Reconsidering the object of photography: German artists, curators and critics in light of "Documenta 5".
Item
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Title
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Reconsidering the object of photography: German artists, curators and critics in light of "Documenta 5".
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Identifier
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AAI3159231
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identifier
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3159231
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Creator
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Manchanda, Catharina.
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Contributor
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Adviser: Romy Golan
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Date
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2005
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Art History
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Abstract
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In the 1960s and early 1970s, the reception of Pop art and Nouveau Realisme, proved vital for a number of German artists who began to probe questions of representation through a deadpan use of photography. Artists such as Sigmar Polke, Gerhard Richter, Hans-Peter Feldmann, and Reiner Ruthenbeck staged material objects and drew attention to the rhetorical inflection of photographic images, while others like Peter Roehr and Bernd and Hilla Becher emphasized formal relationships between single image and serial grid. It was in reaction to Pop that curators and critics also began to reconsider the role of contemporary art. Leftist critiques of commodity culture gradually led to negative interpretations of Pop art in the late 1960s and set the tone for the reception of new art forms such as Minimalism and Conceptual art. Such critical views of commodity culture and the depiction of material objects formed the theoretical starting point for the organizers of the 1972 Documenta who dedicated the exhibition to an investigation of representational questions. Photography emerged as an important new artistic force at this exhibition. Yet despite the ubiquity of photographic projects at "Documenta 5," a candid assessment of the medium and its new artistic uses proved difficult at the time. The current study analyses key photographic works by Polke, Richter, Ruthenbeck, Feldmann, Roehr, and the Bechers in the context of the Documenta organizers' writings on photography and provides new insights into some of the leading artistic and theoretical questions that defined this period.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy Restricted.xlsx
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degree
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Ph.D.