That Head That Head - Multiple Exhibitions and Flag nominations drawing prizes
- Submitting institution
-
York St John University
- Unit of assessment
- 32 - Art and Design: History, Practice and Theory
- Output identifier
- 487
- Type
- M - Exhibition
- Venue(s)
- Muir House, Edinburgh
- Open access status
- Out of scope for open access requirements
- Month of first exhibition
- May
- Year of first exhibition
- 2014
- URL
-
http://ray.yorksj.ac.uk/id/eprint/4837/
- Supplementary information
-
-
- Request cross-referral to
- -
- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
-
0
- Research group(s)
-
-
- Proposed double-weighted
- Yes
- Double-weighted statement
- That Head That Head is an extended, multicomponent practice-based output. Rigorously developed over four years (2016-2020) its methodology has been driven by the making of 900 drawings, a careful reappraisal of the significance of mentorship, and consideration of the impact of the conventions of exhibition display for the medium. Through this multifaceted research process this body of work materially interrogates the complex interplay of classed and gendered subjectivity. Funded by the Arts Council England, it has been disseminated through twenty-four exhibitions, including two solo shows and the touring shows of the Derwent, Jerwood and Trinity Buoy Drawing Prizes.
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- That Head That Head is a multicomponent practice-based output that represents a body of work comprised of 900 drawings, developed over a period of four years and disseminated through twenty-four exhibitions. Supported by funding from Arts Council England, it sought to rigorously interrogate drawing’s capacity to act as non-verbal form of communication; investigating the immediacy of the drawn mark through consciously imposed restrictions on the artist’s materials and motifs. It has created a vocabulary of form that operates at the forefront of the field of contemporary drawing that articulates dimensions of classed and gendered subjectivity hitherto silenced by hierarchies of culture and society.
The discourse on contemporary drawing situates the medium as a powerful tool that can challenge ideologically driven conventions of art and culture, enabling artists to navigate and transform difference into new forms of representation (Dexter, 2005; Downs et al., 2011; Meskimmon & Sawdon; 2016). This submission’s material exploration of social class and sexual difference builds on and develops existing analyses of gender and drawing (Meskimmon & Sawdon; 2016). Its playful enquiry repurposes historically weighted signifiers of class, such as ignorance and the masses and the division of professional and family life to articulate experiences of cultural displacement, countering that isolation by exploring the social dimension of art making through drawing and curatorial decision-making.
This body of work has been disseminated nationally / internationally; in two solo exhibitions, Platform A, Middlesbrough (2017), Rabley Drawing Centre, Wiltshire (2016); and toured in numerous group exhibitions including four prestigious national drawing prizes Derwent (2014); Jerwood (2017-18; 2014-15, Award-winner 2017-18) and Trinity Buoy (2019-20). It was also a catalyst to the ACE project ‘Mentoring for Professional Development’ supported by Prof Anita Taylor (Dundee) and a peer review article published in Drawing: Research, Theory, Practice (2017).
- Author contribution statement
- -
- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
- -
