Widening the View – War and witnessing: Sarajevo then and now

As part of the successes of the last Research Excellence Framework, the School of Humanities and Performing Arts developed an initiative to support current Postgraduate Research students in 2019, to fund activities they may wish to undertake as part of their current research. This summer, Jayne Buchanan, University of Plymouth PhD Art History student, received… Continue reading Widening the View – War and witnessing: Sarajevo then and now

Professor Gemma Blackshaw interview on forthcoming BBC film ‘Egon Schiele: Dangerous Desires’

(Image Copyright: BBC. Image Credit: Bethany Hobbs)   Gemma Blackshaw, Professor of Art History, will be talking about her research in the BBC Studios Production film Egon Schiele: Dangerous Desires, which broadcasts on 10th November, 9pm, on BBC Two. Struck down by the Spanish Flu in 1918, aged just 28, in his short life Egon… Continue reading Professor Gemma Blackshaw interview on forthcoming BBC film ‘Egon Schiele: Dangerous Desires’

Mother Figure (On Being Painted by Chantal Joffe)

Blackshaw and Joffe during the sitting for the third painting in the series, 28 February 2018. (Suki Dhanda, 2018)

  The following was written by Gemma Blackshaw, Professor of Art History, for the major exhibition Chantal Joffe: Personal Feeling is the Main Thing at The Lowry, Salford (19 May – 2 September 2018), which displayed new and recent paintings by Joffe alongside paintings by Paula Modersohn-Becker.   Sunday 11 March I woke for the first… Continue reading Mother Figure (On Being Painted by Chantal Joffe)

‘Crazier than I am, or crazier than I look?’ Egon Schiele’s Self-Portraits

Gemma Blackshaw, Professor of Art History, writes: More than any other image, the self-portrait declares the artist as the subject of the work of art, and the work of art as the means by which we might know him (my use of the masculine pronoun is deliberate here), in all his creative, spiritual and sexual… Continue reading ‘Crazier than I am, or crazier than I look?’ Egon Schiele’s Self-Portraits

Masters Student in Art History wins major national prize for her research on the ‘Stupid Sketches’ of French Post-Impressionist, Émile Bernard.

Fiona Saint-Davis, a student on the ResM Art History programme at the University of Plymouth, has won the coveted national ‘Undergraduate Dissertation Prize’ offered by the Association of Art Historians, the body which represents the discipline in the UK. Against the stiffest competition, with submissions from the largest Art History departments in the country, Fiona… Continue reading Masters Student in Art History wins major national prize for her research on the ‘Stupid Sketches’ of French Post-Impressionist, Émile Bernard.

5th December 2017: Speaking Research- approaches to contemporary research in and out of evaluation structures.

10am-1pm | Rolle 116 Professor Irit Rogoff will talk about her experience of REF and the founding of the new European Forum for Advanced Practices.  Irit Rogoff is a writer, educator, curator and organisor.  She is Professor of Visual Culture at Goldsmiths, University of London, a department she founded in 2002.Rogoff works at the meeting… Continue reading 5th December 2017: Speaking Research- approaches to contemporary research in and out of evaluation structures.

Mayflower400- The Wallflower Project

The Wallflower Project has been launched in the lead up to Mayflower400. The Project will engage local communities in the design and production of outdoor public murals across the city centre. Overseen by the University of Plymouth’s public art specialist Dr Jody Patterson in collaboration with a collective of local artists under the guidance of… Continue reading Mayflower400- The Wallflower Project

Arts and Humanities Research Events This November

The following research events are taking place in the Faculty of Arts and Humanities this month. Please contact theartsinstitute@plymouth.ac.uk if you would like further information. 1st November 2017, 4pm – 5.30pm, Babbage, Room 319 Art  History- Gemma Blackshaw: ‘Waiting for a Cure: Oskar Kokoschka’s Portraits from the Sanatorium du Mont-Blanc’ 1st November 2017, 4.30pm – 6pm,… Continue reading Arts and Humanities Research Events This November

Feature: Gauguin’s ghost in Martinique

View across St Pierre toward Mt. Pelee

BY FIONA SAINT At the age of thirty-nine, the artist Paul Gauguin lived for around five months in an abandoned slave hut on the Caribbean island of Martinique. He later wrote:  I had a decisive experience on Martinique. It was only there that I felt like my real self, and one must look for me… Continue reading Feature: Gauguin’s ghost in Martinique

‘Marx on the Wall’: Muralism and Anglo-American Exchange during the 1930s

Viscount (Jack) Hastings, 16th Earl of Huntingdon, Worker of the Future Upsetting the Economic Chaos of the Present, 1935, Fresco. Marx Memorial Library and Workers’ College, London.

Dr Jody Patterson, Associate Professor of Art History, Plymouth University, is a specialist on art and politics during the mid-20th century. Her research explores mural painting and the democratisation of culture through public art. Whilst her work to date has focused on developments in the United States, she has now addressed the relations between America… Continue reading ‘Marx on the Wall’: Muralism and Anglo-American Exchange during the 1930s