Department of Visual Arts

Permanent URI for this community

https://scholar.sun.ac.za/handle/10019.1/647

Browse

Now showing 1 - 20 of 24

Animated storytelling as collaborative practice : an exploratory study in the studio, the classroom and the community
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2014-12) Young, Tamlyn; Van Robbroek, Lize; Dietrich, Keith; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis investigates stop motion animation as a form of socially engaged visual storytelling. It aims to expand commonly held perceptions that associate animation with the mass media and entertainment industries by investigating three non-industry related contexts: the artist studio, the classroom and the community. In each respective context the coauthoring of stop motion animation was employed as a means to promote collaboration between artists, students and members of the public. This was intended to encourage participants to share their stories regardless of language differences, contrasting levels of academic development and diverse socio-cultural backgrounds. Thus, animation making provided a means of promoting inclusivity through active participation and visual communication. This process is perceived as valuable in a South African context where eleven official languages and a diversity of cultures and ethnicities tend to obstruct an integrated society. My fundamental argument is that animation can be used as a tool to facilitate the materialisation, dissemination and archiving of stories whilst promoting the creative agency of the storyteller.
Art and book : a commentary on artists' books
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2007-03) Emslie, Anne; Dietrich, Keith; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts .
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The thesis investigates the contemporary practice of book art, examining in particular the manner in which it fits both into the tradition of the book and the tradition of art making. The thesis spans two volumes. Volume One discusses the phenomenon of the artist's book from three vantage points: the attempts to define it, the attempts to catalogue it and the attempts to interpret it. Volume Two is an artist's book and although it is part of the project I have set myself, it is not being submitted with the theoretical component of the MA dissertation, but as part of the practical component. (Briefly, one of the tasks it embarks upon is an examination of the phenomenon of thesis writing, as understood and endeavoured by myself in the production of the first volume - in this sense it is self-reflective. Another is an examination of some aspects of my attempts to make examples of artist's books, which includes an investigation of some of the recurrent themes and preoccupations of my work) Volume One is set out in three chapters. The first chapter pursues a definition of book art and the artist's book in order to draw some perimeters around the subject, and to build a picture of its nature. In the course of doing this, the ideas of some book artists and book art commentators are considered in an attempt to create a richer tapestry of understanding. In the next chapter some of the ways in which book art has been categorised are discussed. This is in order to more finely delineate the nature and scope of book art. It is also to bring some clarity to bear upon the different components and manifestations of a vast and sometimes confusing oeuvre. I then suggest a system of classification of my own which offers an adjacent model for investigating artists' books and the endeavour of book art. With the above model in place, I undertake a foray into the arena of interpretation. Here I suggest the suitability of adopting certain methodologies of interpretation that come from the field of contemporary literary studies in general, and the interpretation of poetry in particular. I draw comparisons between the book artist and the poet, and suggest that they occupy a similar territory of meaning making. In the course of laying out my arguments in the three chapters, I refer extensively to examples of artists' books in order to make particular points. Where I consider it apt, I draw upon my book art as a source of example. In this way, I am able to weave into the text some information and reflection about my own practice and concerns as a book artist.
