South African Journal of Art History Volume 25 (2010)

Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/2263/15801

South African Journal of Art History, Volume 25, Issue 1 (2010)
Content
Barker, Arthur	Heterotrophic syntheses : mediation in the domestic architecture of Gabriël Fagan
Coetzer, Nicholas	Towards a dialogical design studio : mediating absurdities in undergraduate architectural education in South Africa
Janse Van Rensburg, Ariane	Mediating between tradition and meaning in stained glass windows
Mare, Estelle Alma	El Greco, a mediator of modern painting
Noble, Jonathan	Editorial
Noble, J.A.	Mediating public and private : three models of 'public space'
Olivier, Bert	Images and mediation
Schmidt, Leoni	Mediation through materiality in post-mediative practices
Steyn, Gerald	From Bordeaux to Barcelona - Le Corbusier's creative journey that went unnoticed
Viljoen, Marga	The body as mediator of the world : contributions of Merleau-Ponty and Don Ihde

South African Journal of Art History, Volume 25, Issue 2 (2010)
Content
Auret, Hendrik	Toward the poetic in architecture
De Klerk, Marna	The life of Frédéric François Chopin - illustrated by stamps : essay
Fisher, Roger C. & Clarke, Nicholas J.	Death, cremation and columbaria in the culture of Dutch Christian Calvinist South Africa
Fisher, Roger C. & Clarke, Nicholas J	Gerard Moerdijk - death and memorializing in his architecture for the Afrikaner nationalist project
Konik, Adrian	Time-images in Khyentse Norbu's Travellers and Magicians (2003) : the possibility of critical Buddhist cinema
Konik, Adrian & Konik, Inge	Challenging the social sciences through the visual arts : reconsidering Foucault in the light of Field's Little Children (2006)
Labuschagne, Pieter	Monument(al) meaning making in the "new" South Africa : Freedom Park as a symbol of a new identity and freedom?
Mare, Estelle Alma	Can one "read" a visual work of art?
Mare, Estelle Alma	Coincidentia oppositorum and hankan gõitso : aesthetic philosophies in the West and Japan - their similarities as expressed in architecture
Naude, Mauritz	A typology for 'waenhuise' in the vernacular farm architecture of the trans-Vaal River region
Naude, Mauritz	Circular structures and buildings associated with vernacular farm architecture and folk engineering
Redelinghuys, Ian & Stevens, Ingrid	Making present the absent other : anamnesis and the work of Kiefer, Boltanski, Cruise and Coetzee
Schoeman, G.T	What is out of sight and un-foreseeable : Pieter Hugo's filtered images
Tietze, Anna	The problem of originality and value in the Lady Michaelis gifts to the South African National Gallery

South African Journal of Art History, Volume 25, Issue 3 (2010)
Content
Deane, Darren R.	The recovery of dialogue
Grobler, Andrea & Stevens, Ingrid	Pornography, erotica, cyberspace and the work of two female artists
Mare, Estelle Alma	Anatomy as an expressive medium : a muscular and an exalted body in El Greco's Christ Healing the Blind (1570-5)
Mare, Estelle Alma	Editorial
Middleton, Lorraine & Breed, Ida	Botanical gardens as experiential science and as living art : the relocation of the succulent section of the Manie van der Schijff Botanical Garden
Olivier, Bert	AVATAR : ecopolitics, technology, science, art and myth
Roshko, Tijen	A dirge for found : the role of science in interior design pedagogy
Steele, J., Ekosse, G-I & Jumbam, ND	Comments on clay bodies used by two potters in the Port St Johns region of the Eastern Cape Province, South Africa
Steyn, Gerald	Le Corbusier's carpet projects on the French Coast - the continuous quest towards creating formulae for better place making
Stupples, Peter	Neuroscience and the artist's mind
Van Heerden, Ariana	Creativity, the flow state and brain function

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Now showing 1 - 20 of 35

El Greco, a mediator of modern painting
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Mare, Estelle Alma
Without clear articulation of their insights, except in painted copies of and citations from his works, various modern artists seem to have recognised that formally El Greco’s late paintings are mental constructs, representing only a schematic version of reality. El Greco changed the communicative function of painting from commenting on reality to constituting a reality. It is proposed that modern artists in a quest for a new approach to painting found El Greco’s unprecedented manner of figural expression, extreme degree of anti-naturalism and compositional abstraction a source of inspiration. For various painters that may have been a starting point in finding a new paradigm for art that was at a loose end after the influence of disciples of the French Academy terminated.
