El programa iconogràfic de l'Attideion del Campo della Magna Matter a Ostia

L'objectiu d'aquesta tesi és l'estudi de tot un seguit d'escultures votives trobades dins el santuari de Cibele de Ostia, descobert a finals del segle passat i excavat amb extensió just abans de la Segona Guerra Mundial. Tanmateix, el nostre objectiu no era el de presentar, únicament, un catàleg de l'estatuària sinó, especialment, la seva funció i relació dins el santuari com un element a considerar per a l'estudi del culte a Cibele i més concretament a Atis.

A Portuguese Embassy to Siam in 1595 and Some Curious Observations

Information culled from the bio-account of Couttre, a Flemish jewel-trader, about a Portuguese embassy to Siam.

CARTA DO RESTAURO 1972, MINISTÉRIO DE INSTRUÇÃO PÚBLICA GOVERNO DA ITÁLIA, CIRCULAR Nº 117 DE 6 DE ABRIL DE 1972

Através da circular número 117, de 6 de Abril de 1972, o Ministério da Instrução Pública da Itália divulgou o Documento sobre Restauração de 1972 (Carta do Restauro, 1972) entre os directores e chefes de institutos autónomos, para que se atenham, escrupulosa e obrigatoriamente, em todas as intervenções de restauração em qualquer obra de arte, às normas por ela estabelecidas e às instruções anexas, aqui publicadas na íntegra.

Alfredo Pareja: ensayista y crítico (Del Historiador y el Ensayista)

La autora revisa la ensayística de Alfredo Pareja sobre temas de arte colonial, cultura y literatura. Da cuenta de la evolución de su noción de lo artístico desde 1933, cuando Pareja marca distancia con la generación anterior y con el arielismo vigente, al hacer suya la defensa del realismo social, más adelante, sin embargo, matizaría estos juicios en otros ensayos. Su postura crítica, en términos generales, no defiende la originalidad ni la forma del texto por sí mismas, sino el valor del contenido, el humanismo empieza a ser el hilo conductor de su narrativa e iluminador de su estética. Por otro lado, siente la necesidad de resignificar lo local en su contacto con lo universal, reconociendo el afán de contemporaneidad de su generación, su defensa de lo mestizo está presente en sus reflexiones sobre el barroquismo latinoamericano. Finalmente, resulta interesante que Pareja aproxime dos grandes momentos del arte ecuatoriano: la pintura y escultura colonial de la llamada escuela de Quito, y la propuesta estética de su generación.

Taxonomical musings

In the ‘Object as Subject’ exhibition held at the Stephen Lawrence Gallery, Greenwich University, myself and two other artists showed work which explores the use of the ‘found object’ in their respective practices. My work was selected by the gallery curator David Waterworth. The work exhibited by me, two multi-media pieces and two films, continues my (practice as research) investigation into using everyday objects as starting points for creating work in a variety of mediums including: sculpture, films, installations and multiples. In this work I address a range of subject matters – philosophical, social and cultural. The history of the use of found object in art began in early 20th century European art when Marcel Duchamp and Pablo Picasso independently introduced everyday objects into their practice. My work continues this research.

Language dominance and lexical diversity: how bilinguals and L2 learners differ in their knowledge and use of French lexical and functional items

This chapter compares lexical diversity of French words used by Dutch-French bilinguals, English-French bilinguals and Flemish L2 learners of French.

Utopia Ltd

Utopia Ltd. explores the relationship between utopian ideas and commodification, bringing together artwork by Blaise Drummond, Brendan Earley, Pil and Galia Kollectiv, David Mabb, Lizi Sanchez and Mary-Ruth Walsh. The seven artists’ work opens up a debate on the utopian within painting, sculpture, architecture, design and video.The works in Utopia Ltd. represent modernist architecture and design in its various mutations within a spectacularised, commodified 20th century consumer society. In these works, the utopian dream seems to burst through again and again, despite rather than because of the permutations of commodity culture. By picturing the past, present and possible future, the works destabilize fixed linear time. By rescuing, reclaiming and re-picturing, Utopia Ltd. suggests that utopian ideas persist in contemporary art, making a provocative demand on the viewer’s capacity to produce utopian dreams of their own. The exhibition’s title Utopia Ltd. is a satirical echo of an operetta by Gilbert and Sullivan, Utopia (Limited) or, The Flowers of Progress (1893), in which a utopian colony is turned into a joint stock company.

