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      • HARVEST
      • Electronic Theses and Dissertations
      • Graduate Theses and Dissertations
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      • HARVEST
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      Samsara unlimited : towards an ecology of compassion

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      Pravin_A2.pdf (14.54Mb)
      Date
      2006-11-18
      Author
      Pillay, Pravintheran
      Type
      Thesis
      Degree Level
      Masters
      Metadata
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      Abstract
      This paper describes the philosophical and functional framework of the MFA thesis exhibition Samsara Unlimited: towards an ecology of compassion. Samsara Unlimited was designed as a conceptual social artwork that would engage a network of art students and interested participants in developing a collaborative network. Using established high art aesthetics and familiar consumer based signifiers; the gallery was transformed over a week into a production, design and retail facility. In this torqued capitalist micro-system, financial profit was considered critical for the functioning of the system but secondary to the generation of a field of compassion. The project sought to create a process through which the general public could become familiar with the perceptive processes engaged by artists in reconstructing everyday reality. It was posited that the ability to engage these perceptive processes would potentially lead to an ontological shift in the spectator. Participants who entered the gallery space could alter between the functional reality of a concept store and the altered reality of an art gallery. The public was encouraged to visit over the week of the installation to ask questions, get involved in art making process or simply socialize with the artists and artisans involved in the project.
      Degree
      Master of Fine Arts (M.F.A)
      Department
      Art and Art History
      Program
      Art and Art History
      Supervisor
      Nowlin, Tim
      Committee
      Mullens, James G.; Crane, Jennifer; Borsa, Joan
      Copyright Date
      November 2006
      URI
      http://hdl.handle.net/10388/etd-09272006-165657
      Subject
      environmental awareness
      social change
      artist activists
      connective aesthetics
      consumerism
      temporary autonomous zones
      cybernetics
      compassion
      ecosystem
      community based arts
      institutional critique
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      • Graduate Theses and Dissertations
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