From Bordeaux to Barcelona - Le Corbusier's creative journey that went unnoticed
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Steyn, Gerald
The evolution of Le Corbusier’s architecture from cuboid, slick and white forms, and the universality of Purism in the 1920s, to an earthy roughness, undeniabl[y] inspired by Mediterranean vernacular traditions after about 1930 is well-known. For example, the Weekend House represented a very obvious tectonic shift from Villa Savoye. Since they share the same basic unit form, the unbuilt Barcelona Residential Quarter (1933) seems to be a continuation of the housing estate in Pessac (1925), the only ground-level, multi-family scheme Le Corbusier ever built. This paper argues that it represented an equally radical rethink of the principles employed in the Pessac housing scheme, but that the differences are much more subtle. The aim is to search for, and analyse the factors that mediated in the transformation of the concept from Bordeaux to Barcelona, only eight years apart. Le Corbusier was a fierce proponent of high-rise “vertical garden cities” all his life. His decision to conceptualise the Barcelona Quarter as a low-rise complex is, therefore, unexpected especially considering that CIAM (of which he was a leading member) at that time was firmly committed to highrise slabs in park-like settings. But Le Corbusier himself alluded to his intentions when he declared that he wished to create “a delightful oasis of refreshing greenery”. The word “oasis” reminds of his frequent visits to Algeria, and his observations are briefly reviewed in order to better understand the formative aspects of his experience. General layout drawings of the project were drawn on computer and these provided the data for the subsequent exploration of the urban framework and the design of the constituent dwellings. The influence of the Arab vernacular on both his urbanism and architecture became very apparent, but it seemed as if the vernacular served to enhance contextual, functional and aesthetic requirements, rather than being a dominantly formative force, as was the case at (say) Roqet-Rob in 1949.
Making present the absent other : anamnesis and the work of Kiefer, Boltanski, Cruise and Coetzee
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Redelinghuys, Ian; Stevens, Ingrid
It is possible that artists, in the making of memorials and monuments, might aid in the process of national healing after a traumatic national era or event. This, it is argued, is more likely to be achieved through the ‘counter-monument’, where a process of anamnesis might occur because of viewer participation, encouraged by certain kinds of contemporary approaches to memorials. Having established motivations for such a process, this article then examines selected examples of post-war German art and post-apartheid South African art, to show that visual representations might have a healing function. It concludes that psychology can learn from art, which can activate the instinct of reflection and act as a psychic mover.
Mediation through materiality in post-mediative practices
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Schmidt, Leoni
This article is based on a conference paper presented at the 2010 SAJAH Conference at the Faculty of Architecture and Planning at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. It poses some questions about the issue of mediation and presents some key ideas and examples from the history of ideas and practices concerning mediation in the visual arts. Following on from there it considers six registers of mediation as experienced at Venice 2009: a major biennale with associated exhibitions in that city redolent with history, memory and other dimensions of mediation between space and a spectrum of materialities manifest in a wide range of art shown in the arena of a city inhabited by many art works, a city transformed by contemporary visual arts practices while simultaneously transforming and mediating those works by providing a relational context for their reception by an engaged audience.
