Output details
34 - Art and Design: History, Practice and Theory
University of Manchester
Museum Bodies: The Politics and Practices of Visiting and Viewing
This is the first book-length (90,000 words) historical study of how museums have staged, prescribed and accommodated a repertoire of bodily practices. It draws on archival sources held in the John Rylands Library, National Gallery, British Museum, Victoria & Albert Museum and Tate, as well as literary, professional and parliamentary accounts of museum visiting from the eighteenth century onwards. From 2000-2011, fieldwork was conducted at the Guggenheim Museum, Courtauld Gallery, British Museum, Tate Britain and Tate Modern. This primary research is analyzed within an interdisciplinary critical framework informed by social anthropology, aesthetics, phenomenology and performance theory.