Art and conversion : an investigation of ritual, memory and healing in the process of making art
(Stellenbosch : University of Stellenbosch, 2006-03) Steyn, Sonja Gruner; Dietrich, Keith; University of Stellenbosch. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
This thesis investigates the concept of conversion which arose out of the process of making soap as medium for my body of sculptural works and signifying its material transformation with ‘cleaning’ and ‘conversion’ – terms encountered in research into chemical transformation (in alchemy) and further endorsed by my linking my sculptural forms, resembling fonts, to religious conversion. A line of theoretical research was thus traced into ritual as an embodied experience of recalling memory in the desire for redemption or healing. Contemporary South Africa art, it seemed, was also going through a conversion process. The movement, from the domination of apartheid to the profound change of the ‘new South Africa’, necessitated a sense of tolerance in response to the reawakening of the diversity of cultures, rituals and memories. Thus present debate surrounding the concerns of reconciliation and restitution requires a re-evaluation of the importance of memory – to forget, to renew or to uphold – in the desire for healing. This has re-awakened an appreciation of multi-cultural rituals and invoked new self-consciousness and a reformulation of identity. I was thus inspired to investigate transformation in terms of art theory, psychology and philosophy. By identifying Freud’s psychoanalytic concept of transference and of ‘working-through’ as a part of his ‘Theory of Conversion’, I arrived at this proposition: art initiates an awakening of self-consciousness. In arguing for the vitality of the mythopoetic imagination, as held within the unconscious, however, I claim that art, as an embodied process, draws from memory, and resonates within the context of a ritualised empathic interrelatedness of ourselves as humans in the environment. In attempting to understand the South African transformation, which resembles the spirit of Renaissance Humanism, I examined how historical shifts influence both inter-human and environment/human relationships. Operating largely in terms of the transference of power and belief, these moved, in an ever-recurring cycle, through sixteenth century Renaissance Humanism, which tolerated diverse religious convictions, to Cartesian reason and the quest for certainty, manifesting in religious and politically motivated wars. This revolution, I believe, has occurred again from the modern to the postmodern era. I believe, therefore, that art has a healing capacity. This flows from a metanoia – a turning around – effected in both artist and audience. Through this creative and aesthetic view of art, experienced in my practical making and substantiated in my theoretical research, art, I conclude, initiates inner conversion and thus healing.
Artists' books in the age of digital reproduction : an enquiry into the problematic nature and (in)accessability of book production as contemporary art
(2012-03) Van Aswegen, Helene; Dietrich, Keith; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
The book and the rhizome : the implications of and alternatives to linear logic, with special reference to artist books
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2015-03) Cardoso, Tuscani; Dietrich, Keith; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis entails an explorative and argumentative study that is concerned with the importance and relevance of artist books, as substantiated by art-historical research into the way in which people present, organize and interpret knowledge about their world as observed in the history of the ever-evolving book; as well as related critical and theoretical discussions surrounding language and art. The structure of the thesis is based on the triadic treatment of book types as presented in philosophers Deleuze and Guattari’s theory of the Rhizome in A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia (1987). Each book essentially stands for a particular system or paradigm of thought that is described in terms of a biological structure. These are the Root book, the Fascicular book and the Rhizome. The root and fascicular structures are shown to be ubiquitous within dominant Western habits of thought, emphasised by the tendency to organize elements around a singular, central motif and, as a result, to create binaries. Although useful for certain practices in life, these patterns of thought have potentially problematic socio-political implications, and they are especially limiting with regards to creative work. An argument is developed in defence of the third book type, the rhizome, as a means of thinking in a non-linear, acentred and more complex and connected way about art, oneself and one’s world. At its core, this thesis works towards establishing a theoretical framework for the practice of artist books, showing how, in numerous ways, artist books encompass this rhizomatic way of thinking.
Contemporary South African printmaking : a study of the artform in relation to socio-economic conditions, with special reference to the Caversham Press
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2002-12) Conidaris, Amanda Jane; Arnold, Marion; Dietrich, Keith; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The body of the thesis explores contemporary South African printmaking by focusing on The Caversham Press, established in 1985. Caversham's success encouraged the opening of four other studios, which formed the core of professional printmaking in South Africa up to 2000. Positioning Caversham in a broader arena, the politicised nature of printmaking in South Africa prior to 1985 is discussed and six projects produced at the Press between 1985 and 2000 are examined to situate the Press within the South African socio-economic and cultural context. Finally, the interaction between prints from Caversham Press projects and the art market in Johannesburg is described and analysed to ascertain the extent to which these six projects were products of their time and place in South African art history. In Appendices IV and V, the candidate's own printmaking work, which examines male midlife depression and its impact on the marital relationship, is discussed.
