This is a response to Ken's post in which he details the bad and the
ugly (Tue, 23 May 2000 20:45:19). I'll respond to 'the good' later,
as I haven't yet had a look at the theses that he mentioned.
Dear Ken,
Thanks for your anti-inflammatory efforts to keep the examples
anonymous. I'm also interested to note that this post, although
dealing with 'the bad and the ugly', seems also to be exploring
positive structures and possibilities for artwork within PhD research.
I don't disagree that the flaws you mention are indeed flaws. I think
they would be flaws in any PhD. For me, they bring up issues of
research training which have been discussed in the UK in some
quarters, but could also be profitably explored at La Clusaz perhaps.
Moving on to your analyses of structures for practice-oriented PhD
theses I'm particularly interested in your following points re
practical artwork:
"To function as a research problem, the work must by definition conflate
three separate aspects of research. These must therefore be explained
clearly to allow distinction.
As process, the work involves method issues and methodological problems.
These issues and problems must be explained in the method chapter.
As artifacts and evidence of process, the work constitutes empirical data.
These must be demonstrated in the core of the thesis. This is where an
exhibition comes into play. Ad this is where rich, full documentation of
the exhibition is required for the thesis. For the reasons I explain here,
however, the exhibition is no substitute for the thesis. An exhibition in a
practice-based Ph.D. constitutes a chapter in a thesis.
As end product and research outcomes, the work constitutes the original
contribution to knowledge."
If, by "end product", you mean the finished artwork/design object(s),
I would say that in my experience of art-practice-based PhDs, the
emphasis has been less on the "end product" and more on the process,
and on the outcome of the research as a whole. Hypothetically, it's
possible for there to be no end product presented (or an
'unsuccessful' end product in art terms), but nevertheless to have a
successful research outcome and an original contribution to
knowledge. In practice, end products _are_ usually produced, but the
original contribution to knowledge may not _necessarily_ rest upon
the end product (as opposed to the 'intermediary products' of test
pieces, prototypes, unfinished artworks etc.)
Your structural suggestion seems to be an interesting area for
further discussion, and I look forward to further discussion on the
DRS list, but I will keep my own response brief in order to catch up
on past posts (I've been away for a while).
yours,
Beryl Graham
_________________________________________________________
Dr. Beryl Graham. Curator, artist, lecturer and writer specialising
in interactive art
Post Doctoral Research Fellow in Art and Design, University of Sunderland
tel: +44 (0)191 233 1098 email: [log in to unmask]
web page: http://www.stare.com/beryl/ OR
http://www.sunderland.ac.uk/~as0bgr/welcome.html
Web pages for art-practice-led researchers:
http://www.sunderland.ac.uk/~as0bgr/learnmat.html
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