Images and mediation
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Olivier, Bert
This paper focuses on the question of mediation via images. Its point of departure is the work of Kant on the mediation of human reality by the faculty of reason, including imagination and the forms of space and time, as well as the categories of the understanding, all of which combine to render an intelligible, spatiotemporal world, as opposed to the inaccessible realm of ‘things-in-themselves’. This is followed by a scrutiny of Gombrich’s claim, that artistic schemata comprise an elaboration, by the artist, on the commonly human, rational structuring of the manifold of experience, according to Kant. In other words, artworks mediate the world in a different, more nuanced manner than reason does in the ordinary course of events – something intelligible in terms of Merleau-Ponty’s conception of ‘style’ as ‘coherent deformation’. With the work of Lacan on the image one comes across an intimation of something paradoxical at the heart of the image, as shown in the infant’s identification with its own mirror-image as ‘itself’, notwithstanding the fact that it is a ‘misrecognition’, for Lacan, and therefore mediates identity as a fictional construct. The exploration of images in relation to mediation culminates in Nancy’s radical phenomenology of the image, which uncovers it as being distinct from, and simultaneously intimately conjoined with, the thing in terms of resemblance. This paradoxical status of the image explains why such diametrically opposed interpretations of the image can exist, ranging from conventional representationalist theories of mediation, to Baudrillard’s denial of mediation with his notion of ‘hyperreality’.
Mediating between tradition and meaning in stained glass windows
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Janse van Rensburg, Ariane
The medieval church used stained glass windows to mediate between Latin scripture and the illiterate laity. Following the Reformation, Calvinist tradition avoided visual symbolism. In the Afrikaans Dutch Reformed Church, the use of symbolism has developed from only the literary symbolism of scripture and the physical symbolism of the sacraments, to a recent reintroduction of visual symbolism into windows. Although this started simply as a mediation of the qualities of light and of separation, (Moerdijk, 1925-52) there was a reintroduction of non-figurative indexical symbols by Daan Kesting and Leo Theron in the 1960s which has grown into layered, referential symbolism. The mediating role of windows has moved from maintaining the status quo to facilitating engagement with meaning in the last 50 years.
Mediating public and private : three models of 'public space'
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Noble, J.A. (Jonathan)
This paper is mindful of the increasingly complex mediations of public and private, and explores theoretical constructs gleaned from architectural thought and political theory, to derive ideas that are pertinent to our present context. It considers three models of public space, namely: physical space (via architecture), de-institutionalised space (via Hannah Arendt) and finally de-territorialised-de-institutionalised space (via Claude Lefort, Chantal Mouffe and Ernesto Laclau). Each model builds upon the previous in terms of complexity, nuance, and indeed relevance.
Towards a dialogical design studio : mediating absurdities in undergraduate architectural education in South Africa
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2011) Coetzer, Nicholas
The design studio is a key component of architectural education. In South African universities, the design studio tends to be dominated by what I call the Apprenticeship Studio. This teaching approach establishes the studio staff as studio ‘masters’ who train students to become architects by transferring their practice-based skills and knowledge to the students. This process of training is further complicated by the good intention of the Apprenticeship Studio to often attempt to ‘solve’ the socio-spatial problems of post-apartheid South Africa. This paper argues that these projects are counter-productive in that they delimit and undermine students’ opportunities to become critical and creative spatial thinkers who might better address the socio-spatial ‘absurdities’ that South Africa foregrounds. As a counter point I suggest that a Process Studio that does not posit normative ‘building’ design procedures as its goals should be emboldened and maximised to develop stronger educational outcomes for students rather than limiting pedagogy to professional training. The Process Studio aligns itself with the pedagogic value of creativity, the outcome of which aims to achieve: independence and risk-taking; flexible research-based strategies or problem-defining development for design; experimentation and imagination building; and the increased ability to make unforeseen connections. To illustrate the potential of the Process Studio I make reference to a process-oriented project that has been running in the First Year design studio at the University of Cape Town. As a counter-point to this project, I also explore the Place-Making Studio which aimed in 2008 to engage students directly in the making of a water-point platform in an informal settlement in Hout Bay, Cape Town. These three kinds of studios, the Apprenticeship Studio (students design ‘buildings’ under the tutelage of practicing architects), the Process Studio (students explore creativity and spatial ideas through a dilatory process) and the Place-making Studio (students physically build a place) become a potential triad that constitutes the dialogical design studio. I argue that the dialogical design studio, engaging as it does with the somewhat contradictory kinds of design studios listed above, will not only best facilitate students’ abilities to mediate the absurdities and contradictions of studying and working as an architect in South Africa at present, but will also prepare them for an increasingly fluid and unpredictable future for the profession.