Die plek van transkulturele kinderprenteboeke in Suid-Afrika
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2016-03) Van der Merwe, Mieke; Dietrich, Keith; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
AFRIKAANS OPSOMMING: Hierdie verhandeling is ‘n kritiese analise, vanuit my uitgangspunt as illustreerder, oor die rol wat transkulturele kinderprenteboeke in ‘n kontemporêre Suid-Afrika speel. Kinderprenteboeke het die vermoë om kinders se siening van die wêreld te vorm en hulle visueel en intellektueel te stimuleer. Dit kan hulle ook blootstel aan nuwe dinge en hul verbeelding prikkel om sodoende ‘n leeskultuur te ontwikkel. Tog word die waarde van hierdie medium in Suid-Afrika geringgeskat. Die meeste kinderboeke word uitgegee vir opvoedkundige doeleindes; daarby is die koste van boeke baie hoog, wat bydra tot die land se swak leeskultuur. Boeke word ook grootliks in Afrikaans en Engels uitgegee, met slegs enkele voorbeelde wat ‘n hibriede Suid-Afrikaanse samelewing uitbeeld. My uitgangspunt vir hierdie studie is om ‘n bewustheid te skep van die voordele wat transkulturele kinderprenteboeke kan hê op kinders se kulturele identiteit, visuele geletterdheid, asook hul siening van ander kulture. Die navorsing fokus bykomend op die verskil tussen multikulturalisme en transkulturalisme en waarom transkulturele kinderprenteboeke ‘n beter medium is vir kinders binne ‘n Suid-Afrikaanse konteks. Om hierdie doelwit te bereik, ondersoek ek die plek wat kinderprenteboeke vanaf 1900 tot en met vandag in Suid-Afrika ingeneem het. Die wyse waarop kultuur visueel in hierdie boeke uitgebeeld word, asook die invloed daarvan op kinders, beklemtoon die behoefte aan transkulturele kinderprenteboeke. Om te kan begryp oor watter eienskappe ‘n transkulturele kinderboek moet beskik, word die inhoud en samestelling ondersoek. Ten slotte implementeer ek hierdie bevindinge deur my eie boek, Thandi goes to Cape Town, te skep. Ek lees hierdie boek voor aan ‘n laerskoolklas om dié prakties-geleide navorsing in praktyk toe te pas. Ná die voorlesing toon die kinders se positiewe reaksie dat transkulturele kinderprenteboeke wel ‘n baie positiewe invloed op kinders kan hê, wat die belangrikheid van verdere studie in hierdie veld herbevestig.
Figuring from within : a study in history, painting and the work of Moses Tladi
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2015-03) Coetsee, Yda Cornelia; Dietrich, Keith; VIljoen, Stella; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This study explores the significance of landscape painting in my own work and in the work of Moses Tladi, one of the lesser-known SA pioneer artists working in the oil painting convention. Through a Romantic lens, I argue that Tladi’s paintings exist as record of his experiences, thoughts and emotions, making use of a hermeneutics ‘from within’, rather than one aimed at Realist exposition. While employing such a hermeneutics in my own practice, I seek out points of connection between Tladi and myself, as well as explore if and to what degree our different socio-political circumstances shape our practices. In part one of the thesis I sketch a narrative backdrop to the era in which Tladi lived and of his relationship to his patrons, mentors and the establishment. I explore his work in relation to popular conventions at the time, matters of modernism and abstraction, as well as to some degree how the landscape genre functions in terms of class. The overall argument is divided in two parts, that of the metaphorical ‘Garden’ and that of the ‘Wilderness’. With this divide I aim to reveal how Tladi employs the transcendent both in the sublime expanse of Sekhukhuneland and in his domestic, everyday reality. The ideological relationship between the Garden and Wilderness is examined in terms of theories on landscape, imperialism and the Lutheran missionary project. In the second part I describe my own work and discuss the contribution it makes. While alluding to many of the devices already discussed in Tladi’s work, I sketch the context in which my own paintings were made and explain some of my stylistic and curatorial choices. In demonstrating how our techniques and methodologies overlap, I aim to cristallise some of the theoretical themes explored.
