John James Marshall thesis.pdf - OpenAIR @ RGU - Robert Gordon ...

etween them. Professor Krauss responded the researcher had engaged flawed
logic in using this method:
"The key to the expanded field is to locate the binary that defines the
object you want to expand... You need to clarify for the logic of the Klein
group to make sense. You might refer to Jameson's Political
Unconscious 128 where it is important and explained in his Introduction."
(From an email received 16/12/2006)
The Klein group is founded on a binary opposition. However, it is precisely this
sort of dichotomous thinking that this study seeks to eclipse. In proposing a
hybrid art and design practice the researcher is making an argument for a postdisciplinary
or pluralist approach to object making. Krauss’s issue was that
‘product design’ is not a part of a binary that is at the heart of architecture. She
is right. However, the researcher reframed the study by taking the approach the
study does not concern the whole of 'Architecture' just ‘building design’. The
Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) defines art and design thus:
“Art and design may include: painting; public art; sculpture;
performance; installation; time-based art; printmaking; photography;
screen productions; virtual reality; multimedia; digital and interactive art
and design… The Council will also support research in architecture that
concerns building design (but not structural or civil or other aspects of
engineering).” (Arts and Humanities Research Council, 2003)
By viewing the activity of design as an integrative process common across
traditional domains this flaw in the original negative proposition was avoided.
The researcher was able to logically extend the definition of digital sculpture,
creating an expanded field for 3D computer-based art and design practice. The
next step was to map the three new positions and establish if there were existing
examples to relate the critical discourse across subject domains to relate these
to. From the critical, contextual review undertaken there seemed to be several
categories of practice that would satisfy these conditions (Figure 72).
128 Jameson, F. 1981. The Political Unconscious: Narrative as a Socially Symbolic Act. Ithaca, New York: Cornell
University Press.
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