Challenging the social sciences through the visual arts : reconsidering Foucault in the light of Field's "Little Children" (2006)
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Konik, Adrian; Konik, Inge
Taking as its point of departure the validity of Michel Foucault’s ideas concerning disciplinary power, bio-power, and the privileged position of sexuality as a focal point of their combination, this article furnishes a genealogical contextualisation of the behaviour of, and the conflicts between, certain of the characters in Field’s "Little Children" (2006). Such an analysis is undertaken, firstly, in the interest of demonstrating the value of Field’s film as a critical cinematic text that reflects upon disciplinary/ bio-power as problematic – through the use of parody and tragedy – and secondly, in the interest of considering the consequent relationship between the social sciences and such forms of visual art. That is, firstly, most mainstream Hollywood films include within their narratives only conflicts between characters that can easily be resolved, in a normative fashion, within the ambit of the disciplinary/biopower discourses that constitute their context. However, in contrast, Field’s "Little Children" implicitly thematises as problematic the ways in which such disciplinary/bio-power discourses both inform subjectivity and dictate the normative parameters of social interaction. Consequently, unlike most other Hollywood films, it refrains from complicity with the discursive regimes of the contemporary era. Secondly, because Field’s film emerged from within the domain of Hollywood, its failure to comply in this regard provides strong evidence of a growth in popular critical awareness, which stands to challenge the validity of social science theories that continue to construe the disciplinary/bio-power subject as discursively myopic. This is because, as part of mainstream culture, Field’s "Little Children" indicates a dissolution of naivety and a concomitant growth in critical awareness on the part of disciplinary/ bio-power subjects – in relation to both their discursive environment and the way in which this environment informs their subjectivity. Moreover, as will be discussed, Field’s film is also not entirely a product of fiction, but rather echoes and reflects both extant social problems and forms of discursive transformation currently underway in relation to them. As such, the social sciences, to avoid falling into the trap of redundancy, can scarcely afford to ignore its implications, and the implications of similar films.
Creativity, the flow state and brain function
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Van Heerden, Ariana
There are various concepts of optimal human functioning such as creativity, flow, peak experience and self-actualization. With suggestions that creativity and flow are interrelated, and possibly even interchangeable, at first glance the metaphor of flow and the concept of creativity seem to be entangled. Rich descriptions of creativity and the flow experience exist, especially in psychological literature, yet very little is understood of the brain mechanisms that govern such human functioning. This article investigates flow, creativity, and the brain mechanisms that elicit such unusual human functioning, and what brain processes ground these psychological constructs. The intention is to distinguish the concept of flow from creativity, and expand the heuristic understanding and value of flow within the creative disciplines.
Circular structures and buildings associated with vernacular farm architecture and folk engineering
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Naude, Mauritz
The rondavel has become a typical feature on farmsteads but it is not the only building with a circular floor plan. Several other structures also have a circular floor plan. In Western architecture we have become accustomed to the domination of the square and rectangle as spatial form giving element in architecture in the West. Even though a circular building is not more complicated than the square or rectangular counterparts, the construction of a cylindrical structure needs some special design and construction precautions to prevent it from disintegrating and cracking in the long run. In some way we perhaps negated the fact that the occurrence and use of the circular shape as solution for space problems has been a strong element in South African folk architecture for centuries. The application and use of the circle in vernacular architecture is not a measure to determine how civilized a community is but rather an example of ‘contact architecture’ that was born from a need and combined with the local building traditions. Over decades this shape was adopted to serve the spatial and aesthetic needs of an individual or family. The construction of a circular building and structure relies on the construction skills of the responsible craftsperson and has played a significant role in defining the character of South African vernacular building typologies.
The recovery of dialogue
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Deane, Darren R.
