Browsing by Author "Lamprecht, Andrew"

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    Culture's “In-Betweens”: Diaspora and artistic practice of Gavin Jantjes, Marlene Dumas and Moshekwa Langa.
    (2017) Speakes, Olga; Lamprecht, Andrew; Martitez-Ruiz, Barbaro
    In 2017, the term “diaspora” is ubiquitous in any form of engagement with contemporary art and artists from Africa. Whether we scroll through the titles of the latest contemporary art exhibitions on the continent and outside, learn about the buzzy new additions to the annual art fair calendar, leaf through the pages of art publications, hear of the new museums of contemporary African art being inaugurated or engage in the theoretical discourse through art history conferences, catalogue essays and scholarly monographs, the talk is no longer about African art or even contemporary African art, but about contemporary art from Africa and its diaspora (s). The term “diaspora” is certainly not new, and originated in the discipline of history and, particularly, in Jewish studies. Its current omnipresence in the fields of art history and theory, however, is the result of a number of new critical, theoretical and curatorial tendencies that have gained particular momentum since the last two decades of the twentieth century.
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    Culture, Commerce and Value: The Contemporary South African Fine Art Market in Relation to Concepts of Artistic and Financial Success
    (2015) le Clus-Theron, Jean; Lamprecht, Andrew; Conradie, Annemi
    In this study I investigate two main premises: firstly that art intermediaries are imperative in value creation in an artist's career, and secondly that high prices are used as a way to justify, measure or reflect an artist's “importance”. The motives for these investigations are, firstly, that there would seem to be insufficient academic research on these notions in the South African art scene, and secondly, the existence of a counter argument, namely, that the high prices attained on the art market may be deemed arbitrary and irrational. This study investigates the South African contemporary fine art scene along with the role of South African art intermediaries and their perceptions on ideas of “importance” and “success”, using two case studies. These case studies comprise the career trajectories of two living artists residing in South Africa, who compared to all other living artists residing in South Africa, have attained the highest prices in their careers for work on auction, namely, William Kentridge and Dylan Lewis. In this study twenty-six intermediaries were interviewed and the ensuing data used to investigate how these and other intermediaries influence perceptions of the importance and success of these artists' work. This dissertation incorporates Pierre Bourdieu's theory of field, capital and distinction, and uses Alan Bowness's four conditions of success as a framework for investigation.
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    Double agents : queer citizenship(s) in contemporary South African visual culture
    (2016) Stielau, Anna; Lamprecht, Andrew; Brundrit, Jean
    South Africa claims the most progressive constitution on the African continent, extending protections to all citizens regardless of race, gender, ability or sexual orientation. Much has been published in recent years about the induction of LGBTIQ persons into this inclusive post-1994 human rights framework, often with a particular focus on the role of the state in instituting non-discrimination legislation and promoting equality. This document reflects my belief that South African sexuality scholarship too often presents incorporation into a unified nation-state as the only desirable outcome for queer citizens. By mapping the manner in which sexual difference has been uneasily imagined in national discourses, I argue here that the ideal South African citizen remains a heterosexual citizen presupposed as private, patriotic, familial and reproductive. I posit that when non-normative sexual identities and practices become visible in the public sphere, they risk assimilation into "acceptable" modes of representation produced in accordance with the expectations and responsibilities attending state-sanctioned national membership. In so doing, I assert, these cultural forms mandate a queerness that leaves structural inequalities intact. To look beyond this horizon I choose to explore dissident citizenship forms that intervene in dominant cultural narratives to expand the boundaries of belonging. Specifically, I concern myself with representations of queer subjects in visual culture and the multiple audiences these representations invite.