Flesh for fantasy : exposing the sexualised and manipulated female persona in contemporary women's media
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2005-04) Hunter, Catherine Wood; Van Robbroeck, Lize; Dietrich, Keith; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis focuses on the representation of women in media aimed at women. A critical examination of visual communication (magazines, advertising and visual story-telling1) will demonstrate that the media may be regarded as highly influential in the way women perceive their bodies, reproduction and sexuality. I begin by examining the presentation of the ‘ideal’ woman as an instance of the Pygmalion complex. This reading of the media’s formulation of the female ideal aims to demonstrate the psychological effects of the Pygmalion complex on women, and illustrates how the resultant striving for perfection drives production and consumption. I shall demonstrate how the image of the ‘ideal’ woman is increasingly more sophisticated and convincingly portrayed through the use of digital manipulation, plastic surgery, excessive dieting and exercise regimes. I propose that the average woman is left feeling inadequate and is undermined by the voice of her own cultural representation. This thesis also investigates the persistence of the virgin / whore binary in the media’s depiction of female sexuality. I propose that this is an essentialist and dualistic presentation of female sexuality as either ‘good’ (surrendered, submissive and conforming – i.e. the virgin); or ‘bad’ (transgressive, explicit, dangerous and destructive – i.e. the whore). I further suggest that this polarised appropriation of women’s sexuality deprives women of ownership of their own sexuality. I also propose that the media’s treatment of female sexuality presents women as being in competition within one another for male attention and approval and that this representation damages female solidarity. Finally I demonstrate that pornography has infiltrated all aspects of popular culture, from magazines to music videos. My hypothesis is that this use of pornographic conventions depicts the rape and abuse of women as normative, commonplace and even entertaining, and that this has a detrimental effect on both women’s and men’s sexual and social wellbeing.
Framing the text : an investigation of collage in postmodern narrative illustration
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2006-03) Halse, Joanne; Van Robbroeck, Lize; Dietrich, Keith; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Collage, as a verbal and visual medium, epitomises the heterogeneity, indeterminacy and fragmentation of the postmodern moment. In this thesis I argue that visual collage - in the context of book illustration - presents an ideal form with which to illustrate the state of contemporary (postmodern) narrative. Postmodernism, as a term or concept, evades any form of absolute or definitive account. Hence, in my discussion of the postmodern condition I move towards an understanding of this complex theoretical and cultural phenomenon. Postmodern cultural artifacts reflect the state of a modernised, Western-orientated, globalised consciousness, which resists arborescent structures in past and contemporary texts. In both postmodern narratives and in literary fictional narratives the condition of artifice is amplified. Thus, this thesis explores various characteristics evident in postmodern fiction in order to understand and demonstrate the changes manifest in contemporary narratives in general. Many of the stylistic and figurative devices employed in the postmodern novel foreground the excessive appropriation and self-reflexive textualism of contemporary texts - these literary devices often reflect particular collage-like tendencies or characteristics. Contemporary literary theory, in addition, provides many useful terms and concepts with which to describe visual texts and, for the purposes of this discussion, narrative illustration. This thesis is centred primarily on an analysis of the practical component completed as part of the Master of Arts degree in Fine Arts. The discussion of the practical work is embedded in the wider fields of book art - particularly the postmodern artist's book (livre detourne) - and in contentious debates around the role of visual narrative illustration. In both the thesis and the illustrated book objects, I challenge the secondary and supplementary position traditionally held by illustration in the context of the book. I argue for a form of visual narrative that is not required to function as a mere translation of the primary verbal text. Instead - working within the context of the artist's book and through the utilisation of collage as a visual (and verbal) medium - I demonstrate that illustration may complement, supplement or subvert the written text. Furthermore, I show that illustration may assume the role of the primary text in the context of the codex. Finally, this study creates a space for a creative and participatory reader who, through the intertextual processes made evident in the book objects, becomes an active 'reader-writer' of the visual and verbal narratives under discussion.
