{"id":{"repo_id":"oxford-brookes","oai_identifier":"tle:d0adb8da-9ead-4298-901c-d7637bb47ced:d6bd9758-527a-46cd-bfe2-c433766e8fca:1"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/oxford-brookes/tle:d0adb8da-9ead-4298-901c-d7637bb47ced:d6bd9758-527a-46cd-bfe2-c433766e8fca:1","repository":{"repo_id":"oxford-brookes","name":"Oxford Brookes University","base_url":"https://radar.brookes.ac.uk/radar/oai"},"display":{"title":"Blazing Century 1: Creative Interventions on the Margins of Two Worlds - Studio-Based Art and Connective Social Practice","abstract":"My research explores and formulates creative interventions on the margins of two worlds: studio-based art and connective social practice. This thesis proceeded as a reflective commentary on this inquiry while engaging five experimental art projects, mainly carried out in Nigeria and South Africa. I have employed the dynamic model of practice-as-research as a conceptual framework that allows the evolving art-research process to draw on a range of theoretical/practical methodologies. While most of my experimental projects are formulated on post-conceptual contemporary art practice, I have remained fixated on the theoretical and practical application of frameworks from social sculpture (Joseph BEUYS and Shelley SACKS), Relational Aesthetics (Nicolas BOURRIAUD), Connective Aesthetics (Suzi GABLIK), and environmentally sustainable and political-ecological (Bruno LATOUR). I have approached my experimental projects with critical praxis, allowing me to overlap existing theoretical frameworks with my artistic practice to produce new outcomes and knowledge. In a working context like Nigeria and South Africa, art practice from the perspective of Fine Art or art-for-art’s sake is geared toward producing “commodified objects”. These forms are charged with visual aesthetic components. They depend highly on the existing socio-economic conditions and lack profound socio-ethical causes. My central question is: is it possible to develop alternative artistic models as forms of creative interventions between a traditional individual studio-based art practice and extended connective social practice? As practice-based research, my work is exploratory and embedded in creative and experimental processes formulated to contribute new forms of knowledge to the field of art. My research’s critical locus evolves from a mediating point of interaction and critique between these two worlds. This allows me to create asymmetric relations between their margins and prompt new “relational encounters” that reproduce a series of “mediated objects.” In this investigation, I consider the concept of “mediated objects” as embodied agencies that hold visual-aesthetic and socio-ethical components. They address the critique outlined in studio-based art and social practice using converging interdisciplinary, cross-cultural, and context-specific methodologies and approaches. My goal in this research is to propose and encourage alternative models of artistic practice – characterised by structurally positioning the five experimental projects through performance action, sound/music, photography/film, and creative vision workshop as firm propositions. These inspired propositions have complex aesthetics and socio-political, cultural, and ecological components. They serve as a more potent alternative art practice in Nigeria, South Africa, and other countries on the African continent, where contemporary socially-engaged art practice is underdeveloped and, in some areas, sparingly practiced in recent years.","abstract_html":"My research explores and formulates creative interventions on the margins of two worlds: studio-based art and connective social practice. This thesis proceeded as a reflective commentary on this inquiry while engaging five experimental art projects, mainly carried out in Nigeria and South Africa. I have employed the dynamic model of practice-as-research as a conceptual framework that allows the evolving art-research process to draw on a range of theoretical/practical methodologies. While most of my experimental projects are formulated on post-conceptual contemporary art practice, I have remained fixated on the theoretical and practical application of frameworks from social sculpture (Joseph BEUYS and Shelley SACKS), Relational Aesthetics (Nicolas BOURRIAUD), Connective Aesthetics (Suzi GABLIK), and environmentally sustainable and political-ecological (Bruno LATOUR). I have approached my experimental projects with critical praxis, allowing me to overlap existing theoretical frameworks with my artistic practice to produce new outcomes and knowledge. In a working context like Nigeria and South Africa, art practice from the perspective of Fine Art or art-for-art’s sake is geared toward producing “commodified objects”. These forms are charged with visual aesthetic components. They depend highly on the existing socio-economic conditions and lack profound socio-ethical causes. My central question is: is it possible to develop alternative