Summary of the Dean Kenning Lectures Term One
Below are short summaries of the Dean Kenning Lectures that began this term Oct 2022. I will document these on a termly basis and include relevant slides.
The Art and Politics of Statues
18/10/22 – This was the first lecture at the start of the term. I think that the key takeaway here was that sometimes it isn’t always appropriate to ‘hijack’ someone else’s cause because it could be seen as self serving self promotion. The case in point was the Marc Quinn ‘A Surge of Power’ (Jen Reid) erected 15th July 2020. Anti-racism protesters in England pulled down a statue of a 17th-century slave trader while demonstrating in solidarity with the US Black Lives Matter movement. Quinn surreptitiously erected the statue early on the morning of 15th July 2020. Although this would seem like an act of solidarity on his part as a white male, it raises questions about the true motivation behind it. Was Quinn simply trying to use a political situation in order to further his own career? Would it have been better to have community art erected instead of art from a white male already making a name for himself?
Another case in point was the work of Vera Mukhina and her ‘Worker and Kolkhoz Woman, 1937.’ This is an amazing sculpture by someone dubbed ‘The Queen of Soviet sculpture’. Again questions can be asked about the actual function of this artwork. Was the artwork actually empowering to the people or was it simply a symbol of elitism and state power?
The sculptor John Ahearn also faced a similar situation.
“Ahearn made bronze statues of three black people from his South Bronx neighborhood: Raymond and his pit bull, Daleesha and her roller skates, and Corey and his boom box and basketball.[10] The statues were installed in 1991.[11]
Faced with protests from black bureaucrats on one hand and black neighbors on the other, who believed that the subjects did not adequately represent the community, Ahearn removed the statues five days after their installation”. – Wikipedia
The key question is more about representation and engagement with a community. Ahearn’s, ‘Walton Avenue Block Party with Community Casts’ appears to have been a much better received venture whereby he was actually engaging with the local community rather than imposing his ideas on them.
Deleuze’s Philosophy and It’s relevance to Art and Science – An Investigation into 3 Books
01/11/22 – Taking a look at
- Gilles Deleuze – Difference and Repetition
- Gilles Felix Deleuze Guattari – A Thousand Plateaus
- Gilles Deleuze – Francis Bacon – The Logic of Sensation