Herinnering, geskiedenis, identiteit : 'n ondersoek na beeld en teks in mito-poesis
(Stellenbosch : University of Stellenbosch, 2002-03) Kaden, Martha J.; Dietrich, Keith; Hattingh, J. P.; University of Stellenbosch. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts; Ivan Jacobs
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This investigation is informed by the assumption that language, as representation and as image, is positioned in a metaphorical relationship to reality. Language, as a structure of representation, is the way in which we represent reality to ourselves and to others and recreate the past, as well as the way in which we invest our lives with meaning, significance and experience. Language includes visual and verbal representation, and this investigation shows how image and text create a variety of multiple meanings through playful and interactive reciprocation. Following from the assumption that language comprises temporal and spatial qualities, it is also the terrain that enables us to know and understand reality, ourselves, and others. This emphasizes the material nature of language, which is also connected with social and cultural practices and, as such, involves reciprocation and interaction between divergences. Language is therefore a mode of action that makes the bridging of divisions possible. Language is proposed as a medium through which the monolithic hegemony of the apartheid past may be confronted within a multicultural South Africa. The aim of representing this past in my work is not to recall it as it was or to discover etemal, inheritable qualities, but rather to bring about re-demption (healing) through re-presentation. Re-demption and re-presentation is a textual practice that involves a re-script of the past. With the understanding that history and culture are regarded as text, re-writing the past does not involve representation as mimesis, but as production. This investigation recognizes the role of the subconscious as the other or the alterity in all language constructs that makes it possible to circumvent the logic of binary oppositions; entertain alternatives simultaneously; erase boundaries; share spaces, and discover the other in the self. This unconscious language of the other, as a strange doubling and interplay between near and far, gives rise to poies/s. The creation of multi-dimensional spaces that draw the poetical and the everyday into an imaginative and directed conceptual interplay as well as provoke dialogue between differences and diversities, engenders a desire for the complexity of the other. The interplay and recurrent movement across divisions and between paradoxes create a new and changed interspace, characterized by difference, plurality, and contradiction. Intertextual spaces allow relationships between differences and exist precisely as a result of dialogicity between diversities. In this way it is possible to establish, by virtue of difference, a mutual, interdependent relationship with the other. Metaphorical language requires an allegorical reading that places divergences in relation to one another, thereby causing a mythic animation of signification that moves from one level to another. Mytho-poeisis, as an allegorical structure, is proposed as a model by means of which symbolic transformation and redemption of the personal and collective psyche may occur. Poetic re-imagining as re-presentation impels change and transformation and points to other possible forms of social and ethical experiences. This impulse, to reconcile the social and the aesthetic, or the cultural with symbolic form, is based on the principle of reconciliation between art and life.
The making of the maker : a practice-based exploration into the process of signification as a mutually constitutive process for artist and artwork
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2012-03) Ferreira, Doret Jr (Johanna Dorothea); Dietrich, Keith; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis is a practice-based investigation into the mutual coming into being of artist and artwork within the process of signification as described by Julia Kristeva. The investigation is done from an unstable subjective position and requires innovative research methodologies and a sustained close connection with the practice in order to accommodate the complexity inherent to the process. The exploration involves a closer look at the process of making of the work, the possible meaning embedded in the artworks and the impact on the maker of the work. The situated knowledge acquired through the praxis provides new insight supported by the theories of Julia Kristeva and others.
