Paul Cézanne and the Making of Modern Art History

The application of art historical methodologies to the study of Paul Cézanne in the 1930s brought about significant changes in the way the artist's art and biography were understood. Art history was institutionalized as an international academic discipline under the pressure of the ideological struggle that preceded the Second World War. This process promoted the incorporation of modern art as part of the disciplinary field. The use of categories of analysis developed for the examination of historical manifestations helped to assimilate modern art into a narrative that extolled the continuity of the Western tradition. This dissertation examines the writings and careers of art historians who published books on Cézanne in 1936 in Paris: Lionello Venturi, the first catalogue raisonné of the work of the artist, Cézanne, son art, son oeuvre; René Huyghe, a monograph, Cézanne; and John Rewald, Cézanne et Zola, which became the accepted biography of the artist. In addition, Rewald's photographs of the sites Cézanne painted were instrumental in introducing space (as perspective) as a category for the analysis of the artist's landscapes, thus helping to establish its link to the Western tradition. The site photographs epitomize the new approach to documentation and the changes in museography that accompanied the transformation of art history. The arrival of émigré art historians to the United States favored the identification of the hegemonic art historical discourse with an anti-totalitarian ideology. Alfred H. Barr Jr., the director of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, organized in 1936 Cubism and Abstract Art. The exhibition, which established Cézanne as a key figure in the development of modern art, associated modern art with the fight against Fascism. This dissertation studies a previously ignored period of the history of the institutionalization of art history and provides arguments for the debate on the epistemological foundations of the discipline and its relationship with museography and art criticism. By questioning these foundations, the dissertation disentangles Cézanne's work from the ideological constructs that were affixed to his art by the interpretations proposed in the 1930s and suggests new avenues for understanding it

A holistic framework for environmental change: socio-environmental cohesion for sustainability

Research purpose: Environmental issues have become a regular debate within social, business and political arenas. The need to combine social, environmental and economic systems to achieve a sustainable future (Triple Bottom Line), is gaining prominence within many international development projects. The study of traditional business Environmental Management Systems (EMS) leads to the observation that such systems place primary emphasis upon economic and environmental factors. The project begins with the proposal that an EMS built by an organisations employees' has a greater potential to identify practical environmental impacts and reduce social resistance to change.Methods: This thesis details the development of a seven-stage framework for environmental change referred to as Socio-Environmental Cohesion for Sustainability (SECS). The framework is trialled within a case study organisation (OrgX) using an interpretivist philosophy of social constructionism to guide the research. An action research project is conducted with the researcher acting as an observing participant of the change process. The developed framework follows a multimethodology design of organisational engagement, with strong emphasis placed upon the social values that can drive environmental management practices. The combination of cybernetic and social tools of organisational analysis is shown to provide a unique approach to environmental strategy design; Viable Systems Model, Team Syntegrity, Cultural Analysis, Social Network Analysis.Results: The Cultural and Social Network Analyses provide evidence of an informal environmental network (EWG) contained within OrgX, and identify the core social environmental values of the employee group. A Team Syntegrity workshop is performed and develops a bottom-up participatory approach to environmental strategy designs between the EWG and business management. Following the workshop, OrgX is shown to implement 56% of the developed environmental strategy within eight months. The Viable Systems Model is used to diagnose the organisations structure, which is then combined with the Social Network Analysis to establish the outreach of the EWG.Conclusions: The recognition of the informal environmental network as an official management committee, improvements to operational efficiency and practical benefits to onsite biodiversity, indicates that the SECS framework is capable of addressing all aspects of the Triple Bottom Line

Critical Practice

This book is available as open access through the Bloomsbury Open Access programme and is available on www.bloomsburycollections.com. What is the relationship between theory and practice in the creative arts today? In Critical Practice, Martin McQuillan offers a critical interrogation of the idea of practice-led research. He goes beyond the recent vocabulary of research management to consider the more interesting question of the emergence of a cultural space in which philosophy, theory, history and practice are becoming indistinguishable. McQuillan considers the work of a number of writers and thinkers who cross the divide between theoretical and creative practice, including Alain Badiou and Terry Eagleton, and the longer tradition of 'theory-writing' that runs through the work of Hélène Cixous, Roland Barthes and Louis Althusser. His aim is to elucidate the contemporary ramifications of a relationship that has been contested throughout the long history of philosophy, from Plato's dialogues to Derrida's 'Envois'

