Pozorování a jeho popis
(2025)
author(s): Roman Štětina
published in: Research Catalogue
(CZ)
Předmětem mého výzkumu je ekfráze – detailní obrazný popis, který svou přesvědčivostí vyvolává ve čtenářově či posluchačově mysli vizuální představy nebo jiné multisenzorické, emocionální a estetické prožitky.
Prostřednictvím setkání a rozhovorů s lidmi z různých oborů se snažím přiblížit roli popisu napříč historií i rozličnými oblastmi lidské činnosti. Zkoumám, jak se měnilo postavení popisu coby kdysi esenciálního stavebního prvku rozhlasových pořadů. Dále jeho význam a užití jako jedné z prvních forem reprodukce umění, analytického kunsthistorického nástroje nebo nedílné pomůcky při interpretaci výtvarných děl. Zaměřuji se také na jeho aplikaci v podobě promptu pro generátory obrázků založených na strojovém učení a trénování neuronových sítí. A věnuji prostor také úloze popisu v životě nevidomých a zrakově hendikepovaných i jeho funkci jako klíčového nástroje v psychoterapeutické praxi.
Podstatnou součást práce tvoří sdílení konkrétních pedagogických postupů při výuce umění v intermediálním ateliéru na Akademii výtvarných umění v Praze (AVU) a v kurzu intermediální přípravky tamtéž. V tomto prostředí, kde se často pohybujeme mezi médii, hraje ekfráze zásadní roli – umožňuje překlenout mezeru mezi slovy a obrazy, respektive plní roli žánru prostředkujícího mezi médii.
V závěru disertační práce prezentuji vlastní umělecký audit v podobě autorské knihy. Zároveň uvádím sbírku ekfrází převážně fiktivních uměleckých děl, které jsem během svého výzkumu nashromáždil od studujících a vyučujících na AVU.
úvodní ilustrace: Martin Groch
(EN)
My research topic is the ekphrasis, i.e., a detailed figurative description that, with its conclusiveness, evokes visual images or other multisensory, emotional and aesthetic experiences in the reader’s or listener’s mind.
Through meetings and interviews with people from different disciplines, I try to approach the role of description throughout history and various areas of human activity. I examine how the notion of description as a historically essential building block of radio programmes has changed. Furthermore, the emphasis is put on its importance and use as one of the first forms of art reproduction, as an analytical tool for art historians or as a crucial device for artwork interpretation. I also focus on its application in prompting of image generators based on machine learning and neural network training. And I also consider the role of description in the lives of the blind and visually impaired as well as it being a key tool in psychotherapy.
A substantial part of the work is dedicated to the dissemination of specific pedagogical practices in teaching art in the Intermedia Studio at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague (AVU) and in the intermedia preparatory course there. In this environment, where we often switch between various media, the ekphrasis has a crucial role. It allows us to bridge the gap between words and images, or rather it represents a genre that mediates between the given media.
In the conclusion of my dissertation, I present my own artistic audit represented by my artist's book. At the same time, I present a collection of ekphrases of mostly fictional works of art that I collected from students and teachers at the Academy of Fine Arts during my research.
thumbnail by Martin Groch
Seminar – Of Artistic Research: considered through hybrid writing and visual practice
(2023)
author(s): Mike Croft
published in: i2ADS - Research Institute in Art, Design and Society
The exposition involves the adaptation of the psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan's logical square, to convey an idea of artistic research practice considered from the perspective of the human subject's position in its midst. As part of the discussion the author has used some evidence of a previous lecture presentation, integrating such material with that of a newer project concerning the visualization of a nightmare image of a phantom in a portal. The tools of the research are a hybrid form of writing that embroils fictional and academic modes as a language-based practice, and visual artistic practice. The author takes Lacan's idea of the confounding of any logical argument by automatic obfuscation of it by unconscious process, and imagines that he has an other to him as a subjective second voice. The question of voices is central to the research; the suggestion that one does speak to oneself in various ways simultaneously that may be fashioned as distinct and separate. It is argued that the research aspect of artistic practice involves just a section of Lacan's logical square, particularly concerning contingency. This orientation may call to question one's tendency to reason and find meaning from the necessary locus of inquiry from the vantage-point of the language-based Symbolic – of Lacan's three psychic structuring registers Imaginary, Symbolic, Real. The element of fiction provides a literary inclination whereby, while the artistic research speaks about itself as research and references a visual practice, the exposition could also be considered a language-based practice in its own right.
A Change in Perception
(last edited: 2022)
author(s): Garry Barker
This exposition is in review and its share status is: visible to all.
An artist’s narrative that sets out to introduce the starting point for a new body of evolving work that will grow out of an interrogation of somatic perception and interoception.
As the corona virus pandemic emerged the artist Garry Barker had just been given a commission to develop a series of playing cards that were designed to help people develop conversations about their bodies. However lockdown prevented many proposed activities taking place, initial packs of cards were produced but they couldn’t be used to play the suggested games, and the artist was asked if he could develop an online version. The artist’s research then began to change direction and questions were asked about the nature of perception itself, the body and somatic awareness. Research was refocused on inner body perception and neuropsychology and associated drawings were made in response to a growing awareness of internal body schemas, together with visualizations of relationships between interoception and exteroception. Gradually what emerged was the artist’s realization of how important his own imagination was in building images of how we feel about our inner bodies.