Supervised by Jeremy Millar, Senior Tutor in Critical Practice at the Royal College of Art, and Dr Andrew Wilson
October 2016 鈥
Front cover of Film Art magazine, no.9, 1936
This thesis catalogues and analyses instances when film form, theory, technology, architecture, discourse and ephemera influenced artists working in the first half of the twentieth century in Britain, focusing on activity in London. It makes detailed case-studies of particular works executed in the traditional media of painting, sculpture and print that result from this interest, alongside examples of artists鈥 work in film. In parallel, it traces the evolution of an idea of film as art in texts written by artists, critics and theorists during the period in question.
The thesis analyses films, artworks and monographic and institutional archive papers held at Tate, the British Film Institute and the Harry Ransom Center, as well as in smaller public and private collections. It attempts to resist the linearity of art history in order to make visible artists鈥 concern with film, and the resultant focus is on artworks, films, publications and exhibitions as 鈥榗ontainers鈥 for cyclically shifting conceptions of film as/and art that could inform the present rubric of 鈥榓rtists鈥 moving image鈥.
How did you come to be researching this subject?
My present doctoral project is important to me because it connects the somewhat sprawling research and curatorial interests I have pursued over the previous ten years professionally. Although interdisciplinary in nature, the backbone of my topic is the development of modern art in the UK, so Tate is the instinctive home for this research.
About Inga Fraser
Inga Fraser is a curator and writer with over ten years鈥 experience working in museums and galleries in London including curatorial posts at Tate and the National Portrait Gallery. Her research focuses on the impact of the emerging disciplines of film and photography on art in the twentieth century, and the convergences between art, fashion and design in the modern period. Her present doctoral project explores artists鈥 engagement with film in Britain in the twentieth century.
Selected publications include:
鈥楨ncounters: Derek Boshier and Film鈥 in Helen Little (ed.), Derek Boshier, 2023; 鈥楢lia Syed鈥檚 Wallpaper: 鈥渢he agreement of deviations鈥濃 in Maria Palacios Cruz (ed.), Alia Syed, 2023); 鈥楤arry, Iris (1895鈥1969)鈥, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 2022; 鈥楥olour and Kinesis鈥, Tate Etc., no. 48, Spring 2020; 鈥楩rom a sheet of paper to the sky鈥, British Art Studies, no.7, Autumn 2017; 鈥榁isual Culture鈥, The Year鈥榮 Work in Critical and Cultural Theory, vol.25, no.1, 2017; 鈥楰inomuseum? Film and Video at the Tate Gallery: the Rushes of a Relationship鈥, LUX Online, November 2017; 鈥楩rom a Sheet of Paper to the Sky: Pattern in the Work of Paul Nash鈥, in Paul Nash, ed. Emma Chambers, Tate, 2016; 鈥樷淣ew Relations, Unsuspected Harmonies鈥: Modern British Art in Finland, 1906鈥1964鈥, FNG Research, no.4, 2016; 鈥榁isual Culture鈥, The Year鈥檚 Work in Critical and Cultural Theory, vol.24, 2016, pp.246鈥68; 鈥楳edia and Movement: Barbara Hepworth Beyond the Lens鈥, in Barbara Hepworth: Sculpture for a Modern World, eds. Penelope Curtis and Chris Stephens, Tate, 2015; 鈥楾he 鈥淓nglish Independents鈥: Some Twentieth-Century Women Carvers鈥, Sculpture Journal, vol.23, no.3, 2014; 鈥楤orn Fully Clothed: the Significance of Costume for the Silent Cinema Vamp鈥, in Birds of Paradise: Costume as Cinematic Spectacle, ed. Marketa Uhlirova, 2014; 鈥楾ree, Iris (1897鈥1968)鈥, The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 2014; 鈥楤ody, Room, Photograph: Negotiating Identity in the Self-Portraits of Lady Ottoline Morrell鈥, in Biography, Identity and the Modern Interior, eds. Penny Sparke and Anne Massey, 2013.