artistic models as forms of creative interventions between a traditional individual studio-based art practice and extended connective social practice? As practice-based research, my work is exploratory and embedded in creative and experimental processes formulated to contribute new forms of knowledge to the field of art. My research’s critical locus evolves from a mediating point of interaction and critique between these two worlds. This allows me to create asymmetric relations between their margins and prompt new “relational encounters” that reproduce a series of “mediated objects.” In this investigation, I consider the concept of “mediated objects” as embodied agencies that hold visual-aesthetic and socio-ethical components. They address the critique outlined in studio-based art and social practice using converging interdisciplinary, cross-cultural, and context-specific methodologies and approaches. My goal in this research is to propose and encourage alternative models of artistic practice – characterised by structurally positioning the five experimental projects through performance action, sound/music, photography/film, and creative vision workshop as firm propositions. These inspired propositions have complex aesthetics and socio-political, cultural, and ecological components. They serve as a more potent alternative art practice in Nigeria, South Africa, and other countries on the African continent, where contemporary socially-engaged art practice is underdeveloped and, in some areas, sparingly practiced in recent years.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Ukpong, Wilfred"],"institution":"Oxford Brookes University","degree_name":null,"degree_level":null,"degree_discipline":null,"degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Lee, Ray"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2022,"date_issued":"2022","date_published":"2022","updated_at":"2026-07-24T03:42:51Z","subjects":[],"languages":["en"],"rights":["All rights reserved"],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://doi.org/10.24384/s05c-tm92","outbound_label":"DOI","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Lee, Ray","Ukpong, Wilfred"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Ukpong, Wilfred"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date","label":"Dc Date","values":["2022"]},{"key":"dc:publisher","label":"Institution","values":["Oxford Brookes University"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["thesis"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["en"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["All rights reserved"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["https://doi.org/10.24384/s05c-tm92","https://radar.brookes.ac.uk/radar/file/d0adb8da-9ead-4298-901c-d7637bb47ced/1/Appendix 1 PhD Catalog 2022 by Wilfred Ukpong.pdf","https://radar.brookes.ac.uk/radar/file/d0adb8da-9ead-4298-901c-d7637bb47ced/1/Ukpong2023BlazingCentury.pdf"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["My research explores and formulates creative interventions on the margins of two worlds: studio-based art and connective social practice. This thesis proceeded as a reflective commentary on this inquiry while engaging five experimental art projects, mainly carried out in Nigeria and South Africa. I have employed the dynamic model of practice-as-research as a conceptual framework that allows the evolving art-research process to draw on a range of theoretical/practical methodologies. While most of my experimental projects are formulated on post-conceptual contemporary art practice, I have remained fixated on the theoretical and practical application of frameworks from social sculpture (Joseph BEUYS and Shelley SACKS), Relational Aesthetics (Nicolas BOURRIAUD), Connective Aesthetics (Suzi GABLIK), and environmentally sustainable and political-ecological (Bruno LATOUR). I have approached my experimental projects with critical praxis, allowing me to overlap existing theoretical frameworks with my artistic practice to produce new outcomes and knowledge. In a working context like Nigeria and South Africa, art practice from the perspective of Fine Art or art-for-art’s sake is geared toward producing “commodified objects”. These forms are charged with visual aesthetic components. They depend highly on the existing socio-economic conditions and lack profound socio-ethical causes. My central question is: is it possible to develop alternative artistic models as forms of creative interventions between a traditional individual studio-based art practice and extended connective social practice? As practice-based research, my work is exploratory and embedded in creative and experimental processes formulated to contribute new forms of knowledge to the field of art. My research’s critical locus evolves from a mediating point of interaction and critique between these two worlds. This allows me to create asymmetric relations between their margins and prompt new “relational encounters” that reproduce a series of “mediated