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Common ground: finding an American aesthetic in ceramics through the history of wilderness and ceramic art in America
(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Arts & Architecture, 2021) Botelho Alvarez, Alejandro Manuel; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Josh DeWeese
My quest to find a unifying principle that constitutes 'American ceramics' has led me to survey the histories of studio ceramics in America and Wilderness and Nature in America. I've discovered resounding similarities between the two: both were responses to a flagging sense of identity and a hope to (nostalgically) confirm and promote certain values and worldviews (over others). Both our relationships with nature and American studio ceramics are monolithic in their founding ideals and have persisted into the 21st century; both have been fundamental in my upbringing and have codified my own worldview. However, I've become sensitive to the fact these particular values are rooted in privilege, are fundamentally exclusionary, and are ripe for a reexamination. In this paper I propose that we revisit the bearing of the values that wilderness and the aesthetic judgements of ceramics in the early 20th century have on society today. It does not mean that these traditions should be totally abandoned. Instead, I am convinced that a more pluralistic and inclusive approach to both is a more holistic way forward. By appraising the histories of wilderness and ceramics in America I hope to uncover some of the unrecognized people and cultures that have been deliberately redacted from the history. In so doing, I expect to find similarities and trends within the existing canon that are commonly celebrated and introduce the forgotten traditions back into the fold, such that it might lead to a new vision for American ceramics. In conclusion, I hope that this rediscovered American aesthetic might be the framework in which I create my own body of work, with a particular appeal towards process rather than form, as a criterion of excellence. With an understanding that American studio pottery has many different traditions to pull from that are still being 'digested', but that these diverse inspirations is not a weakness, but a strength.
The Montana modernists: redefining Western art
(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2019) Corriel, Michele; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Mary Murphy
Through an investigation of twentieth-century Montana postwar societal aspects, I examine the emergence of an avant-garde art movement in the state. The pioneers of this movement, Jessie Wilber, Frances Senska, Bill Stockton, Isabelle Johnson, Robert DeWeese, and Gennie DeWeese, nurtured, sustained, and promulgated an aesthetic philosophy that redefined Western art in Montana. Divided into three sections, the exploration of this avant-garde movement concentrates on place, teaching/artistic lineage, and community. Part one examines place. For some, place refers to the physical attributes of Montana in the postwar years, the isolation, the beauty, and the complexity of its landscape that not only served as a backdrop but also played center stage in the influences on life and art. For others in the group, place became a metaphor for the body politic, a personal evocation of space held within the boundaries of time. Part two charts each artist's artistic lineage to further understand how they arrived at their particular artistic styles. Community, the third section, seeks to answer one of the larger questions within this work: how did six artists working in Montana in the late 1940s create a thriving art community that opposed the meta-narrative of the West and still resonates in contemporary Montana art. A thorough study of their teaching styles, art techniques, and social gatherings demonstrates the workings of a tight-knit community of like-minded artists (and writers, dancers, musicians, and philosophers) as they addressed the changing zeitgeist of a postwar America, cultivating fresh ideas through a modern lens, allowing Montanans a new option for viewing themselves.
Geographic perspectives on state-directed heritage production in Twentieth-Century Montana
(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2019) Briwa, Robert Merrill; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: William Wyckoff; William Wyckoff was a co-author of the article, 'Making heritage through Montana's official state highway maps, 1914-2000' in the journal 'Geographical review' which is contained within this thesis.
Heritage produces deeply entrenched understandings about places across a range of geographic scales. Heritage is a deliberate framing of identity, actively constructed to promote ties binding history to place. This research interrogates the intersections of heritage, landscape, and state government in twentieth-century Montana. It examines how selected Montana state institutions produced heritage. The Montana Department of Transportation (MDoT), Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks (FWP), and the State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) direct heritage production through numerous practices, including cartography (MDoT), state park management (FWP), and historic preservation (SHPO). This dissertation draws from conceptual frameworks of place identity and heritage and employs qualitative methods--principally archival research and document analysis--to examine how these state institutions produce Montana heritage. Between 1914 and 2000, the MDoT used its highway map program to anchor Montana heritage around five themes: territorial identity, mythic west, natural wealth, outdoor recreation, and hospitality. Montana's state park system, particularly Bannack State Park, demonstrates federal and local influences in evolving state visions of heritage at a Montana ghost town. National narratives centered on Euro-American westering experiences evolved to a more culturally inclusive heritage at Bannack. Montana's historic preservation movement under the direction of the SHPO shows a trend towards a decentralized planning model that increasingly emphasizes preservation outcomes grounded in regional and more inclusive perspectives. In Montana's urban landscapes, however, local contexts and generative forces weaken state-directed preservation. These case studies offer six common characteristics of state-directed heritage production in the American West. 1) States shape heritage production in a variety of ways and these diverse institutional drivers evolve over time. 2) State-directed heritage production reflects an evolving dynamic existing across institutional and geographic scales. 3) Key individuals matter in heritage production and they have the ability to shape long-term narratives of state-produced heritage. 4) Sufficient funding from state and federal sources consolidates states' abilities to produce heritage, while insufficient funding from state and federal sources weakens states' abilities to produce heritage. 5) The evolving content of heritage production reflects changing cultural values and related political mandates. 6) State-directed heritage in Montana relies on dispersed heritage governance.