Mastering myths and wandering wallflowers : botanical illustrations, gardens and the "mastery of nature"
(Stellenbosch : University of Stellenbosch, 2009-03) Du Toit, Victoria; Dietrich, Keith; University of Stellenbosch. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
This thesis investigates the historical roots of botanical illustration. It argues that far from being simply scientific representations of plants and flowers, empty of artistic comment and only accompaniments to a scientific text, botanical illustrations assisted in presenting plants brought to Europe from the colonies, in ways that influenced the easy assimilation and appropriation of these plants into European culture. The "mastery of nature", which implies an attitude of dominance by humans over nature, is discussed as symptomatic of the European colonial period. European acts and attitudes of dominance are manifest in scientific approaches toward botany, botanical illustrations and gardens. This thesis proposes that attitudes of dominance have resulted in humans being spiritually and physically separated from nature. This thesis proposes that associations of botany, flowers and botanical illustrations with the feminine have assisted in human domination over nature. In much the same way as female is dominated by male, in a human sense, so plants and flowers were pictured as feminine − replete with feminine associations of subservience, weakness and vulnerability − making a human domination of the plant world possible. The artworks produced in conjunction with this thesis, for the degree Master of Philosophy (Illustration), aim to promote a sense of human attachment to and identification with the plants painted, in opposition to the separateness from nature that is promoted by the "mastery of nature". While traditional botanical illustration, in service to modern science, promoted the supremacy of vision as a way of knowing nature, the artworks draw attention to the unseen issues around plants and the human spiritual connections with them. This thesis proposes that, in a contemporary context characterized by an environmental crisis, there is a new role to be played by botanical illustration: it is felt that botanical illustrations should emphasize human connections with the plant world, thus alerting humans to the necessity of nature for our physical, as well as spiritual, survival.
Minding matter : reflecting and fixating on landscape painting
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2017-12) Den Heijer, Klara-Marie; Dietrich, Keith; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This study aimed to consolidate the changes in my perception of the concept of landscape brought about while creating a body of landscape paintings. In the context of practice-based research (reflection-in-action methodological approach where the researcher is also the researched), these paintings form the practical component of this study and as such constitute the basis of the theoretical thesis. Landscape refers to a way of seeing closely allied to a process of observation. The convention of landscape embodies cultural specific patterns of thinking constructed on the conceptualisation of the world in images, both physical and mental. As something that is culturally perceived, landscape influences the way we behave and therefore has a transformative effect on our relationship with our given environments, marked by the acculturalisation of our physical world. Both the concept of landscape and the genre of landscape painting often relate to questions of ownership or - in the context of this study - a sense of belonging, which led me to investigate the notions of nostalgia, the sublime and the uncanny. Landscape hints at our yearning to be a part of the world, while simultaneously revealing a desire to be different and to stand apart from the world. In this manner, landscape serves as both a bridge and a schism in the controversial dichotomy between nature and culture. This study led to the conclusion that landscape painting is an act of reflection that both separates our sense of self from our sense of the world, and affirms the deep bond we have with the world around us.
'n Ondersoek na betekenis in prenteboeke vanuit 'n vertaalteoretiese perspektief : met spesiale verwysing na illustrasies vir die werk van Annie M.G. Schmidt en ander herskrywing tussen Afrikaans en Nederlands
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2004-03) Grobler, Piet; Dietrich, Keith; Bouma, Paddy; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Illustration and translation have so much in common that the theoretical "instruments" used to describe, substantiate and evaluate translated works, can also be used where picture books are concerned. These similarities include the fact that illustrations as well as translations function semiotically - both relay narratives by means of systems of signs or codes. As signs, the contents of translations and illustrations have meaning or obtain significance only once they are read by an individual - homo significons - in a specific context. Another significant similarity between translation and illustration is the fact that both deal with the intercultural transfer of a narrative. The theory of translation takes cognisance of the contextual and, from the perspective of gender and postcolonial studies, points to the fact that cultural differences (and the power imbalances and ideologies they often imply) are closely linked to translation strategies. The literary environment and the circumstances in which the translation (or picture book) is produced, are also relevant for the meaning that can be ascribed to the picture book. In the literary environment (and indeed in most academic disciplines) the didactic benefit of picture books is accentuated more or takes precedence over the aesthetic qualities which these may have. Key concepts and theorists for this study are: • illustrations and translations as rewritings can be worthy and influential renderings of the source text • intertextuality will be the undisputed starting point for the (inevitably interdisciplinary) study of picture books • the skopos-theory according to which the objective of the book greatly determines the appearance and meaning thereof • Riitta Oittinen's theory of translation according to carnivalism which focuses on the child receptor Geoff Moss' and Jens Thiele's reference to ambiguity and experimentation in picture books Edward Venuti's reference to two (apparently opposing) translation strategies, namely domestication and foreignization. With this study I conclude that meaning in translated picture books is brought to the text by all participants and can therefore never be completed. Picture book illustrations as aesthetic products demand that the rewriter experiment with the narrative in a carnavalistic and unrestricted manner. At the same time, however, the illustrator or tranlator should anchor this experimentation in reality by meeting other role players (publishers, educationalists, literary theorists, authors and readers) in dialogical rewriting.