objects.” In this investigation, I consider the concept of “mediated objects” as embodied agencies that hold visual-aesthetic and socio-ethical components. They address the critique outlined in studio-based art and social practice using converging interdisciplinary, cross-cultural, and context-specific methodologies and approaches. My goal in this research is to propose and encourage alternative models of artistic practice – characterised by structurally positioning the five experimental projects through performance action, sound/music, photography/film, and creative vision workshop as firm propositions. These inspired propositions have complex aesthetics and socio-political, cultural, and ecological components. They serve as a more potent alternative art practice in Nigeria, South Africa, and other countries on the African continent, where contemporary socially-engaged art practice is underdeveloped and, in some areas, sparingly practiced in recent years."]},{"key":"dc:format","label":"Dc Format","values":["application/pdf"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["Blazing Century 1: Creative Interventions on the Margins of Two Worlds - Studio-Based Art and Connective Social Practice"]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:contributor":["Lee, Ray","Ukpong, Wilfred"],"dc:creator":["Ukpong, Wilfred"],"dc:date":["2022"],"dc:description":["My research explores and formulates creative interventions on the margins of two worlds: studio-based art and connective social practice. This thesis proceeded as a reflective commentary on this inquiry while engaging five experimental art projects, mainly carried out in Nigeria and South Africa. I have employed the dynamic model of practice-as-research as a conceptual framework that allows the evolving art-research process to draw on a range of theoretical/practical methodologies. While most of my experimental projects are formulated on post-conceptual contemporary art practice, I have remained fixated on the theoretical and practical application of frameworks from social sculpture (Joseph BEUYS and Shelley SACKS), Relational Aesthetics (Nicolas BOURRIAUD), Connective Aesthetics (Suzi GABLIK), and environmentally sustainable and political-ecological (Bruno LATOUR). I have approached my experimental projects with critical praxis, allowing me to overlap existing theoretical frameworks with my artistic practice to produce new outcomes and knowledge. In a working context like Nigeria and South Africa, art practice from the perspective of Fine Art or art-for-art’s sake is geared toward producing “commodified objects”. These forms are charged with visual aesthetic components. They depend highly on the existing socio-economic conditions and lack profound socio-ethical causes. My central question is: is it possible to develop alternative artistic models as forms of creative interventions between a traditional individual studio-based art practice and extended connective social practice? As practice-based research, my work is exploratory and embedded in creative and experimental processes formulated to contribute new forms of knowledge to the field of art. My research’s critical locus evolves from a mediating point of interaction and critique between these two worlds. This allows me to create asymmetric relations between their margins and prompt new “relational encounters” that reproduce a series of “mediated objects.” In this investigation, I consider the concept of “mediated objects” as embodied agencies that hold visual-aesthetic and socio-ethical components. They address the critique outlined in studio-based art and social practice using converging interdisciplinary, cross-cultural, and context-specific methodologies and approaches. My goal in this research is to propose and encourage alternative models of artistic practice – characterised by structurally positioning the five experimental projects through performance action, sound/music, photography/film, and creative vision workshop as firm propositions. These inspired propositions have complex aesthetics and socio-political, cultural, and ecological components. They serve as a more potent alternative art practice in Nigeria, South Africa, and other countries on the African continent, where contemporary socially-engaged art practice is underdeveloped and, in some areas, sparingly practiced in recent years."],"dc:format":["application/pdf"],"dc:identifier":["https://doi.org/10.24384/s05c-tm92","https://radar.brookes.ac.uk/radar/file/d0adb8da-9ead-4298-901c-d7637bb47ced/1/Appendix 1 PhD Catalog 2022 by Wilfred Ukpong.pdf","https://radar.brookes.ac.uk/radar/file/d0adb8da-9ead-4298-901c-d7637bb47ced/1/Ukpong2023BlazingCentury.pdf"],"dc:language":["en"],"dc:publisher":["Oxford Brookes University"],"dc:rights":["All rights reserved"],"dc:title":["Blazing Century 1: Creative Interventions on the Margins of Two Worlds - Studio-Based Art and Connective Social Practice"],"dc:type":["thesis"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-24T03:42:51Z"}