Leeds Arts University Repository (CREST)
Not a member yet
446 research outputs found
Sort by
Retouch
No full textThe solo performance ‘Retouch’ comprises a series of acts relating to an exhibition of JA Nicholls’ paintings.
Research process: The performances were developed in response to new paintings by JA Nicholls. Through this new series of portraits Nicholls sought to “speak of personal worlds, of desire, uncertainty and failure. Awkward and rough, the paint searches to and fro for a sense or touch of people absent and missed, settling here then there, upon uncertainty, disquiet, affection, intimacy. The paint pulses the presence of what’s missing.” The performances call attention to the particularities of Nicholls’ technique – for the performance, the artist presents her own face as canvas, medium and mirror in order to explore performativity and portraiture, gesture and expression.
Research insights: Responding to four of the paintings, four performances replicated different aspects of Nicholls’ work – from the vigour of her brushwork (repeated with vigorous movement on the performer’s own face), to a sense of the person represented (the artist lost in a moment of idle fidgeting), to a consideration of the isolation encountered by the figures (the artist demarcated areas of isolation around herself and the gallery visitors). Repeated and changing in tone and pace throughout the event, the acts took on different interpretations depending on who was witness to them and their own responses to the paintings on display.
Dissemination: The performances were presented on the opening night of ‘On Touch’ at Bobinska Brownlee gallery (BBNR), London, 17 March 2022
John Constable was my first art teacher: Construction of desire in a working-class artist/academic
No full textThe development of ‘desire’ in a working-class artist/academic is explored through an analysis of the reminiscences between the author and her mother.
It is argued that the notion of cultural capital implies a deficit in working-class subjects that is deterministic and does not fully explain those who are successful in the art world and/or academia. Rather than thinking about works of art and art practice in terms of cultural capital, they are conceptualised as resources that can have existential significance for some people. This is because early interactions with the arts enable people to connect with the world and at the same time enable them to recognise their own desires and talents while learning to think critically about their lives. The findings of this study suggest a nuanced approach based on cultural assets and resources rather than cultural capital should be considered in educational policy and practice.
This chapter was included in the volume "The Lives of Working-Class Academics: Getting ideas above your station", which won the Ryan and Sackrey Award for Best book by writers of working-class origins or that speak to issues of the working class academic experience. The award was presented by WCSA (Working-Class Studies Association) 2024 Awards for work produced in 2022 and 2023
Music Theory in Higher Education: The Language of Exclusion?
No full textThis study analyses the entry requirements for undergraduate higher education music courses. This shows how high-level music theory skills and instrumental grade attainment relating to theoretical understanding of score notation can be a barrier to music higher education.
It is argued that modes of institutional capital relating to theoretical music skills represent an exclusive and excluding form of implicit discrimination. This leads to unrepresentative populations within HE music programmes and onwards into the music profession.
Through an ontological justification of Western art music, and the corresponding ‘grammar’ of music theory, as a language, the nature of exclusivity implied by these entry requirements is identified. It is proposed that music theory requirements result in severe marginalisation of aspirant young musicians who do not ‘speak’ the ‘correct’ language, as defined by institutional and professional gatekeepers. The socio-economic culture of music education becomes fixed in elitism through this narrowing of the ‘language of access’. The intersectionality between race and class exists to compound the elitism of modes of musical language, further ensuring ‘what music is’ is decided by unrepresentative groups. Suggestions are proposed of what music departments can do to widen access and participation, moving towards a broader definition of musical literacy and the theoretical tools applied to a more diverse range of musical objects
Insert Yourself
No full textThe output is a solo exhibition by Dale titled ‘Insert Yourself’. The exhibition is comprised of a series of freestanding and wall-based sculptures, with an accompanying soundtrack composed by Jia Lee.
Research Process: The sculptures act as standalone works, but also have the capacity to be activated by the physical interaction of the audience (under the artist’s instruction). They are thus both sculptures and performative objects. Recalling either specific body parts, or poses, or built to the proportions of the human body, the works present openings and positions through which a body, or part of a body, might enter. They are constructed of lightweight materials to be malleable, like the body itself.
Research Insights: The artworks surprise and provoke. They are serious and playful. Hovering between abstraction and figuration they reflect the artist’s concerns around ‘objecthood’ – what it is to be a ‘thing’ in a world increasingly turning to digital immateriality. The presentation of the works as 3 dimensional drawings allows for volume to be added via the audience, so that they take on both ‘full’ and ‘empty’ aspects. The use of music in the public presentation underlines the works’ moods (warm, pensive, amused, unsure) and allows the audience to establish a working rhythm.