The cultural richness that once made Leonardo’s "Paragone" possible quickly waned in the wake of the 18th century separation of natural science and fine art into competing systems of knowledge, leaving architects to contend with ‘gaps’ and fragments of unity. Arguably these gaps are the cause of much uncertainty in a discipline that, weakened through autonomy is enriched by engagement and multidisciplinary praxis. If traditional architectural treatises that once took art and science to be intertwined skills held together by a higher order of design intelligence are difficult to conceive in our present culture, what valid mode of discourse remains to assist architects [to] think through the future continuity of art and science? This paper does not support the view that systematic methods are easily transposed onto architecture in order to reduce its unpredictable phenomena to stable predictable facts. Contemporary thought is sufficiently mature to realise that the generalisation of specialist knowledge, instrumentality and expertise always leaves something out. The ongoing challenge to architecture today is therefore how to re-articulate the relational space between art and science in a way that enhances their symbiosis within design. Symbolism, metaphor, analogy and geometrical abstraction once supplied architecture and creative discourse with intermediate links and devices, but what other tactics are available to the architect today? The primary objective of the paper is to recover traditional "dialogue" as a legitimate and meaningful mode in this regard. Secondly, the paper critically differentiates dialogue from its more contemporary version, "collaboration", with which it is often confused. The question at stake is whether the now ubiquitous notion of collaborative practice can actually fulfil the purposes of mediation and enrichment associated with dialogical intelligence, or is it yet another functional adjunct for streamlining technique and labour?
Anatomy as an expressive medium : a muscular and an exalted body in El Greco's "Christ Healing the Blind" (1570-5)
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Mare, Estelle Alma
For Renaissance artists whose purpose was to portray human figures convincingly knowledge of anatomy, which is based on the dissection of bodies, was essential. In the case of El Greco, who received his first artistic education in late Byzantine Crete, the acquisition of anatomical knowledge was prerequisite to enable him to become a Western painter. By the seventies of the sixteenth century his art reveals a rapid development of naturalistic figural representation. As an unique example of his expressive use of anatomy the second version of "Christ Healing the Blind" (1570-5) is analysed. The focus is put on the body-spirit duality represented by the juxtaposed muscular body of the Hercules figure and the exalted figure of the man who had regained his sight. By means of these anatomically contrasting figures El Greco demonstrated the dichotomy between classical and Christian art. In this seminal work he initiated his personal manner of figural representation, foreshadowing his later works in which figures are elongated and dematerialised to express their non-terrestrial, spiritual destiny according to the Neoplatonic idea.
Le Corbusier's carpet projects on the French Coast - the continuous quest towards creating formulae for better place making
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Steyn, Gerald
Whereas the merit of Le Corbusier’s Unites d’Habitation is still contentious, his contemporaneous unbuilt housing schemes on the French Coast are praised for their sensitivity towards history, climate and their sites, as well as for their formative influence on some other important Post World War II buildings. This article investigates how he explored the dialectic between art and science – always a major concern for him – as well as their relationships to architecture and urbanism.
A dirge for found : the role of science in interior design pedagogy
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Roshko, Tijen
This paper discusses the fundamental pedagogical objectives and methodologies that were employed in a graduate level interior design studio to expand the boundaries of applicability of the profession and to encourage multi-dimensional design strategies. As science and technology continue to accelerate and to change our society, design has become the primary mediator in the implementation of these changes in our daily lives. The role of designer has changed from primary form generator to interpreter of the new, emerging reality which is informed by science and technology. As a consequence, designers have begun to assume a prominent role in society as the intermediaries of the need of contemporary culture for synthesis. The change in the pedagogical objectives of design disciplinary studies is inescapable and must respond to the evolving role of the designers. The current study explores this evolution and provides a platform for illustrating an integrated, interdisciplinary approach to design education where science plays a dominant role.
Neuroscience and the artist's mind
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Stupples, Peter
This paper is a heuristic attempt to put art back into nature by trying to understand the biological basis of mind and its relation to the world. This relationship is negotiated at a physiological level by primary consciousness but, with the development of the human brain over time, higher-level consciousness has evolved symbolic systems to explore the significance of social and cultural experience, as well as to make forays into new ways of thinking about the world through recursive synthesis. The arts – including the visual arts – are an important field within higher-consciousness. Their significance for each of us is constrained by genetic inheritance, somatic and social evolution, and is part of the mental repertoire we utilise to process phenomenological experience within a social context.
