Research master thesis | Arts and Culture (research) (MA)
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This thesis focused on several female collectors in the seventeenth century in the Low Countries and what their influence has been on for example the science of botany, garden design, and...Show moreThis thesis focused on several female collectors in the seventeenth century in the Low Countries and what their influence has been on for example the science of botany, garden design, and entomology. The main figures that are discussed are Maria Sybilla Merian, Magdalena Poulle, and Agnes Block.Show less
Research master thesis | Arts and Culture (research) (MA)
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In the thesis “Anti-Cantos. A Collection of Stories on Listening and Desire” the relation between listening (to music), desire and the construction of the listening subject is discussed. It...Show moreIn the thesis “Anti-Cantos. A Collection of Stories on Listening and Desire” the relation between listening (to music), desire and the construction of the listening subject is discussed. It consists of three parts: 1) a theoretical introduction in which the traditional Lacanian psychoanalytical idea of desire is revisited through a positive understanding of desire in listening to music, combined with a critique on Adorno’s idea of structural listening, thought from Jean-Luc Nancy’s ideas on resonance and listening; 2) an essay on the relation between listening and desire in literary sources. The Siren episode from Homer’s Odyssey as well as Italo Calvino’s story A King Listens are deconstructed through ideas of Peter Sloterdijk, Maurice Blanchot and Roland Barthes; 3) a trisected essay on three (Blixa Bargeld, Jaap Blonk, Samuel Beckett) musical voices as conveyers of desire in listening. Primary sources are combined with Artaudian ideas on sound and Barthes’ understanding of the Grain of the Voice and jouissance.Show less
Research master thesis | Arts and Culture (research) (MA)
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This thesis examines the notion of productive multisensory experiences in museums of modern and contemporary art, as well as the pedagogy of current olfactory curatorial strategies and fruitful...Show moreThis thesis examines the notion of productive multisensory experiences in museums of modern and contemporary art, as well as the pedagogy of current olfactory curatorial strategies and fruitful conceptual tools for such future strategies in art museums. It sets out to develop a theoretical framework for understanding immersive, multisensory art museum experiences as meaningful and educative. The sense of smell functions exemplary in this for it is an exceptional multisensory sensation in itself that requires thorough reconceptualization since it has long been repressed in Western epistemology.Show less
Research master thesis | Arts and Culture (research) (MA)
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This thesis proposes a reading of the French academic movement during the early years of Louis XIV's reign, under the lens of discourse and hegemony theory. Special attention is given to the...Show moreThis thesis proposes a reading of the French academic movement during the early years of Louis XIV's reign, under the lens of discourse and hegemony theory. Special attention is given to the writings and paintings of Charles Le Brun, Premier Peintre du Roy, presented as the most accomplished example of the painting's hegemonic function and identity during the founding years of the Academie Royale de Peinture et Sculpture.Show less
Research master thesis | Arts and Culture (research) (MA)
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The question of what it means to be an art curator in the expanded field of artistic production has been a subject of enigmatic allure in the field of the arts. Discussions on the subject have...Show moreThe question of what it means to be an art curator in the expanded field of artistic production has been a subject of enigmatic allure in the field of the arts. Discussions on the subject have produced interesting and productive contributions in terms of the role and purpose that is assigned to the curator, of which ‘mediator’ and ‘process shaper’ have achieved major currency. In response to the major challenges brought forth by the rapidly evolving global cultural climate of the last decade – migration, global capitalism, new forms of imperialism-, the practice and discourse of curating is seen to have made a shift from mere mediating towards an emphasis on the performance of leadership within the arts. The thesis statement made in this regard is that contemporary curating constitutes a new form of leadership, that is, cultural leadership. This statement is examined from the main question whether it is indeed possible and productive to conceive of the contemporary art curator as cultural leader? As this is still a largely un-theorized topic, the present research will comprise a theoretical treatise and will be conducted from a combination in methods of literature analysis and critical theory. The avant-garde will be employed as a working concept to explore and assess the new notion of the curator as cultural leader.Show less
