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Victor Burgin's "Gradiva": Feminism, Antiquity, and Conceptualism

Ackerman, Amanda K

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2016, MA, University of Cincinnati, Design, Architecture, Art and Planning: Art History.
Victor Burgin (b. 1941) is a British artist and theorist, and is one of the pioneers of conceptual art. His works emphasize social and other ideas or concepts, as well as formal and iconographical conditions. Two strategies are prevalent in Burgin’s work; namely: the inclusion of appropriated imagery and the presentation of text within or accompanying such images. In this thesis study I examine Burgin’s Gradiva (1982). This work, a group of seven photo-textual panels that is derived from Sigmund Freud’s (1856-1939) essay “Delusion and Dreams in Jensen’s Gradiva.” Freud’s essay is a commentary on the novella, Gradiva: A Pompeiian Fancy, which was written in 1903 by German author Wilhelm Jensen (1837-1911). The novel, the essay, and resulting work by Burgin all refer to a fragment of a relief sculpture that was most likely a Roman copy of a Greek original. The layered textual work by Burgin emphasizes gaps in reading, the temporality of cinema and photographic works, and modes of viewing in antiquity and the 19th and 20th centuries. In the introductory chapter, I discuss Burgin and the devices and methods of conceptualism which pertain directly to his work. In chapter one I closely examine Burgin’s Gradiva and its use of appropriated imagery, and the layers of references within the work. In chapter two, I examine the roles and representations of women in antiquity and how those differ from the roles of women at the emergence of feminism. I aim to interpret this work from a different perspective than existing scholarship.
Kimberly Paice, Ph.D. (Committee Chair)
Morgan Thomas, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
Maia Toteva, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
66 p.

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Ackerman, A. K. (2016). Victor Burgin's "Gradiva": Feminism, Antiquity, and Conceptualism [Master's thesis, University of Cincinnati]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1470672257

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Ackerman, Amanda. Victor Burgin's "Gradiva": Feminism, Antiquity, and Conceptualism. 2016. University of Cincinnati, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1470672257.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Ackerman, Amanda. "Victor Burgin's "Gradiva": Feminism, Antiquity, and Conceptualism." Master's thesis, University of Cincinnati, 2016. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1470672257

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)