Michael Fried’s theatricality and the practice of painting

ABSTRACT

This article is the posthumous publication of a lecture given by the artist and academic Beth Harland (1964–2019). It was originally presented at a conference on Theatricality, at Lancaster University in 2017. This paper begins by working through the arguments of Michael Fried, to situate the key terms of theatricality and absorption, before then turning to contemporary painting practice (with notable reference to the work of Tomma Abts) to advance her reading of ‘an absorptive mode of address within contemporary painting’. This article also situates Harland's own art practice.

KEYWORDS:

• Absorption
• contemporary painting
• Michael Fried
• theatricality
• Tomma Abts

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Beth Harland

Beth Harland (1964–2019) studied at the Ruskin School of Art and the RCA before completing her PhD at the University of Southampton. She was an associate lecturer at Central St Martins, a senior lecturer at Winchester School of Art and latterly a professor of Fine Art at Lancaster University, as well as an associate editor of the Journal of Contemporary Painting. Her research interests included: pictorial modes of address and spectator experience; painting and digital imaging and notions of temporality in art. Exhibitions of her work included Impermanent Durations; On Painting and Time, at the Institute for Contemporary Art, Singapore, the Bundoora Homestead Arts Centre, Melbourne and the Peter Scott Gallery, Lancaster.

Sunil Manghani is a professor of Theory, Practice and Critique at Winchester School of Art, University of Southampton (UK). He is a co-editor of Journal of Visual Art Practice, a managing editor of Theory, Culture & Society, and a fellow of the Alan Turing Institute. His books include Image Studies (2013), Zero Degree Seeing (2019); India’s Biennale Effect (2016) and Farewell to Visual Studies (2015). He curated Barthes/Burgin at the John Hansard Gallery (2016), along with Building an Art Biennale (2018) and Itinerant Objects (2019) at Tate Exchange, Tate Modern.