Search
Now showing items 1-20 of 50
"Art is religion:" Adolf Hoelzel's modernism
(2012)
This study considers the work of Austrian-born Adolf Hoelzel (1853-1934), an innovative artist and educator whose contributions to German modernism deserve to be reassessed. His intense lifelong search to understand the ...
Ana Mendieta- a search for identity
(2012)
Ana Mendieta was a Cuban-American female artist, whose work was a
continuing search for identity throughout her life. She often searched for her roots in
the earth itself, using it directly in her art and with her own ...
Gao Brothers' Execution of Christ: visual lexicon transcending culture, time, and place
(2011)
After the death of Chairman Mao Zedong in 1979, China began a national transformation from a once self-imposed isolated culture to one that hoped to be economically and culturally engaged with the rest of the world. Chinese ...
Visual narratives and the portrait busts of Edmonia Lewis
(2011)
This study considers the social and historical significance of the extant portrait busts sculpted by Edmonia Lewis. The Afro-Native American artist is best known for her thematic sculptures such as Forever Free (1867), ...
François Boucher and His Chinoiserie
(2010)
In this master's thesis, I reexamine the Chinoiserie of the French Rococo artist François Boucher (1703-1770). First, I discuss the French concept of China during the first half of the eighteenth century. Second, I analyze ...
Dining and revelry in French rococo art
(2012)
This thesis explores the popularization of the theme of the 'hunt luncheon' in the Rococo
period, within the context of the châteaux renovations undertaken during the reign of Louis
XV. In 1730s, the young king commissioned ...
Subversion of the gaze Degas and the social implications of his Dancers
(2011)
Edgar Degas' portrayal of women has generated particular interest. His subjects
were often thought to be women of ill-repute, yet Degas shows them hard at work. I believe
that Degas purposefully set out to chronicle the ...
George Catlin and the Pipestone Quarry: paradise of the red gods
(2012)
George Catlin, pioneer, author, ethnographer, entrepreneur, was foremost an artist of exceptional talents. He made five difficult journeys westward from 1830-1836 to paint the Native Americans and their way of life. His ...
Meretites' Faience Ushebtis: An Analysis and Determination of their Production in a Late Period or Ptolemaic Workshop
(2010)
The hundreds of faience shabtis in an individual Late Period burial demanded a significant production effort within a workshop. Petrie's discovery of thousands of molds for small faience objects in Amarna (1891-92) and ...
Lotte Reiniger’s career in animation and her first full-‐length animated film, The Adventures of Prince Achmed
(2015)
Lotte Reiniger was the woman responsible for making the world’s first full-‐length animated film, Die Geschichte des Prinzen Achmed (The Adventures of Prince Achmed, 1926). Along with her collaborators, she worked on the ...
The traditions and history of indigo dyed textiles in Sierra Leone as they relate to the art and life of Hajja Kadiatu Kamara
(2012)
Indigo dyeing or 'Gara' has a lengthy history as well as a major role in the economies and cultures of West African countries. Although most gara dyers remain anonymous outside of their communities, Hajjah Khadijatu Kamara ...
Transcending the metanarrative: the postmodern spirituality of Shirazeh Houshiary's sculpture
(2012)
Through her mystically infused, minimalistic sculptures, Iranian-Âborn,
London-Âbased artist Shirazeh Houshiary (1955-Â ) has continued the trend of
abstract spiritually in contemporary art. However, the theology that ...
Gulshan Muraqqa’: An Imperial Discretion
(2016)
This thesis researches two folios (pages) from the Gulshan muraqqa’, an
imperial album of the Mughal Empire. The two folios, The Poet and the Prince
and A Buffalo Hunting a Lioness, are currently in the permanent ...
Rubens' vision for the Luxembourg Palace
(2015)
Marie de Medici commissioned a series of twenty-four paintings intended as an allegorical cycle of her life from the artist Peter Paul Rubens in 1622. This thesis proposes that the cycle does not have just one intention ...
Fresh Meat Rituals: Confronting the Flesh in Performance Art
(2016)
Meat entails a contradictory bundle of associations. In its cooked form, it is
inoffensive, a normal everyday staple for most of the population. Yet in its raw, freshly
butchered state, meat and its handling provoke ...
Embroidering Biblical Heroines in Seventeenth-Century England
(2015)
English embroideries in the seventeenth century frequently depict biblical
narratives that feature examples of proper female behavior. Produced by young girls and
women, they were made to adorn the embroiderer’s home in ...
The Boundaries of Femininity: A Case for Two Women Artists Working in Eighteenth-century France
(2015)
Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun and Adélaïde Labille-Guiard were two of the most prominent
women artists in France during the second half of the eighteenth-century. I argue in this
thesis that in their responses to a range of ...
Pieter Bruegel The Elder’s The Months: A Perspective
(2014)
In the year 1565, Antwerp merchant Nicolaes Jongelinck commissioned Pieter Bruegel the Elder to paint a series of paintings, The Months, for his suburban villa. Unfortunately, Jongelinck lost possession of the series of ...
Contemporary Landscape Photography: Dissolving Boundaries in Jungjin Lee’s Wind Series
(2016)
In the Wind series (2004-2007), Korean photographer Jungjin Lee captures
tumultuous views of the American desert. These photographs are printed on handmade
mulberry paper, which Lee sensitizes by hand and heavily edits ...
Goya and the grotesque: a study of themes of witchcraft and monstrous bodies
(2012)
Francisco de Goya lived during the "Enlightenment," an age associated with reason, when traditional superstitions became viewed as ridiculous beliefs of the ignorant poor. Goya adopted the theme of witchcraft into his ...