'n Ondersoek na en dekonstruksie van die taal (beeld en teks) vervat in die visuele narratief met spesiale verwysing na die komiekstripmedium
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2002-03) Ferreira, Rikus; Dietrich, Keith; Bouma, Paddy; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis is concerned with a study of the two basic elements of communication, namely image and text. How these basic communication tools function in the genre of the visual narrative with regard to their roles in the comic strip and the artist's book, will be examined. Both genres, the comic book and the artist's book, consist of complex structures regarding their workings in the framework of the visual narrative, and this work explores these complexities by analysing how image and text function in the visual narrative. The area of semiotics is used as a basis on which the arguments in this thesis are built. The principles contained in semiotics act as useful guidelines in the reading and understanding of communication in general, but in this study these principles give focus and structure to the research of especially the comic strip and the artist's book. Concepts that are discussed in depth include the interesting interactions which occur between image and text when they are used together. Signs, icons, symbols and how they function with (or without) text, are also examined. Text can also function as image, and this visualisation of text is explored. The role of concepts like interpretation, perception, the study of images and image-association, are all very important in the visual communicator's eventual success with his/her communication. How these concepts influence the creation and forming of one's visual intelligence and visual literacy, and the eventual effect it has on the process of communication, make up a very important part of this study. These arguments lead to a discussion of the dynamics contained in the visual narrative when looked at from a semiotic perspective. Central to the discussion on the visual narrative in this thesis, is the differentiation between two similar genres: 1) Firstly, a discussion of the functioning of the comic strip medium. Important aspects of this subject are the interactions of image and text, and how the comic medium consists of a unique set of symbols, which influence the specific communication in this genre. 2) Secondly, the genre of the artist's book, and how the medium of the book functions as a unique phenomenon in communication. The systems of meaning contained in the medium of the book are looked at against the light of a semiotic analysis of text and image. This research supports the importance of a semiotic approach as a helpful aid in the interpretation of any piece of communication, but especially that of the comic strip medium and the artist's book. The theories of Charles Peirce, Ferdinand de Saussure, Roman Jakobson, Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Umberto Eco are used as basis of the arguments in this thesis and serve as valuable ground for a useful discourse. The implementation of above mentioned theories lead to an indication of the complexities involved in the special visual language of the comic strip and the artist's book.
Op weg na 'n kontemporere eko-estetiek
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2003-12) Harley, Magdalena Johanna Gertruida; Dietrich, Keith; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: On the way to a contemporary eco-aesthetic. My thesis consists of three chapters; the first chapter contains a basic background study and philosophic research of concepts which are relevant to my work; the second chapter is a discussion of ecofeminism as political and spiritual phenomena (my work resorts in the genre of ecofeminism); and the third chapter is an analytic consideration and discussion where my works are presented as a visual explanation of my own interpretation of the dialogue between art and science with underlying geographical and ecological concepts. Some of these concepts purport the ritual of cycles and the aesthetic experience thereof. They deal with the earth as maternal patron where the layers of society (evidence of existence) becomes evident in the layering of the earth. This evidence of existence can be found in the waste generated from the cyclic existence of living beings and organisms. In addition, the traditional scrub or healing activities which are ascribed to women, are used as an argument to effectuate a consciousness of symbioses.