Critical Practice

This book is available as open access through the Bloomsbury Open Access programme and is available on www.bloomsburycollections.com. What is the relationship between theory and practice in the creative arts today? In Critical Practice, Martin McQuillan offers a critical interrogation of the idea of practice-led research. He goes beyond the recent vocabulary of research management to consider the more interesting question of the emergence of a cultural space in which philosophy, theory, history and practice are becoming indistinguishable. McQuillan considers the work of a number of writers and thinkers who cross the divide between theoretical and creative practice, including Alain Badiou and Terry Eagleton, and the longer tradition of 'theory-writing' that runs through the work of Hélène Cixous, Roland Barthes and Louis Althusser. His aim is to elucidate the contemporary ramifications of a relationship that has been contested throughout the long history of philosophy, from Plato's dialogues to Derrida's 'Envois'

Edwin Fischer and Bach Performance Practice of the Weimar Republic

Edwin Fischer (1886-1960) provided a synthesis of approaches to Bach pianism that resolved dialectical tensions of long standing between schools that opposed one another throughout the nineteenth century. I argue that Fischer’s synthesis––which permits exegetical interpretation while maintaining a preservationist stance toward the integrity of the text––resembles both Felix Mendelssohn’s bifurcated approach to Bach’s music and Moses Mendelssohn’s description of a similar duality within modern Judaism. Such resemblance may not be coincidental or superficial, given that Fischer married into the Mendelssohn family at the height of its cultural influence in Weimar-Era Berlin. Although pieces of the Mendelssohnian construct were in circulation well before Fischer’s HMV recording of The Well-Tempered Clavier (recorded between 1933 and 1937), that recording served to codify and promulgate his synthesis, which was based on a crucial new approach. The foundations of this approach, which I call musical interpretation through structural amplification, we laid by Ernst Kurth, Karl Straube, Albert Schweitzer, and Ferruccio Busoni, all of whom were in Fischer’s personal circle. Fischer’s exegetical manner of approaching Bach’s keyboard music, through a combination of analysis and amplifying commentary (via pianistic interpretation), appears to have been instrumental in altering Bach pianism in the long term. Despite Fischer’s significance, however, nothing yet has been written that analyzes his Bach-performance practice. I attempt to address that lacuna with this work, the execution of which stems from my belief that conducting a performance practice analysis alone would be insufficient, that such an analysis is best viewed within the complex matrix of Bach-reception in the Weimar Republic; in other words, as an exercise of network science. Fischer’s network was rife with nationalist sentiment that gathered around a revolving diorama of Bach, Dürer, and German Gothic art and architecture during, and just prior to, Fischer’s formative years; with statements of belief regarding the apotropaic power of Bach’s music, which emerged naturally from the German social construction known as Kunstreligion; and with the aesthetics of das neue Bauen that were manifested by the Bauhaus, with which Fischer was very closely associated. In pursuing my investigation and report of findings in this way, I also employ techniques and theories that I have borrowed from cognitive science, especially as it relates to religion, and from the social anthropology of art. On the whole, I suggest that performance practice change takes place within complex systems––which behave in ways that differ fundamentally from those of simple systems––and that such changes in performance styles are poorly described and understood if one indulges in conjuring notions of hovering entities (e.g., “modernist Bach-performance”) in place of describing networks and processes

2018

The Yearbook mirrors the annual activities of staff and visiting fellows of the Maimonides Centre and reports on symposia, workshops, and lectures taking place at the Centre. Although aimed at a wider audience, the yearbook also contains academic articles and book reviews on scepticism in Judaism and scepticism in general. Staff, visiting fellows, and other international scholars are invited to contribute

Scribner's Monthly 1870-1881: Illustrating a New American Art World

This dissertation examines the illustrations and text of Scribner's Monthly, arguably the most prominent monthly magazine during the 1870s. Initiating improvements in reproduction technology and art criticism, Scribner's played a major role in the development of the nation's art world in the Gilded Age, transforming the reception, perception and consumption of images by the American public

2018

The Yearbook mirrors the annual activities of staff and visiting fellows of the Maimonides Centre and reports on symposia, workshops, and lectures taking place at the Centre. Although aimed at a wider audience, the yearbook also contains academic articles and book reviews on scepticism in Judaism and scepticism in general. Staff, visiting fellows, and other international scholars are invited to contribute