The Royal Conservatoire and the Royal Academy give permission to no fewer than 10 artists to start a PhD. Never before so many doctoral projects got approved at the Schools of Arts.
Seven new doctoral students are allowed to start their doctorate at the Conservatoire, with three of them receiving a doctoral scholarship. Musician and visual artist Geoffa Fells starts the research entitled 'Sounding Equality Investigating how contemporary composition can contribute as an artistic activism for the rights of women and girls'. Luc Nijs is a philosopher, musicologist and musician and with 'KIMUPE1 - KineMusical Performance - An artistic journey into creative multimodal improvisation' he investigates whether movement can become a basis for developing creative improvisation skills and an own musical language. Finally, in 'The Hearing Glass: Synaesthetic Correspondences in The Musical Practice', composer Umut Eldem interweaves neuroscience with creative and educational perspectives on synesthesia.
Four artists can start without a scholarship: Writer and theater maker Vincent Van Meenen with '100 years of surrealism - In dialogue with surrealistic creative methods', musicians Maria and Styliani Markatatou and their project on the 'The tradition of mandolin music' and clarinettist, composer and psychologist Jo Stijnen with 'Authentic creativity as a catalyst for developing a powerful artistic learning environment'.
Three PhD students will start at the Academy in September. With 'Empty Pages', graphic designer Bas Rogiers presents the conventional art book, which is functional, represents and discloses art, as opposed to the so-called artists' book, which questions its function as a book, presents art and is autonomous as an art object. Anton Cotteleer is a sculptor and with 'An unsharp scan' he wonders how sharpness-blurriness relates to the memory that is shaped by visual media such as family albums. Socially committed artist Els Dietvorst investigates whether artists can play a more active role in society, becoming a 'Partisan of the real' who critically disrupts individualism.
The doctorates in the Arts are organised in collaboration with ARIA, the Antwerp Research Institute for the Arts.
Image: Anton Cotteleer, The pale green contact, 2017.
