Pedaços

This is a 50 minute solo performance work. Created by Magda Miranda and Rea Dennis Directed by Rea Dennis Performed by Magda Miranda Entitled 'Pedaços' - a Portuguese word meaning pieces or fragments, the performance is built on fragments: of text, of memory, of artifacts collected over a life, of cultural identity that is fractured through the passages of life, migration, the death of family members, and even ageing. Part of Dr Dennis' practice-led research the inquiry explores the way memory intersects with creative process, including spontaneity and decision making, when devising for theatre. Following a post-doc line of inquiry which yielded two previous works: Apart of and A Part From (2007) and Train Tracks and Rooftops (2010) in which Dennis performed and directed. The current work shifts focus to my work in a directorial role alone. It is performed by Magda​ and informed by her memory.

Promoting and supporting requirements engineering creativity

Requirements Engineering (RE) is a commencing phase in the systems development life cycle and concerned with understanding and specifying the customer's requirements. RE has been recognized as a complex cognitive problem solving process which takes place in an unstructured and poorly understood problem .context. A recent understanding describes the RE process as inherently creative, involving cycles of incremental building followed by insight-driven econceptualization .of the problem space. This chapter relates this new understanding to various creative process models described in the creativity and psychology of problem solving literature.

A review of current attempts to support problem solving in RE using
various design rationale approaches suggests., that their common major
wealmess lies in the lack of support for the creative and insight-driven problem solving process in RE. In addressing this weakness, the chapter suggests a new approach to promoting and supporting RE creativity using design rationale. The suggested approach involves the ad hoc recording of rationale to support the creative exploration complemented by a post hoc conceptual characterization of the problem space to support insight driven reconceptualization.

Crafting organization

The recent shift in attention away from organization studies as science has allowed for consideration of new ways of thinking about both organization and organizing and has led to several recent attempts to 'bring down' organizational theorizing. In this paper, we extend calls for organization to be represented as a creative process by considering organization as craft. Organizational craft, we argue, is attractive, accessible, malleable, reproducible, and marketable. It is also a tangible way of considering organization studies with irreverence. We draw on the hierarchy of distinctions among fine art, decorative art, and craft to suggest that understanding the organization of craft assists in complicating our understanding of marginality. We illustrate our argument by drawing on the case of a contemporary Australian craftworks and marketplace known initially as the Meat Market Craft Centre ('MMCC') and then, until its recent closure, as Metro! ‡ Stella Minahan was a board member and then the Chief Executive Officer of the Metro! Craft Centre.

`Out on the borderlands`: Time, generation and personal agency in women`s lives

What tools can we use in attempting to understand the recurring patterns of some girls’ early school leaving and consequent exclusion from well-paid employment? From which disciplinary fields can we take them? Using Bourdieu’s concept of the ‘scholastic point of view’ - the inherent intellectual bias of a discipline, in his case sociology - as a springboard, we suggest that if one turns to different ‘fields’, approaches might be found which point towards differing perspectives. This article brings Bourdieu into dialogue with the work of feminist historians and their conceptual tools. Carolyn Steedman’s notion of the politics of envy and Sally Alexander’s appropriation from psychoanalysis of the idea of repetition offer generative ways of exploring the ‘unthought categories of thought which delimit the thinkable and predetermine the thought’ (Bourdieu and Wacquant, 1992: 40). In their focus on gender, they have much in common with feminist sociologists’ responses to Bourdieu’s work, suggesting that a gendered ‘perspective’ offers a way of avoiding the ‘singular viewpoint’ inherent in any one discipline.

The editor as animation inbetweener

With digital compositing and digital special effects, the traditional edits of cut, dissolve and wipe, are being augmented by a more complex, yet liberating, creative process. This paper will explore how the language of film editing may be shifting and evolving due to new tools at the filmmakers disposal (and the ease with which to use them).

With the convergence of all media into the digital realm, the distinctions between animation and live-action filmmaking are continuing to blur. In fact, editing live-action film is now often similar to the process of animation. In many ways, the film editor is becoming like an “animation-inbetweener, ” of the “key posses” that have been “drawn” by the cinematographer.

This new animator/compositor/editor uses a variety of methods for creating inbetweens in order to connect two distinctly different scenes. These can include the use of; morphing, animated mattes, digital animation, and controlled complex dissolves. Not only can this process create a unique visual style, but in addition, new languages can also be explored.

Eisenstein was very interested in how new meanings can be created by the linear juxtaposition of distinctly different scenes. But what does it mean when these two scenes are allowed to evolve into each other?

Furthermore, the editor, can now easily allow selected elements to transcend between shots. It is now possible for the editor to decide what portions of the scene are most important, and what the viewer should take with them into the next scene. What should be highlighted, or what elements should be suppressed.

In order to illustrate these ideas, this paper will look at the earlier film editing theories of, Eisenstein, Pudovkin and G.W. Pabst, and the traditions and theories of animation. It will also showcase contemporary compositing/editing examples.

Perceptions of the impact of art : implications for the art sector

This paper explores how individuals perceive art and its impact, and what implications these perceptions have for the art sector. Much previous research into the impact of art has been based on perspectives of art and impact implicit in government policies. This paper posits that to increase demand for art activities, a greater understanding of individuals’ perspectives of these two concepts is necessary. The paper reports findings of a three year research project into the impact of art based on the perception of the individual. Findings highlight three key areas: first, it is not the art product, but creativity or the creative process that results in impact; second, that individuals are autonomous in the creation of art experiences and the resultant impact; and third that there is a link between the motivation to have an art experience and the perceived potential impact.

