Event and Lecture Series

Culture, (anti)Aesthetics, Activism and Social Practice

Presenter: Stephen Pritchard, PhD student and Senior Research Assistant, FADSS, Northumbria University. Director, dot to dot active arts

Date: 27 April, 2016
Time: 4:30 pm
Location: LIP 032

Image: Liberate Tate intervention, Martin LeSanto-Smith, 2015

ABSTRACT: Herbert Marcuse’s later writings offer an incredibly insightful analysis of the power of the Establishment and the expansion of capitalism at a time pre-dating neoliberalism.  His predictions about the strengths and weaknesses of both consumer society and oppositional movements were (and remain) amazingly accurate; perhaps even more relevant today.  But his preoccupation with a certain form of aesthetics and associated artistic practices greatly weakens his otherwise deeply inspiring philosophical theories – an Achilles heel that undoubtedly reflects his own personal preferences and beliefs.

This paper seeks to rethink Marcuse’s revolutionary and utopian ideas from a cultural perspective that rejects any notion that a paradigm shift can somehow supported by the discredited aesthetics of a bourgeois elite.  It seeks to reconceive of the aesthetic experience as intensely personal and relational which can be stimulated by a range of socially engaged and activist practices that Marcuse may have considered to be ‘anti-art’.  The intention is to re-contextualise Marcuse in light of contemporary acts of resistance which may and may not be considered as art, but which can never be canonised as Art. 

BIO: Stephen Pritchard is a second-year PhD researcher at Northumbria University exploring the potentialities of art as social practice in creating spaces for acts of resistance and liberation and in supporting movements towards radical democracies.  His work is deeply rooted in the critical theory of Herbert Marcuse as well as Bakhtin’s notions of the carnival and the critical utopias of Tom Moylan et al.  His approach is deeply intradisciplinary spanning politics and political theory, cultural policy, economics, decolonisation and border thinking, psychodynamic and psychoanalytic theories, sociology, and visual and material cultures. He has lectured widely including at Durham University, BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Arts and Arts Council England National Office, is a published academic and an established blogger.

Talk by Michael Johnson:

Treasures of Islamic Architecture

Date: Thursday 10 March

Location:  Northumberland Building Room 252

Time: 6:30 - 7:30

Organised in collaboration with the University’s Islamic Society 

Keeping the bits alive: authenticity and longevity for digital art

Presenter: Dr Perla Innocenti, Senior Lecturer in Information Science, Northumbria University

Date: 24 February, 2016
Time: 4:30 pm
Location: LIP 032

Image : Jeffrey Shaw, The Virtual Museum, 1991/2007, interactive Environment, ZKM_Collection

ABSTRACT: The technological landscape in which digital art is created and used challenges its long term accessibility, the potentiality of its integrity, and the likelihood that it will retain authenticity over time. We must act to keep digital art alive. However, digital artworks have questioned traditional museological approaches to documentation and preservation because of their ephemeral, documentary, technical, and multi-part nature. There are theoretical, methodological and practical problems associated with documentation, access, function, context and meaning of digital art, which require to be more systematically and scientifically addressed. From an interdisciplinary perspective I will discuss a field investigation of current digital and media art conservation practices at leading international museums and the review of relevant conservation initiatives.

BIO: Dr Perla Innocenti is a cultural heritage scholar with a passion for curating, making accessible and sustainably reusing tangible and intangible heritage in a digital world. She is Senior Lecturer in Information Science at the iSchool of University of Northumbria and Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Glasgow, where she was awarded her PhD in Cultural Heritage Informatics. Over the last decade Perla led research at national and international level on cultural heritage, social inclusion and ICT; digital libraries interoperability; user requirement analysis and risk assessment for digital preservation; digital imaging; history and display strategies of museums and libraries.  She is currently interested in exploring how cultural heritage can contribute to social inclusion and what models and digital tools can be used to reach out and engage with wider audiences. For further info visit Dr innocenti's profile.

"Technology advanced treatments for the conservation of traditional and modern paintings"

Presenter: Dr Charis Theodorakopoulos

Date: Thursday 28 January, 2016 
Time: 4:30 pm
Location: Burt Hall Seminar Room, Northumbria University

In the last two decades there are remarkable advances in the technologies developed for a wide range of art conservation treatments. This talk is about cleaning of painted surfaces of a variety of works of art. Cleaning aims at the removal of accumulated soils and pollutants, degraded and discoloured aged varnishes, and/or non-original overpaint layers, which impede the intended viewing and the accurate study of the artworks. Ideally, the treatment should leave the paint layers intact so that the post-treatment aesthetics as well as the mechanical, physical and chemical post-treatment condition of conserved works of art will not be affected.

These objectives justify multidisciplinary collaborations of physicists, chemists, polymer scientists, art conservation scientists, art history technologists with conservators to generate and evaluate new cleaning methods incorporating organic solvents and aqueous solutions, lasers, laborious micro-emulsions, smart gels of advanced polymer networks with properties assisted by nanotechnology. The advances of the paint industry – from traditional natural resins and drying oils, proteins and inorganic pigments employed mainly up to the early twentieth century, to synthetic media and pigments employed since the mid-twentieth century – intensify the treatment challenges, transforming art conservation into a technology-intensive and science-rich field.

