I will be giving a talk at the University of Leeds in December. More information will be available here at some point. My talk is based on my PhD thesis, and is titled ‘”avant garde” and “Avant Garde”: A Practice-Led Investigation’. Below is an abstract for the talk:

‘avant garde’ and ‘Avant Garde’: one term denotes artistic progression, the other describes a fixed concept. Both fuel artistic practice. The terms are easily and often confused and this goes someway to blurring the boundaries between being progressive and adhering to a style. This talk examines and compares these two definitions by way of an introspective examination of the compositional process. Investigations involve a series of forced attempts at being avant garde (progressive); however, as will become clear throughout this talk, forced attempts at being progressive are destined to fail due to the inescapable phenomenon of Meno’s paradox that, instead, explains the existence of the Avant Garde as a fixed concept. Theoretical research suggests that this is symptomatic of the way current society is organised. This talk explores ways in which compositional practice can work with the societal status quo in order to be avant garde in the progressive sense.

The above image comprises the cover of the 1983 edition of Guy Debord’s Society of the Spectacle by J.R. Eyerman, superimposed onto a photo of Kasimir Malevich’s Black Square taken by Micha Theiner (edited by Michael D. Atkinson and Alannah Marie Halay).

Image credit: Kasimir Malevich, J.R. Eyerman, Micha Theiner, Michael D. Atkinson, Alannah Marie Halay