublime aesthetic and paradoxically represent the appeal and irrevocable danger of absolute power. Through close readings of narratives about Superman, Batman, the Lone Ranger, Captain America, and Wonder Woman, I explore the contradictory nature of the sublime superhero, detailing how each character's origin story creates a figure who both celebrates and challenges the moral and political virtues of American society

Between the Natural and the Artificial: The Sublime Sexual Sensation of Car Crashes in J.G. Ballard’s Crash

At a time when technology progressively pushes back nature, the sexual act runs the risk of being denaturalised. The notion of the sublime, which I argue is how humans react to the machine as a surrogate for nature and as a sexual stimulus in Crash (1973), is therefore of central interest in this article. Ballard himself has described Crash as ‘the first pornographic novel based on technology’ (1973, 6). This engagement with a technologised sexuality is explored as a subjective narrative stance, which grants authenticity to the fictive alter ego, who can probe alternatives to an extra-textual reality. This narrative mode is notably potent in relation to the narrator’s estimation of the merge between sexuality and technology in the form of car crashes uniting Eros and Thanatos. I therefore suggest that Crash can be read as an attempt to localise the natural and human in a world dictated by artificiality and technology

Out of bounds

Humans have an inescapable desire for rationality, structure, and order. We seek efficiency and certainty in our individual and communal lives. We have been encouraged to believe that most things are under our control until something strikes us and brings to consciousness the limits of our knowledge. It’s usually nature’s wild power that overwhelms our faculty of reason and reminds us of our limits. Philosophers called this sensation of overwhelm in the face of nature the sublime experience. In modern cities, surrounded by skyscrapers, we are reminded of our own technological achievements, while nature feels disconnected and distant. Yet, if we allow ourselves to be vulnerable, even in urban environments, nature’s mysteriousness and ongoing transformation leads us to feel a full spectrum of emotions as it plays with our perception and imagination. In my textile collection for interiors, I use the skyscraper and its straight, repetitive lines as an underlying reference to our own underlying structural laws and rationality, highlighting at the same time how its reflective and translucent surfaces mirror the sky’s endless and active transformation. With emphasis on materiality, form, texture, and color, my collection speaks to the phenomena observable in both universes—rigid, urban, man-made, alongside natural, transient, and vast—as a reminder that we and our achievements are part of nature’s power and that we are, in some sense “one with the world.” In this thesis book, I narrate the profound effects of nature experienced by my grandmother and explore the history and philosophy of the sublime, as well the concept of rationalism. I also document my thesis collection, in which these concepts are physically manifested to act as reminders of our vulnerability and humanity

The Continuous Movement of Water and Time

Water has a relationship with every living thing on earth, and represents a force that both gives life and can eliminate it. In my work, I use water, color, and the figure to explore the sublime, death and decay, the passage of time, and overwhelming emotions. I have looked at my work in relation to Marilyn Minter’s photography, Mark Rothko’s color field paintings, Julie Evans’ and Henri Matisse’s cut-out works, Sam Gilliam’s continuously changing canvas installations, and Ekaterina Smirnova’s investigation into the meaning of an individual’s place in the universe. By seeing the different ways in which these artists and myself have dealt with these different facets, I hope to gain a better understand of the different ways in which humans process difficult concepts such as these, which I can then use in my future art therapy practice

Absurd Vessel

Absurd Vessel is a series of multimedia paintings using themes of science fiction to explore the cognitive estrangement of mind and body through devotional imagery. These paintings provide a playful space in which earnest existential topics are expressed through so-called gay filth and deviancy and reoriented as rites of personal salvation. In this body of work, I research the various ways queer artists and writers come to terms with their spirituality while existing on the theological fringes. I extend this endeavor to cosmic cycles of death and rebirth in order to express a type of extro-science fiction, where full comprehension is just beyond reach. This ineffability parallels my former Christian beliefs’ inability to conceive of the exaltation of a queer body