Dissemination: The exhibition was open to the public at PINK, Manchester from 5-31 May 2022. It was supported by a series of performative tours for the general public, as well as specialist audiences (including learning disabled students via Venture Arts, Manchester); ‘We Are Sculpture’ workshops for 7-11 year olds, and a live set by Jia Lee presented within the exhibition itself
God Shaped Hole
No full textThis essay focuses on three bodies of work examining parallels between religious aesthetics and practice, and social media. The artworks, which include our own and Casper White’s, explore manifestations of the quasi-religious in the contemporary everyday–their subjects intersect with, or function like, Christian religious objects, such as votives, veils, shrouds, prayers, and icons. The works discussed in the essay draw on traditional religious artforms to explore our actions and interactions on, and with, social media. As the title of the essay suggests, these works are united by an interest in contemporary practices and objects, which perhaps latently occupy a space left by religion in secular life. We will
focus particularly on how these works elucidate intersections between religious practice and digital cultures through themes of space, presence and participation
Weeds
No full textThe output is an artefact created by Boiangiu, commissioned for the 'Following Threads' exhibition at Bradford Industrial Museum. Boiangiu has combined printmaking and stitching to create an artefact which celebrates the medicinal properties of undesirable plants that are often overlooked or treated as 'Weeds'.
Research Process:
The brief for this commission was to create an artefact exploring the effects of industrialisation on the environment in the Bradford area.
Boiangiu produced work based on the Cliff Castle Museum collections, with particular focus on the implications of using pesticides from the Victorian era in current times for the benefit of modern gardening techniques, which are promoting exotic plants and hybridisation.
The creative output produced by Boiangiu as a result of this research is an artefact which brings attention to and celebrates the existence of plants that are often overlooked or treated as ‘weeds’.
The artefact Boiangiu has created sits alongside images of the herbariums found at Cliff Castle.
Research Insights:
This research celebrates the beauty and properties of weeds in modern times. ‘Weeds’ brings attention to the fact that a large proportion of undesirable plants have always been at the heart of botanical research, and have curative properties which are still evidenced and trialled today in modern medicine. These plants are also all well-known to be rich food sources for natural pollinators.
Dissemination:
The work has been shown in the 'Following Threads' exhibition at Bradford Industrial Museum, from 26 February 2022 - 23 January 2023. The project will also form part of an exhibition documentary, which will be created at a later date
The boy can’t help it: Little Richard’s disruption and re-construction of screen performativity
No full textAs both “…the architect of rock and roll,” and the archetypal rock and roller, Little Richard’s genre-defining performance of sound and self in the studio, on stage and on screen repeatedly sets and transgresses the boundaries of performativity within popular music and popular culture.
In cinema appearances which include lip-synching to his music in The Girl Can’t Help It (1956), portraying a slowly exploding music producer in Down and Out in Beverley Hills (1986), and voicing his own cartoon cameo for television’s The Simpsons (2002), Little Richard’s screen performance collapses performer, persona and protagonist into an expressive mode which draws on, defies and so re-defines our understanding of pop stars-as-actors.
This essay examines the cultural impact of Little Richard as a multi-media stylistic originator and disruptor, with a specific focus on screen-based dimensions of his musical influence and performance legacy
The Industrialisation of Animation Education
No full textThis chapter explores the pressure on animation courses to produce highly skilled, technically proficient graduates who are ‘ready for industry’ and the pressure that this places on students to be technically excellent upon completion of their studies.
This presents a problem for academics, as there is only a finite amount of time to enable students to understand approaches to becoming a creative practitioner, develop a specialist practice and acquire practical, technical and effective communication skills. The emphasis that industry representatives place on purely technical skills presents issues for courses who are, at the same time, enabling students to become independent thinkers and innovators who can function creatively within their chosen discipline to a high level. The purpose of this chapter is to bring this discussion to the fore and explore the impact it has on students’ approaches to their education
QAA Collaborative Enhancement Project, 2021 Belonging through Assessment: Pipelines of Compassion
No full textIn February 2021, colleagues from University of the Arts London (UAL), Leeds Arts University (LAU) and Glasgow School of Art (GSA) secured funding for the QAA Collaborative Enhancement Project – Belonging through assessment: Pipelines of compassion. The project began against the backdrop of the Covid-19 pandemic and the team identified a shift in assessment practices across the three participating arts institutions. This offered an opportunity to further our work, in collaboration, to address social justice, belonging and inclusion through compassion.
This project aims to:
1. Identify areas of enhancement in assessment policies and practices to promote student sense of belonging and tackle issues of social justice.
2. Link this relational work with attainment gap/awarding differentials agendas in the creative arts.
3. Develop collaborative, dialogic, polyvocal and affective resources for staff development across the HE sector
Disaggregating the Black Student Experience
No full textSlow progress has been made by educational leaders in addressing participation, non-continuation and awarding gaps between black and white students. However, there is the potential of strong leadership to drive change in arts higher education institutions. The barriers that prevent action are partly due to the structures in which leaders operate that discourage challenge and change and promote white privilege. Professor Randall Whittaker, Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Academic) at Leeds Arts University in conversation with Professor Samantha Broadhead, Leeds Arts University, discusses some of the reasons why previous policies have failed to close participation, non-continuation and awarding gaps. He also argues for the disaggregation of categories of different ethnic groups in data collection. Whittaker’s arguments about leadership refer to national and institutional policies and practices that impact on race in the UK’s arts higher education