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    How does collective practice function as an artistic strategy
    (2019) Weber, Deborah; Lamprecht, Andrew; Josephy, Svea
    This research interrogates the different strategies and methodologies employed by collectives (with a focus on South African collectives in the past two decades) to raise fundamental questions about art; the nature of artistic work, forms of production, authorship, autonomy and collaboration as an artistic strategy. The research sets out to explore collaboration as a field of art practice. The criteria for selection of the collectives in the research was each collective needed to comprise of three or more artists who have produced and authored work together under an umbrella name, they also needed to use multi-disciplinary practices. The selection included: Galerie Puta (2003), Avant Car Guard (2004), Doing it for Daddy (2006), Gugulective (2006), Centre for Historical Enactments (2010), Burning Museum (2013) and iQhiya (2015), Guerilla Girls (1985), Laboratoire Agit’Art (1975), Raqs Media Collective (1992), Ubulungiswa/Justice and Karoo Disclosure (2014). The idea of shared authorship is the central tenet around which all collective practice revolves. This thesis looks at the collective authorial voice as a strategic artistic practice in contemporary art that enables reappraisals of artistic production. Furthermore it interrogates the decentralization of authorship, as an artistic strategy to shift paradigms of thinking in relation to power structures, be it institutional, political or ideological.
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    Intramediary presence : body, interactivity and networked distribution in immersive virtual reality art
    (2013) Leibbrandt, Tim; Richards, Colin; Lamprecht, Andrew
    This thesis is concerned with the ways in which the medium of immersive virtual reality has been utilised in the art context since the early 1990s, with a view towards the contemporary relevance of the medium. Artworks that have been realised through both Head-Mounted Display (HMD) and CAVE Automatic Virtual Environment (CAVE) systems are discussed. The first chapter uses the 1993 Solomon R. Guggenheim exhibition 'Virtual Reality: An Emerging Medium' as a starting point in order to introduce the defining concepts of immersion and interactivity into the discussion. Thereafter, the second chapter is focussed on the body in relation to immersive virtual reality, examining the idea of virtual disembodiment in detail. This discussion is influenced by William Gibson's dichotomizing of "meatspace" and "cyberspace" in Neuromancer (1984). The psychological effects of avatars (the virtual body that surrogates for the physical body in virtual reality) are also looked at. The third chapter extensively discusses the ideas of agency, interactivity and narrative in relation to expanded immersive models of cinema that incorporate active audience participation. Gonzalo Frasca's video game theory concepts of "ludology" and "narratology" are applied, as are ideas of agency from Brenda Laurel's Computers as Theatre (1993) and Janet H. Murray's Hamlet on the Holodeck (1998). These notions of agency are also juxtaposed with the problem of passivity within conventional 3D cinema. The fourth chapter concerns cyberspace (defined as a middle-space that emerges between networked telecommunication technologies) and its implications for immersive virtual reality. The chapter concludes with a nod towards the growing potential of the Internet to facilitate the distribution of immersive virtual environment artworks. Finally, the conclusion looks at technological developments that have taken place during the two years that this thesis was written in order to suggest ways forward for the medium.
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    Leisure Island: An Investigation of Suburban Landscapes and Domestic Spaces in South Africa
    (2017) Lilford, Kirsten Lee; MacKenny, Virginia; Lamprecht, Andrew
    Media and communications analyst, Roger Silverstone (1997) brings our attention to the negative elements of the suburban landscape, a space more often associated with the comfortable life – one filled with luscious garden lawns, large crystal blue swimming pools, double garages and domestic workers' quarters. That this domestic space has ‘protected' itself from the stress of the city through the use of high walls, electric fences and wrought iron gates, is an irony worth commenting on. As Silverstone notes, this constructed paradise is not without its complications.
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    Other observations
    (2004) Van der Byl, Gretchen; Teale, Julia; Lamprecht, Andrew
    Painting presents an almost infinite range of possibilities to convey meaning through the versatility and potential of the medium. It is to this potential for mimicking and representing the real world that I wish to turn; for whilst the word painting refers to the manifestation of the physical object, it also, more importantly for this discussion, refers to the act of painting itself, the application of paint onto a surface in the articulation of an illusory reality. This ability to represent in paint, upon a two-dimensional surface, the real world in such a way as to cause in the viewer an experience which is somehow like that of looking at the world, is called naturalism.