Disappearing threads : art between text and textile in Argentina, Brazil, and Chile after 1955
department or school: Arts, Faculty of
department or school: Art History, Visual Art and Theory, Department of
data provider: DSpace
degree campus: UBCV
creator: Witkowski, Jacqueline
issued: 2025-05-31T07:00:00Z
issued: 2021
related degree: Doctor of Philosophy - PhD
degree grantor: University of British Columbia
description: This dissertation examines how textile forms and metaphors came to be used by artists in the Southern Cone of South America after 1955, in a moment that was marked by authoritarian governments. Within the countries of Brazil, Argentina, and Chile, textile materials, techniques, and concepts initially appeared under a modernist, primarily formalist paradigm. But as each country faced increasingly repressive regimes, artists harnessed such forms and traditions to address local historical and sociopolitical concerns. I examine how references to unspun wool and fiber, and threads more broadly, were not only explored through their material qualities but also acted as a process to engage the political context. Artists further utilized and adapted textile concepts through accompanying mediums such as poetry and forms of writing. The evocation of textiles accompanied an effort to relocate national narratives concerned with marginalized communities, such as Afro-Brazilians and Indigenous groups, who, during dictatorships, were further stripped of social programs and human rights. Through case studies of artists Lygia Pape in Brazil, Cecilia Vicuña in Chile, and Mirtha Dermisache in Argentina, this dissertation examines the specific ways in which each brought together a combination of textiles forms, materials, metaphors, and writing to address experiences of their volatile historical contexts. Therefore, my argument moves outside considering textiles as political solely based on their handmade quality or “low” status as craft, which permitted them to go undetected; rather, I am analyzing how their utilization in South America at a moment steeped in interconnected political and aesthetic challenges perhaps necessitated the textile as an operational force. I argue that the medium and concepts afforded by the textile – or what has recently come to be called “textility” – were able to provide alternative methods to understanding tumultuous historical situations and support avenu…
aggregated CHO: https://circle.library.ubc.ca/rest/handle/2429/78339
note: Disappearing Threads: Art between Text and Textile in Argentina, Brazil, and Chile after 1955 by JACQUELINE WITKOWSKI B.A., DePaul University, 2010 M.A., The University of British Columbia, 2014 A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE AND POSTDOCTORAL STUDIES (Art History and Theory) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Vancouver) May 2021 © Jacqueline Witkowski, 2021 ii The following individuals certify that they have read, and recommend to the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies for acceptance, the dissertation entitled: Disappearing Threads: Art between Text and Textile in Argentina, Brazil, and Chile after 1955 submitted by Jacqueline Witkowski in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Art History and Theory Examining Committee: Dr. T’ai Smith, Professor, Art History, Visual Art & Theory, UBC Supervisor Dr. Ignacio Adriasola, Professor, Art History, Visual Art & Theory, UBC Supervisory Committee Member Dr. Alessandra Santos, Professor, French, Hispanic and Italian Studies, UBC Supervisory Committee Member Dr. Charlotte Townsend-Gault, Professor Emeritus, Art History, Visual Art & Theory, UBC University Examiner Dr. Pilar Riaño-Alcalá, Institute for Gender, Race, and Social Justice, UBC University Examiner iii Abstract This dissertation examines how textile forms and metaphors came to be used by artists in the Southern Cone of South America after 1955, in a moment that was marked by authoritarian governments. Within the countries of Brazil, Argentina, and Chile, textile materials, techniques, and concepts initially appeared under a modernist, primarily formalist paradigm. But as each country faced increasingly repressive regimes, artists harnessed such forms and traditions to address local historical and sociopolitical concerns. I examine how references to unspun wool and fiber, and threads more broadly, were not only ex…
has type: Thesis/Dissertation
date issued: 2021-11
is shown at: 10.14288/1.0397467
language: eng
degree discipline: Art History
provider: Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library
publisher: University of British Columbia
rights: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
rights URI: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
scholar level: Graduate
contributor: Smith, T’ai Lin, 1975-
type: Text
identifier URI: http://hdl.handle.net/2429/78339