Future Monument

Based on a series of collage made from images of mega yachts, the Future Monument looks at the possibility of taking late capitalism more seriously as an ideology than it takes itself seriously. The project asks whether the private display of wealth and power represented by the yacht can be appropriated for a new language of public sculpture. The choreographed live performance of the construction of the large scale monument was scripted to a proposed capitalist manifesto and took place in a public square in Herzliya, Israel. It aimed to articulate the ideology latent in capitalism’s claims to a neutral manifestation of human nature. The Future Monument project was developed through reading seminars taking place at Goldsmiths College, as part of a research strand headed by Pil and Galia Kollectiv on irony and overidentification within the Political Currency of Art research group. This research has so far produced a series of silk screen collage prints, a sculpture commissioned by the Essex Council and a live performance commissioned by the Herzliya Biennale. However, the project is ongoing, with future outputs planned including a curated exhibition and conference in 2012, in collaboration with Matthew Poole, Programme Director of the Centre for Curatorial Studies at the University of Essex.

Modern lovers

Modern Lovers was a survey show of contemporary art practices in dialogue with modernism, bringing together established and emerging artists based in London and international artists from Berlin, Jerusalem and Zagreb. The show features video, film, installation, sculpture, music and performance work that addresses the legacy of the avant garde and the survival of its aesthetics within contemporary culture. In 1976, as punk rock was busy smashing the cultural rubble left behind by the second world war and rejecting the consumer society that had emerged from the ruins, one band bravely announced that it wanted no part in this destruction. Jonathan Richman's Modern Lovers sang about how they still loved the old world. Neither parents nor girlfriends could understand, but the decaying inner city with its false promises of progress still held a fascination for Richman, who claimed he wanted to keep his place in this arcane landscape. Punk's assault on culture was the logical conclusion of modernism's linear narrative of art as a force of innovation that must reject preceding artistic movements to establish new ones. Echoing the negations of Dada, it set out to put an end to this narrative, an end to culture. It is partly because of this inherently destructive and totalising side of Modernism that it has come under harsh critique in the post modern era. Nevertheless, we are still caught up in the same dialectic of progress, revolution and destruction. Post modernism has failed to unseat our desire for the revolutionary moment, even as it has been co-opted to the degree of meaninglessness by the discourses of marketing and Capitalism. But, like Jonathan Richman, the artists in the exhibition "Modern Lovers" keep returning to modernism for something else. Instead of taking it at its word when it proffers revolution, they turn to it in search of reform. Still loving the old world and desiring a dialogue with the past, perhaps as an antidote to the eternal present of Capitalism, they are willing to engage with its aesthetics and ideas on equal ground. Leaving behind the ironic deconstructions of post modernism, they find perspectives worth salvaging and juxtapose them with contemporary visual productions. Trading in the grand narratives of modernity for a more personal approach, they don't seek the purity of form that drove the avant garde movements that inspire them but rather revel in adulteration, dilution and contamination of the past by the present". A live performance by sala-manca was sponsored by the British Council and took place May 26th, 19:00. MODERN LOVERS was accompanied by a catalogue (14.80 cm x 14.80 cm) including essays by Avi Pitchon, the sala-manca group and the curators. A discussion panel about the exhibition themes, as well as the catalogue launch,took place at Goldsmiths College's cinema on the 27th of May at 14:00, chaired by Dr. Suhail Malik (Senior Lecturer & Course Leader Postgraduate Fine Art Critical Studies at Goldsmiths College) and with the participation of Tom Morton (curator, Cubitt Gallery, and regular contributor to Frieze magazine), sala-manca (artist group), Dr. Amanda Beech (artist, curator and senior lecturer at the Wimbledon School of Art), Matthew Poole (course director of MA Gallery Studies, dept. of Art History and Theory at the University of Essex).