An honourable practice: The artist’s print as a strategy for social engagement

Frimodig, Kerstin Elisabet

Abstract

An Honourable Practice is a cohesive study of the operative and ethical framework around the role of the artist and printmaker. The research project uses the artist’s prints as a strategy for social engagement, drawing on the dynamic between a personal vision and the collective, which seems to arise in printmaking as a practice of multiples.

The exploration is a practice based PhD. A dialogic and collaborative process is key to contributing to a socially engaged and efficacious method weaving an individual creative praxis with theory. A methodology emerges supported by intentions to engage with causes broader than the artist’s individual experiences. Concepts such as paradigmatic particularity, politi-kitsch, alienation, empathetic connection, relational aesthetics and ethno-mimesis inform the practice, cross-referenced throughout the text in a Glossary of Terms.

Primary research instigates a series of project-based case studies, each building on preceding understandings and findings. Case studies span the representation of slavery, human rights, freedom, racial hatred, and identity and property ownership. These frame the practice, while a personal narrative runs parallel to the experimentation. The practice of artist and activist Iris de Leeuw, with whom I worked closely, and the ideas of LUUKS contribute to the assessment and development of a model of socially engaged practice. Secondary research draws on the history of print and an evaluation of a range of pictorial strategies. Contextually relevant images and my own work are presented as Plates in the accompanying Volume II and cross-referenced as Figures throughout the text.

This thesis interrogates the concept of An Honourable Practice and aims to contribute to the current debate on the efficacy of art beyond its commodity value. It seeks its social value and a way for the individual practitioner to ethically position them self in relation to their own creativity and to a wider, collaborative audience. The case studies build to a model of practice that finds form in the project The Longest Print. A Five Step Strategy is then identified to be of value to other practitioners in the field who want to disseminate a socially engaged method to academics, artists and decision makers.
This consists of: identifying objectives, instigating preparatory activities, organising public engagement, conducting reflection and cross-disciplinary dissemination, and embedding the knowledge in personal practice by making artists prints. The strategy offers a pragmatic and inclusive approach to the complexity of a fine art social practice.

• Thesis Type: Thesis
• Publicly Available Date: Jun 7, 2019
• Keywords: printmaking, socially engaged, social practice
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/914046
• Additional Information: Patent Applicant : N/A
• Award Date: Feb 20, 2016