Comments on clay bodies used by two potters in the Port St. Johns region of the Eastern Cape Province, South Africa
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Steele, John; Ekosse, Georges-Ivo; Jumbam, Ndze Denis
This collaborative study has brought together our various backgrounds in art history, ceramics practice, chemistry, and clay mineralogy, so as to contextualise properties and ideas about the clay bodies used by octogenarian potters Alice Gqa Nongebeza and Debora Nomathamsanqa Ntloya. Nongebeza works from her homestead at Nkonxeni village [31º 37’59.66”S, 29º 23’22.26”E] in the Tombo area, and Ntloya is based at Qhaka village [31º36’34.04”S, 29º 24’34.78”E] in the Chaguba area, these sites being within about 5 kilometres of each other on the R61 road from Mthatha towards Port St Johns. Working separately, these potters have been digging clay from their respective mining sites and making pots for approximately the past sixty years. In this paper notions about why those specific clays were chosen and why their characteristics are desirable are enframed by comparative chemical analyses thereof as well as by a broad overview that places these clays in a wider perspective.
Pornography, erotica, cyberspace and the work of two female artists
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Grobler, Andrea; Stevens, Ingrid
This article examines pornography and erotica as categories of representation, in which cultural and societal constructions and constrictions define the female body as passive and ‘other’ in relation to the male body. It briefly examines traditional forms of pornography, then contrasts these with the practice of certain contemporary female artists, who use pornography and cyberpornography to subvert these constrictions and to suggest more liberating representations of the female gender and sexuality. It argues that cyberspace and virtual reality, in enabling the construction of dematerialised bodies, might offer a means for female artists to liberate their bodies from cultural stereotypes in their production of erotic art.
"Avatar" : ecopolitics, technology, science, art and myth
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Olivier, Bert
This paper is an ecopolitical interpretation of James Cameron’s recent film, "Avatar". By ‘ecopolitical’ is meant that the film is not merely ecologically significant – in so far as it stresses the vital interconnectedness of all living beings as well as with their environment – but communicates and promotes a political stance which should galvanize people into the kind of action that is intent on rescuing the planetary ecosystem(s) from continued exploitation and degradation at the hands of an economic (and political) system that is not receptive to the needs of living beings. Heidegger’s critique of technology, as well as his understanding of art is enlisted to make sense of the remarkable fusion of advanced cinema technology and creative film-art in "Avatar", and Joel Kovel’s analysis of the phenomenon of life provides a conceptual grid for the interpretation of Cameron’s thematization of life on the fictional planet of Pandora (which functions here as metaphor for Earth). It is argued that, through viewer-identification with the protagonists in the film, it engenders a ‘transformative’ experience on the part of audiences, allowing them to conceive of moving from a state of ‘paralysis’ (represented in the character of Jake) to one of ecopolitical action. Attention is also given to the countervailing images of technology and science projected by the film, as well as to the question, whether its representation of the relation between science and myth is commensurate with Nietzsche’s conception of this relation and with Lyotard’s distinction between narrative and scientific knowledge.
A typology for 'waenhuise' in the vernacular farm architecture of the trans-Vaal River region
(Art Historical Work Group of South Africa, 2010) Naude, Mauritz
The word ‘waenhuis’ has become synonymous for what is also referred to as a ‘wagon shed.’ Eventually, the term will disappear as the building’s association with wagons becomes less obvious. At the same time ‘waenhuise’ will become relevant to museums and conservationists involved in the study and conservation of local vernacular architecture. Part of investigating these buildings is the creation of a typology to determine trends and building traditions associated with this building type. Spatial configuration and organization of the floor plan are useful criteria to create such a typology. Two basic types, single- and multi-space ‘waenhuise’ can be distinguished. Single-space buildings can be divided into ‘open-sided shelters’ and ‘waenhuise with walls’. Multi-space buildings are divided into those structures consisting of a core building with additions and those that are part of a dwelling. Material and building technique are less important criteria for a typology, but remain essential for the description of the architectural vocabulary of individual buildings.

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