Appropriation art has largely been theorised through semiotic and postmodern frameworks that privilege sign-based readings and institutional critique. This article proposes mutualist appropriation art as a practice-driven framework that reframes appropriation as a reciprocal process between artist and source. Mutualism is defined here as a materially and embodied mode of working, in which the physical conditions of the appropriated object actively shape artistic decisions, so that meaning emerges through co-production rather than being imposed upon an inert sign. Building on and extending insights from theorists including Isabelle Graw and Jan Verwoert, and artists such as R. H. Quaytman, Rebecca Fortnum and Melissa Gordon, the article differentiates mutualist appropriation art from the Pictures Generation theorisation by specifying how reciprocity is enacted through studio procedures. Andrew Bracey's practice-based research is drawn upon to demonstrate how tacit knowledge, durational looking and speculative thinking operate as methodological conditions through which artists generate interpretive knowledge. The article argues that attending to material reciprocity has significant implications for art historiography, practice-based research and debates on authorship and originality. Without such a reframing, appropriation discourse risks overlooking how artists actively generate knowledge through making.
This paper explores transhistorical curation as a methodological and conceptual framework through a case study of The Omnipotence of Dream, exhibited at the Salford Museum and Gallery (2024-2025). Focusing on British Surrealism, the exhibition paired six historic works from the museum's collection with newly commissioned contemporary responses engaging directly with the originals. Drawing on curatorial theory, feminist critique, and posthumanist discourse, the research examines how this strategy challenges historical hierarchies and reanimates heritage collections within contemporary cultural debates. Using a practice-based approach combining curatorial planning, artistic production, and academic analysis, the study evaluates the project's outcomes. A case study of Eileen Agar's Room with a View of the Moon (1981) and four contemporary reinterpretations demonstrates the potential of transhistorical curation to foster intergenerational dialogue. The paper concludes that commissioning contemporary responses to historic works creates reciprocal relationships that deepen interpretive engagement, foreground overlooked narratives, and activate museums as sites of cultural critique. It argues that transhistorical curation is a vital tool for reframing art history, expanding museum relevance, and engaging audiences with intersections of gender, feminist and new animist ecology, identity, and materiality.
This paper theorises vernacular aesthetics as a situated and alternate epistemology that signifies political performances embedded in the textures of ordinary life, transcending institutional categories of art and politics. Using an interdisciplinary lens of political philosophy, performance studies, and art theory, the paper examines prominent cases like the Shaheen Bagh (2019-2020) and the Farmers' Protests (2020-2021, 2024-2025) to demonstrate how mundane acts such as serving tea, maintaining langaars (community kitchens), or repurposing protest spaces into self-sustaining villages become potent political strategies through sustained repetition and care. Engaging with the shift from aesthetic autonomy and disinterested contemplation to participatory and performative paradigms of art, the paper argues for a reorientation of political aesthetics through the lens of the everyday.
This study examines the influence of Chinese calligraphy traditions on selected practices within contemporary Western calligraphy through a focused analysis of the works of Niels 'Shoe' Meulman. After outlining the key characteristics of Chinese calligraphy in relation to its writing system, aesthetic principles, and embodied modes of practice, this study places these features in dialogue with the dominant historical orientations of Western writing traditions. Drawing on documentary research and secondary sources, this study adopts a case-based approach to explore how certain aspects of Chinese calligraphic thinking - particularly those concerning gesture, process, rhythm and performativity - resonate within Meulman's practice. Through a close examination of his calligraphic and performative works, this paper suggests that contemporary Western calligraphy can move beyond a purely functional or product-oriented framework toward an understanding of writing as an embodied and expressive action in which words operate as visual images. Beyond semantic transmission, these practices foreground vivid expressions, individuality, and material engagement with tools and surfaces. By grounding its analysis in a specific artistic practice, this paper contributes a nuanced perspective on how Chinese calligraphic concepts are selectively engaged within contemporary Western calligraphy, while acknowledging the historical and semiotic complexity of Western writing systems.
This article does not attempt to set down guidelines to visual essay writing - this would be impossible due to the complexities of the form. Instead, it provides observations on some of the ways that the visual essay can support different ways thinking with text and image - altering perspectives, creating arguments and building narratives through the sequencing of images and the spatial relationships between image and text - as well as considering the role of image captions. At the same time, and not unconnected, it acknowledges the difficulties inherent in working with non-standard layouts within the parameters of academic publishing. By providing an exchange of ideas (both abstract and practical) that may seem marginal or even contradictory, it is hoped that looking at different aspects of the unique form will help to identify some of the paths that a visual essay might take and that writers might be encouraged to develop their essays in ambitious and experimental ways, considering the diversity of image behaviours and how they interact with text forms. In the longer term, the visual essay form itself and the dialogue around it might be advanced.