Towards the development of a conceptual design management model for remote sites

Remote and environmentally sensitive sites present unique challenges for participants involved in the design and construction process. Worldwide advances in information technology coupled with improved site accessibility and manageability has enabled the construction industry to undertake such projects with greater ease. Furthermore, research on information technology in construction has begun to focus our attentions on our increased ability to work virtually in distributed teams. These remote sites have a range of development potential as clients have varied interests including; tourism, scientific investigation and resource exploration and processing which impact upon the management of the design process. These sites pose unique challenges to the project teams and in particular for the management of project design. The conceptual design phase is often marked by an iterative and creative process, which tends to be a sociologically oriented world where designers respond to a range of functional, aesthetic, environmental and even spiritual concerns. Strategic decisions made during the briefing and conceptual design stage may impact upon construction logistics and sustainability. Detailed design for construction tends to be a production oriented world. There is a significant body of literature that addresses the application of lean thinking to improving the interface between detailed design and construction production. There is little literature that takes a holistic view of design management for remote sites. The lean design management field of research has much to contribute to the design management of these projects. The review of the literature indicated that much of the lean thinking has been primarily concerned with sequential production. However, lean thinking is based upon principles of flow and value, which is also conducive to the complex process involved in design management for remote sites. A conceptual model is developed that considers both the production and sociological approaches to design management, in response to the peculiar demands of the site and their project teams.

Understanding social creativity amongst event professionals : an action research approach

Live events represent a significant and growing sector of the creative industries but the creative process underlying this sector is little researched in the event management context. Despite the increased consumption of virtual and online media, the live event remains a popular channel of expression for a wide range of creative art forms and commercial messages. Live events use such messages as 'props' or 'stages' to produce memorable and emotionally positive moments for audiences. The creative process behind developing a live event is in itself a live event, involving groups of event professionals working in a social context to conceptualise ideas for their audiences. This research fills the gap for event professionals in the creative industries by seeking to understand the creative process intrinsic to live events. This paper suggests that social creativity is used to develop live event concepts. The phenomenon of social creativity identified from the existing literature is explored in the context of its application to event professionals. An Action Research approach is recommended to better understand the key antecedents of social creativity and how they can influence event concept development.

Madonna of the eucalypt : novel and exegesis

The thesis comprises a novel and exegesis. The novel explores migration and spirituality in a family saga that moves from the islands of Sicily to the Australian Mallee desert. The exegesis concentrates on the "unknowability" of the creative process, which is explored through the journey motif.

Look who's morphing

This project's creative component is "Look who's morphing", a fiction collection that explores the theme of personal identity. The exegesis analyses an issue pertaining to the writer's creative process: what degree of directness was employed in the authorial identity in his creative work and how was this level of directness realised?

e-learning through digital theatre : breaking down the tyranny of distance and limits of location

In this article, we report on a cross-disciplinary, cross-cultural digital exchange project between Australian Drama and Education students and Dutch English Language and Culture students, and examine the impact of the place-independent, technology-mediated communications and collaboration on their learning trajectories. The intensive, intercultural collaboration between the two groups of students resulted in a 50-minute group-devised, digital theatre play entitled Quarter Acre Dreaming. This play, performed through live interactive media by both Dutch and Australian students, traced the historical development of the Australian suburb, while integrating scenes of Dutch immigration into Australia. In the creative process, the students on either side of the globe interacted through Computer-Mediated Communication (CMC), and used videoconferencing and Skype for live rehearsals and discussions to advance their learning of English, their performance repertoire and cross-cultural understanding.

‘No one will ever know...’ : the Holocaust, ‘privileged’ Jews, and the ‘grey zone’

This paper explores the problems of judgement and representation in relation to Jewish victims of the Holocaust who occupied so-called privileged positions in the camps and ghettos. Such figures, forced to act in ways that have proven controversial both during and after the war, faced unprecedented ethical dilemmas under Nazi persecution. Taking Auschwitz survivor Primo Levi’s highly influential essay on the ‘grey zone’ as a point of departure, I examine the extreme situations confronted by prisoner doctors, an important – though little discussed – category of ‘privileged’ Jews. Investigating the synergies between history, memory and film, I focus particularly on the case of Gisella Perl, a prisoner doctor whose experiences in Auschwitz-Birkenau are represented in her memoir and a recent fiction film. The emotionally and morally fraught circumstances of prisoner doctors can never be fully understood, yet reflecting on the double binds they faced, and acknowledging the inherent problems involved in representing and judging them, enables a nuanced approach to the moral complexities of the Holocaust.

Richard Tucker. Deakin University

Creativity has been defined 'as the production of novel and useful ideas in any domain'. I would question the words 'novel' and 'useful' because, if the idea is 'useless' but new to the creator, the creator has still given birth to an idea via some form of creative process. I suggest, therefore, that 'creativity' is simply the production of ideas. But it is not quite that straightforward. Innovation is often distinguished from creativity as the successful implementation of ideas. Yet there is a creative process between the birth of an idea and its implementation—that is evolving/ developing/ operating on an idea. This development of an idea is also creativity. I would therefore say that creativity is a two-stage process: it is, firstly, the production and, secondly, the development of ideas; where 'production' is understood as the initiating activities a designer undertakes to inform or inspire ideas.

Indelible 4

The painting is one of a series that responds to the landscape of central Australia and extends on my interest in the interaction of matter and the emergence of new insights that is inherent to the creative process