The National CollegeVisual Culture Staff
Francis Halsall, MA; PhD (Glasgow)
Lecturer, History/Theory of Modern & Contemporary Art
halsallf[AT]ncad.ie
Areas of research and supervision expertise
Theories and histories of modern and contemporary art
Philosophical aesthetics
Theories of Modernism
Historiography
Sociological theories of art (with a particular focus on Niklas Luhmann and systems-theory).
Education
MA and PhD in Art History (systems aesthetics) from Glasgow University and currently working towards a PhD in Philosophy (Niklas Luhmann and aesthetics) at University College Dublin.
Professional activities
Coordinator of Art in the Contemporary World www.acw.ie.
Member the editorial board of the Journal of Visual Art Practice
Member of the inaugural committee for the gallery at NCAD (2009-12).
Recent representative publications
Books
1. Systems of Art, (2008) (foreword, Prof. Kitty Zijlmans)
2. Rediscovering Aesthetics, (with Julia Jansen & Tony O'Connor, (Stanford University Press, 2009) ):
3. Aesthetic Practices and Critical Communities: Art, Politics, Friendship (with Julia Jansen and Sinead Murphy (Springer, 2012)
Articles
1. "Chaos, Fractals and the Pedagogical Challenge of Jackson Pollock's 'All-Over' Paintings,'" The Journal of Aesthetic Education (2009)
2. "Strategic Amnesia (on art history in Ireland in the 21st century)", The Irish Review, (Winter, 2008)
3. "Niklas Luhmann," in Costello & Vickery, (eds.) Art: Key Contemporary Thinkers, (Berg Publishing, Jan. 2007)
Other
1. What is Modern and Contemporary Art? (booklet and talk with Declan
Long), (Irish Museum of Modern Art, 2009, 2010 and High Lanes Gallery,
Drogheda, Jan. 2011)
2. "Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is", essay accompanying 4+4+1, a CD
release (Anthony Kelly, David Stalling, Mick O'Shea, Danny McCarthy), (Farpoint Recordings, 2010)
3. "5 Points on Pentagonism" a catalogue essay for Gerard Caris, (forthcoming.)
4. 'Postmodernism', contribution to The Encyclopedia of Irish Art and Artists, eds. Marshall, Murray (forthcoming)
Current PhD students' topics
1. Play, event and system in contemporary art
2. Ethics and aesthetics (focus on Levinas, Ettinger)
3. Conceptual art and aesthetics (focus on Bochner)
4. Alter-modernism
5. Remix cultures
6. Modern and contemporary regional arts spaces in Ireland; an historical and institutional account
7. Painting and the uncanny (joint supervisor, practice PhD)
8. Photography, migration and identity (joint supervisor, practice PhD)
9. The experience and definition of public spaces of exclusion (joint supervisor, practice PhD)