Life, Re-Scaled

This edited volume explores new engagements with the life sciences in contemporary fiction, poetry, comics and performance. The gathered case studies investigate how recent creative work reframes the human within microscopic or macroscopic scales, from cellular biology to systems ecology, and engages with the ethical, philosophical, and political issues raised by the twenty-first century’s shifting views of life. The collection thus examines literature and performance as spaces that shape our contemporary biological imagination. Comprised of thirteen chapters by an international group of academics, Life, Re-Scaled: The Biological Imagination in Twenty-First-Century Literature and Performance engages with four main areas of biological study: ‘Invisible scales: cells, microbes and mycelium’, ‘Neuro-medical imaging and diagnosis’, ‘Pandemic imaginaries’, and ‘Ecological scales’. The authors examine these concepts in emerging forms such as plant theatre, climate change art, ecofiction and pandemic fiction, including the work of Jeff Vandermeer, Jon McGregor, Jeff Lemire, and Extinction Rebellion’s Red Rebel Brigade performances. This valuable resource moves beyond the biological paradigms that were central to the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, to outline the specificity of a contemporary imagination. Life, Re-Scaled is crucial reading for academics, scholars, and authors alike, as it proposes an unprecedented overview of the relationship between literature, performance and the life sciences in the twenty-first century

Fleeced

This essay reads the Genet column of Glas in terms of the deconstructibility of ‘the deciding discourse of castration’, as Derrida puts it. Here, the fleece that Genet imagines Harcamone wearing in The Miracle of the Rose takes centre stage, as much as Genet’s flowers. The fleece is both garb and pelt, at once a talismanic scalp, a part that has been brutally cut away, and a covering used to shield or shelter what is vulnerable or exposed. It is both something stolen, and a protective barrier against loss. To get ‘fleeced’ already carries a double and ambiguous set of possible meanings, then, and Derrida puts it to work in the interests of a double-sexed deconstruction of castratability (a sort of theft beyond the possibility of theft). If the erection cannot ‘fall’ without re-elevating the entire edifice or column of that phallogocentrism of which castration would paradoxically form an uncastratable part, Derrida’s insertion of a deconstructive ‘hole in erection’ exposes to a powerfully deciphering and transformative reading just this tale of castration’s uncastratability. Taking up Derrida’s suggestion that the bi-columnar is in a certain sense uncastratable, the essay closes by reading into the Hegel column of Glas precisely this deconstructibility of a ‘deciding discourse of castration’, notably in terms of the Hegelian interpretation of Antigone’s politics

Corda na bretha: Cord of life

Through the creation of images of imaginary solar systems my thesis will explore the development of space through the processes of collograph and four-color intaglio-type inversion printmaking with painting. I am interested in the possibility of what we know and can touch, so I create my own visual universes for exploration. Kasimir Malevich influenced my personal exploration. Malevich created his own movement of Suprematism, which enabled him to construct images that had no reference at all to reality. Suprematism refers to the pure feeling in art over art\u27s objectivity. I began treating the surface of the imprinted paper by creating depth out of translucent and opaque levels of color. The visual imagery that I supply the viewer with is an intricate knotting of fluid shapes, much like Irish calligraphy and scroll work, in order to create a texture that depicts a solar system. Depicting the stars use to be considered a scientific and artistic endeavor. My thesis is my artistic interpretation of an unknown galaxy in which the viewer can immerse themselves in movement, depth, imagination and the Sublime. By using simple shapes in order to construct a fictitious environment, I am inviting the everyday viewer to contemplate my space. Deeply embossed collographs become landscape surfaces for painting. The choice of colors results in pulling some shapes forward and pushing others back to create atmospheric perspective. In doing so, I am able to create 3-demenional images on a 2-dementional surface. The technique of Four-Color Intaglio-Type inversion permits creating images from photographs of the collographic boards. Adobe Photoshop will enable manipulation of size, color and saturation levels of the images, which will draw attention to key areas from the original collographic plates. This replicates the way that a telescope with photographic capabilities would function in deep space. This dynamic artistic idea translates the high relief texture of Vincent Van Gogh\u27s paintings to printmaking. This idea was also inspired by the simple geometric forms and organic lines found in the paintings of Kasimir Malevich. My initial experiments suggest that the exploration of these techniques and media will be productive in the creation and expression of the solar systems I envision

Baby\u27s Day Out

Baby\u27s Day Out explores the world through a phenomenological newness that is expressed within abstract figurative painting. Fact and fiction blend in this fantastical array of emotions and real-world referents. I relied on quick mark-making, intuition, and gestural brushwork to explore representations of psychic and emotional states. The results are reminiscent of dreams, poems, secret whispers, unconscious fantasies, and delusions. The viewer is left to navigate the aporia of the space, by gingerly extending each limb forward and backward, to wander from piece to piece. Meaning is relative as the content of each painting is dependent on the interpretive lens of the individual: this is Baby Time