'Saints in Glass'

Date: 14th January 2016
Time: Various but starts at 10am
Location: Cathedral Church of St Nicholas, St Nicholas Squre, Mosley Street, Newcastle Upon Tyne, NE1 1PF

St Nicholas' Cathedral in Newcastle upon Tyne has some beautiful examples of Victorian stained glass, some of which are believed to be close copies of the original medieval windows.

This short series of talks will introduce you to some of the saints and their European legends via the windows of one of Newcastle's most famous churches . The stories of the Virgin Mary, St Cuthbert, St Margaret, St George, and St Oswald will be analysed in exciting detail.

A talk on Victorian glass in the cathedral and beyond will help you understand how the Victorians approached these medieval legends - plus, modern glassmakers will share some of their trade secrets with you.

“Recent and future projects: 19th and 20th century architecture”

Presenter: Dr Michael Johnson

Date: Wed. Dec 9
Time: 4.30pm
Location: Burt Hall Seminar Room, Northumbria University

Michael Johnson, Lecturer in Design History, will give an informal talk on his research into the histories of 19th and 20th century architecture. Recently completed projects include the Victoria County History’s study of Sunderland, due for launch on 14 November, and a new book on working class housing. With longstanding interests in the architecture of North East England, Michael is currently writing a monograph on country houses in the North East in collaboration with Dr Richard Pears of Durham University. Provisionally entitled The Northumbrian Country House, this will examine the history of elite dwellings in Durham and Northumberland from the Tudor period to the present. Independently, he is working on a monograph on the architects Dunn and Hansom, who spearheaded the resurgence of Catholic architecture and ecclesiology in the 19th century. Developing from his MA dissertation and entitled Dunn and Hansom: Architects of the Catholic Revival, this research will situate this important architectural practice within a national context.

"Transnational Textiles: New Directions” The Design History Symposium

Presenter: The Design History Society Symposium co-organised by CloTHINK and Visual and Material Culture Research Group

Date: Friday, 27 November 
Time: 9.30am – 5pm
Location: Squires Building, Room 210

Transnational Textile: New Directions examines whether the movement of textiles and fashion across borders removes distinctions and boundaries, or reinforces them.  The close analysis of African, Chinese, European, Indian, Japanese, North American, and Scandinavian examples from the nineteenth century to the present will demonstrate an ongoing cross-cultural dialogue rather than single journey from one culture to another in design inspiration, manufacturing, marketing and consumption. Papers will explore the ways in which new productions and uses occur in the interstitial space created in exchange between cultures. 

 For full details visit the Transnational Textiles page here.

“Geek Chic ? The Design of National Health Service glasses and questions of Identity”

Presenter: Dr Joanne Gooding
Date: June 17th 
Time: 4.30pm
Location: Burt Hall Seminar Room, Northumbria University

I will revisit my MA research which considered the design and production of spectacles in Britain following the introduction of standardised frame styles under the National Health Service.  The actions of the Government and professional bodies greatly affected the trade in eyewear and thus restricted opportunities for innovative design;  but the wider impact was upon a generation of patients for whom NHS specs represented “a badge of poverty across their faces”. (B. Castle, 1976). My current research considers the changing representation of spectacle-wearers in popular visual culture and how glasses contribute to identity.  Sunglasses have always been seen as fashionable accessories, retro and vintage revival of styles is commonplace, so are spectacles, and even the once-reviled NHS glasses, now chic?

"Heritage as Process"

Presenter: Dr Susan Ashley
Date: May 28th 
Time: 4.30pm
Location: Squires Building Room 314, Northumbria University

Dr Ashley offers some personal thoughts about the ‘value’ of heritage, with stories of work and research experiences over the years with sites of heritage-making, from Algonquian rock art to Black history to the Chattri memorial group in Brighton.

Image: Rock Art, Writing-on-Stone, Canada

"Slave Trade to Fair Trade: Change and Development in Philanthropy and Craft"

Presenter: Shelagh Wilson
Date: Wednesday 21st January 2015
Time: 5.00 pm
Location: Lipman Building CPD 002

Celebrating the work of Dr Malcolm Gee

Presenter: Dr Malcolm Gee
Date: 19 November 2014
Time: 4:00 -5:30 p.m.
Location: Burt Hall

The Visual and Material Culture research group honours the career of Dr Malcolm Gee through an illustrated talk by Malcolm about his research and work at Northumbria University Department of Arts.

Malcolm will present:

Sites and paths of consecration – Artwork destinies of the 20^th century

This talk will illustrate through a range of case studies the ways in which the functioning of the art market has structured the histories of individual works from the point of production to their current situation, mainly as key elements in a hierarchy of values secured by art history. It will consider the different agents involved in this process, the sites through which works passed and their impact on their status, and also the ways in which economic and political factors contributed in determining their destinies.