RESEARCH
While accounting for the economic and cultural factors that constrain its production, I seek to understand what new forms of connection can come from art. The history of photography is my primary focus, and my method combines phenomenology and feminist/queer theory. In this light, I write about practices that probe the texture of ordinary life, test the boundaries of appropriation, and alter perception. I have written on an international group of artists, such as Yael Bartana, Dan Graham, Akram Zaatari, Bruce Nauman, and Elin Hansdottir, as well as Fluxus—a postwar collective that focused the viewer's attention on everyday occurrences, such as smiling or leaving the room.
Recently, I served as lead curator to the reinstallation of Bruce Nauman's 1970 San Jose Installation, which culminated in my forthcoming Bruce Nauman: Spatial Encounters (with Constance M. Lewallen, University of California Press). I am concurrently completing a manuscript on the diorama—a pre-cinematic light and paint entertainment that emerged in nineteenth-century Paris. I argue that the diorama persists in other guises today, and consequently serves as a sentimental and backward-looking impulse in contemporary art. My interview with installation artist Dan Graham on this topic is forthcoming in a special-issue of Culture et Musées devoted to the diorama.
HISTORY
Before entering the academy I was a professional photographer. In this capacity, I was fortunate to work with a number of notable artists—such as Richard Barnes, who sparked my interest in archives and evidence. Simultaneously, I earned a MA in Inter-Arts from San Francisco State University—studying with performance artist Christine Tamblyn, theorist Kaja Silverman (at UC Berkeley), and filmmaker Trinh T. Minh-ha—and then a PhD in Visual and Cultural Studies from the University of Rochester. My dissertation was advised by Professors Michael Ann Holly and Douglas Crimp. Since then, grants and fellowships from the Camargo, the Clark Art Institute, the Centre Allemand d’histoire de l’art, the National Humanities Center, and San José State University have helped me to continue my research.
TEACHING
I am Associate Professor and coordinator of the Art History and Visual Culture at San José State University. I also teach graduate seminars in the MFA program. My seminar topics include the archive, contemporary craft, photography and perception, the spectacle, and art historical methods. My undergraduate courses include the history and theory of new media, introduction to visual culture, the art of the 1960s and 70s, and issues of materiality in contemporary art (called "The Thing").
I can be contacted at dore.bowen@sjsu.edu.
While accounting for the economic and cultural factors that constrain its production, I seek to understand what new forms of connection can come from art. The history of photography is my primary focus, and my method combines phenomenology and feminist/queer theory. In this light, I write about practices that probe the texture of ordinary life, test the boundaries of appropriation, and alter perception. I have written on an international group of artists, such as Yael Bartana, Dan Graham, Akram Zaatari, Bruce Nauman, and Elin Hansdottir, as well as Fluxus—a postwar collective that focused the viewer's attention on everyday occurrences, such as smiling or leaving the room.
Recently, I served as lead curator to the reinstallation of Bruce Nauman's 1970 San Jose Installation, which culminated in my forthcoming Bruce Nauman: Spatial Encounters (with Constance M. Lewallen, University of California Press). I am concurrently completing a manuscript on the diorama—a pre-cinematic light and paint entertainment that emerged in nineteenth-century Paris. I argue that the diorama persists in other guises today, and consequently serves as a sentimental and backward-looking impulse in contemporary art. My interview with installation artist Dan Graham on this topic is forthcoming in a special-issue of Culture et Musées devoted to the diorama.
HISTORY
Before entering the academy I was a professional photographer. In this capacity, I was fortunate to work with a number of notable artists—such as Richard Barnes, who sparked my interest in archives and evidence. Simultaneously, I earned a MA in Inter-Arts from San Francisco State University—studying with performance artist Christine Tamblyn, theorist Kaja Silverman (at UC Berkeley), and filmmaker Trinh T. Minh-ha—and then a PhD in Visual and Cultural Studies from the University of Rochester. My dissertation was advised by Professors Michael Ann Holly and Douglas Crimp. Since then, grants and fellowships from the Camargo, the Clark Art Institute, the Centre Allemand d’histoire de l’art, the National Humanities Center, and San José State University have helped me to continue my research.
TEACHING
I am Associate Professor and coordinator of the Art History and Visual Culture at San José State University. I also teach graduate seminars in the MFA program. My seminar topics include the archive, contemporary craft, photography and perception, the spectacle, and art historical methods. My undergraduate courses include the history and theory of new media, introduction to visual culture, the art of the 1960s and 70s, and issues of materiality in contemporary art (called "The Thing").
I can be contacted at dore.bowen@sjsu.edu.