Ontogenesis
(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Arts & Architecture, 2019) Sprenger, Megan Gwynn; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Jeremy Hatch
When one experiences place, do they comprehend what they are experiencing and think nothing of it, or do they find themselves lost in their own contemplations of place? In my research, I will discuss the importance of place and how it is a mirrored developed experience with that of the city and of self. This is done through the notions of space, place, and time. I have painstakingly constructed a body of work that relates these three important factors of humankind's growth and experience through the use of ceramics, wood, and other mixed media materials. It is my intention to bring to light the systems in which this mirrored development exists. Each section interweaves my own personal experiences. Interweaving research I have done through phenomenology, urban planning and human develop[ment].
Sheep country in three western American localities: place identity, landscape, community, and family
(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2018) Sando, Linnea Christiana; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: William Wyckoff
Sheep ranching in the American West is a vanishing way of life, but one that has for generations shaped many of the region's communities and their cultural landscapes. This research explores how powerful and enduring place identities associated with sheep ranching and the wool industry have transformed communities in Sweet Grass County, Montana, Elko County, Nevada and Umatilla County, Oregon. To assess the evolving roles sheep ranching and the wool industry have played in cultivating place identity, I used interviews and conversations, 'stories,' landscape observation and analysis, an analysis of past and contemporary creative endeavors, and archival works, such as government documents, local histories, newspaper articles, and promotional literature and imagery. I also explored the concept of place identity from varied perspectives, including from a community standpoint and a more in-depth family perspective. The sheep and wool industries did not unfold and impact the places and people in identical ways. Factors including the physical environment, local economies, key players and image makers, cultural backgrounds, and defining institutions of communities all played a role in shaping place identities. This research also shows the myriad ways communities and their residents incorporate the heritage of raising sheep into their daily lives, such as through festivals, community events, the sharing of social memories, and through creative works. The urban and rural landscapes in each case study also reflect the wool and sheep legacies, but this legacy is displayed differently based on distinctive environmental settings and unique settlement histories. By assessing the concept of place identity from varied perspectives and varied sources in three different localities, this dissertation provides a meaningful methodology for examining the ways place identities are created, nurtured, and reflected at multiple scales and in a diversity of communities.
Coping with the landscape: an aesthetic analysis of the intermediate zone
(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Arts & Architecture, 2018) Parker, Ryan Keith; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Jim Zimpel
Numerous studies have been conducted into the aesthetics of landscape, both through objects (sculptures and installations) and through pictorial devices (painting, printmaking, photography, etc.). The fact being that, as long as the horizon line is interrupted these studies by artists will continue in hope of understanding and changing their own reality. Aligning with the history of the photographic land survey, the emphasis of this work is to direct the reading of landscapes towards an aesthetic analysis of the modern mobile landscape. Considering the accumulation of capital as the driving force of the aesthetic change in the landscape, this analysis will focus on the geography of the highest concentration of visible indicators, the intermediate zone. Within this transitional space, as is similarly true with ecological systems, the highest concentration for diversity has the ability to manifest at the edges of converging zones, due to the overlapping of multiple systems in one geographic locality. Accumulation of indicators, both those failing in the system and those entering the system will be present. Recognizing that this survey considers the use and misuse of utilitarian objects and architecture as a method of evaluating time, purpose, and relative availably to the general population, it will present an argument for the intentional denial of the legibility for this landscape, leading to a further lack of understanding within the general population. This result will further lead to the alienation of the population from its landscape.