Opening the curiosity box : botanical images as sites of transformation for the scientific practices of annotation and display in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2007-03) Stewart, Karen; Dietrich, Keith; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis investigates the hidden narratives of South African botanical images made in the late seventeenth to eighteenth century. Plant collecting and image making was part of early modernist scientific practice of collection and display. These images are examined from postmodern perspectives that treat them as "texts" that validated colonial botanical agendas. Botanical art objectified "nature" enforcing it into a textual code that sanitised it and made it suitable for study by Eurocentric natural philosophers. The impact of particular scientific agendas about "nature" can be linked to the stereotyping and subjugation of both indigenous knowledge systems and women. This thesis considers the impact that the complex historical and socio-political situations of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries had to bear on the discursive formations associated with the botanical sciences, of which botanical art forms an integral part. The process whereby indigenous knowledge was effectively written out of acceptable botanical practice (a trend that persists today) is evaluated. I determine what the current negative stigmas associated with the art form are and conclude that artists and botanists working within the discipline do not acknowledge the limitations of the art form in reflecting empirical "truths" and this leads to the creation of images that rely on tradition rather than innovation. I discuss my practical work in relation to the ideas presented in this thesis.
Die plek van die inheemse kinderprenteboek in post-apartheid Suid-Afrika, met spesiale verwysing na die Nama taal
(Stellenbosch : University of Stellenbosch, 2011-03) Steenkamp, Janita; De Villiers, Karlien; Dietrich, Keith; University of Stellenbosch. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This study discusses the role of the indigenous picturebook in South Africa and the positive aspects it holds with regards to developing a reading culture in this country. Specific focus is placed on postmodern picturebooks and it discusses why these types of books are more succesfulsuccessfulin teaching children to read than “traditional” picturebooks, and finally to promote a healthy reading culture. The main argument is that picturebooks occupy a void where different factors such as didactic and economic elements should be taken into consideration. The possible role picturebooks can play in the rehabilitation of the dying Nama language and culture is also considered as well as links between Nama and Afrikaans stories. HibridityHybridity theory is also taken into account and possibilities of merging Afrikaans and Nama to create a bilingual picturebook is also explored. The picturebook is also discussed as a form consisting of different factors.These factors include elements regarding narrative theory and semiotics. The premise of this discussion is based on Roland Barthes’ theory regarding the meaning of signs, namelysemiotics. Narrative theory is also taken into consideration with special reference to Perry Nodelman’s theory regarding the combination of narratology and semiotics in the dissection of picturebooks. In the conclusion it is discussed why it is very important for writers and illustrators to have a sound understanding of the theory regarding picturebooks in order to create quality picturebooks. The main theme in this study is that picturebooks are a perfect medium for children to learn how to read and develop their visual literacy.
A renewed viewer-reader condition : mediating between semiotics and counter-semiotics
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2006-12) Taylor, Michael (John Michael); Dietrich, Keith; Bouma, Paddy; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Visual Arts.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: As the title of this thesis anticipates, two modes for interpretation are discussed: visual semiotics and pictorial counter-semiotics. Rooted in and conceived from an established linguistic methodology for learning the significance of signs, visual semiotics constitutes an interpretative mindset which affords only a confined set of theories for the viewer. These conceptions, directing the codes by which, for example, visual narratives are created and understood, hold certain limits for the viewer's full appreciation and formation of the selfhood of pictures. Visual semiotics presents images to viewers as a form of text, implying that they be read and studied in a particular fashion - an attitude advancing the idea that images are subsidiary to text. This limited theory is investigated here. Pictorial counter-semiotics, a misrecognized counterpart of semiotic study, offers a paradigmatic shift in the recognition and understanding of visual signification. By exposing a number of visual paradoxes, it enables the viewer to evaluate and reconsider his I her position on the construction and cultural implementation of pictures. Three particular instances of image-making, namely anti-splendor, 'exfoliation', and 'multistability', are brought in line with my own art and image-making processes to elucidate a counter means for picture interpretation. Counter-semiotics is not an anti-semiotic stance. It is instead a conjoining feature of a viewer's interpretative mindset and effects the constant transference between pictorial convention and pictorial discovery.

Browse

Browsing Department of Visual Arts by browse.metadata.advisor "Dietrich, Keith"

Results Per Page

Sort Options