Unseen: The Lives of Looking
- Submitting institution
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University College London
: B - UoA32B The Slade School of Fine Art
- Unit of assessment
- 32 - Art and Design: History, Practice and Theory : B - UoA32B The Slade School of Fine Art
- Output identifier
- 14967
- Type
- T - Other
- DOI
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- Location
- Queen's House, Greenwich, London UK
- Brief description of type
- Exhibition: Unseen, National Maritime Museum Greenwich (2015). Digital or Visual Media: film distributed in Europe and North America (2015).
- Open access status
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- Month
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- Year
- 2015
- URL
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- Supplementary information
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- Request cross-referral to
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- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
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- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
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0
- Research group(s)
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- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- The research investigates the specialist skill and knowledge of professionals engaged in acts of looking when conducting surgery and medical examinations, surveying planets, revealing abuses of human rights and making art, representing their singular approaches as well as commonalities. These insights are delivered by an output consisting of a 90-minute film, distributed in Europe and America and presented at film festivals, and an exhibition also presenting the film alongside curated artefacts and drawings, displayed under the title of Unseen: The Lives of Looking (2015). The title refers to the lives of four individuals with extraordinary relationships to looking: an international eye surgeon, a NASA planetary explorer, a leading human rights lawyer and an artist and filmmaker, Goodwin himself. Through the film’s presentation of Goodwin’s closely observed drawings, live action and intricately woven soundtrack, different forms and reasons for looking are revealed, reflecting too on the different scales and sites of observed material. The film presents a poetic and metaphysically charged journey, exposing a kinship between those who live by the sensory rules of observation and a desire to decode what is seen in pursuit of knowledge. In Goodwin’s five-month museum show at the Queen’s House, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, his film was supplemented by the artist’s drawings featured in the film, and artefacts belonging to the four subjects of the research. This collection of works and objects were, in turn, supplemented by items from the Maritime Museum’s collections, curated by the artist, relating to three historical figures – two astronomers and an artist who made detailed studies of naval battles – who are associated with Greenwich, underscoring the importance of looking as a vehicle for developing knowledge. This theme was the focus of a conference organised to coincide with Goodwin’s exhibition and at which the artist delivered a key-note talk.
- Author contribution statement
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- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
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