The gradual instant
(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Arts & Architecture, 2016) Osman, Michelle Jocelyn; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Sara Mast
Using visual imagery of my perceived environment allows me to map the intersection between unease with my surroundings and a deep connection to them at the same time. This work forces me to address questions of how I choose to interpret my environment. Integrating transitory clouds formations with signs of the built environment locates the work in an ephemeral and contemplative non-space.
From opportunity to destitution : the role of the land in Hollywood's depictions of Oklahoma
(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Arts & Architecture, 2015) Thurston, Colleen Elizabeth; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Andrew Nelson
Much as John Ford's Westerns help to establish the myth of the wild and unconquered American West, a place that existed only in Hollywood and in the imaginations of generations of Americans nostalgic for perceived unburdened freedom in the form of manifest destiny, Oklahoma's on-screen landscapes cannot be separated from the stories they help tell. From cowboy and Indian Westerns, to desperate dust bowl narratives, to southern plains and country living, Hollywood tells only the stories of what Oklahoma can and does represent to the rest of the country - rife with stereotypes and realities alike. Cities are not prominent in Oklahoma films, with scenic country landscapes providing the stage for the action. Hollywood films set in Oklahoma are centered around the landscape, and many are unique in that their stories cannot be told in any other geographic location in the country. This is due in part to many of these mainstream films being adaptations of primary sources that explicitly state the setting as Oklahoma, and accounts for the development of the depiction of the landscape as a character in such films.
Montana industrial landscapes : reflections on place
(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Arts & Architecture, 2004) Salix, Nolan G.; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Harold Schlotzhauer
As a painter I am intrigued with large scale industrial sites that have transformed or are transforming the Montana landscape. I am drawn to their monumental scale as well as the visible alteration of earth that occurs at such sites. Montana’s industrial history is easily visible in the presence of both working and abandoned old structures as well as in the physical alterations left by various extraction industries. The superfund site in Butte and the controversial tire-burning plant in Trident are both examples of natural places transformed into industrial landscapes. After observing these sites for hours or days, I begin to look past the negative content traditionally associated with such sites. My impressions instead become more deeply realized as I recognize the formal beauty inherent in the site itself. Many of these sites may be sources of harm or death to various life forms, yet they are also exquisite in color and captivating in design. My use of non-traditional media and technique is inspired by the industrial materials and processes used by the industries at the sites. I use these materials and techniques in order to simulate the history of the site. For example in the Berkley Pit an image of a large copper mine, the site is represented by panels of copper that cover the entire painting surface. I mimic the historical practice of mining by chemically altering the copper with various patinas and violating the integrity of the surface by physically removing part of the copper. In the painting, Phillips\Exxon, motor oil and roofing tar give the artwork the aroma and texture representative of an actual oil refinery. My work demands that the viewer contemplates the Montana industrial landscape in a manner previously inexperienced. The scale of my paintings is large in order to present the materials in a manner that expresses the immensity of the place. Working on such large panels, often six by eight feet in size, demands a large amount of physical effort and skill when working outside in the harsh winter climate of Montana. Often, a natural weather pattern, such as wind, rain and snow, creates an effect on my paintings by physically altering my applications during the paintings development. Working in plein air has pushed my painting style to become more experimental and physically engaging which has resulted in a deeper understanding of the landscape. Both my chosen materials and my naturalistic approach to painting help to represent the physical essence of the Montana industrial landscape. Though these sites may be seen as dirty, and even ugly to some, there is an aesthetic beauty inherent in these landscapes that compels me to look deeper.
Glimpses of my journey
(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Arts & Architecture, 1994) Thorn, Richard Lee
I am an explorer. I work in a personal and private way, which enhances my own journey of exploration and discovery. My site-interactive ceramic sculptures intensify the bond of energy that exists between myself and nature, revitalizing me and reaffirming that which I know to be true or of value. I deliberately create startling or unsettling conditions that are intended to provide a glimpse into unexplored inner realms, challenging myself and viewers to engage in exploration. My work is not a finished product, but a continuing process. The process begins with my exploration of the surrounding mountains, with my search for sites with which I feel an inner connection. This exploration inspires the construction of site-interactive sculptures which I call Spirit Vessels: ceramic sculptures which function as containers for my spirit and as focal points for my thoughts and energy. I choose shapes, colors, textures and a scale which unify the vessels with their sites. I return often to the sites, frequently bringing back rocks to guide me in the treatment of each work’s surface. At times, I texture my work with these rocks by pounding or pressing them into the wet clay.

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