Creative Communication

Abstract: Recently I completed a performative (creative) PhD in the School of Creative Communication (now the Faculty of Design and Creative Practice) at the University of Canberra, Australia, where such doctorates were established only in 2002. Since I completed in 2006, I have been contemplating some process issues that emerged during my three and a half year’s studies. While conferring with fellow students and colleagues at three universities in England, I found that the many of the problems they encountered were similar and so were not due uniquely to the innovative phase that I encountered, but were part of a wider scenario.
At my university, the requirements for a creative doctorate are a creative component (equivalent to about 60,000 words) and a theoretical component (exegesis) of about 30,000 words. The physical outcome of my thesis is two artist’s books: one, Tissue, is autobiographical, while questioning the nature of autobiography, memory and identity. The other, Re-Picturing My Life, is the theoretical component, examining several paradigms including issues of methodology; the value of art as research; theories of memory, identity, autobiography, and human interactions with objects (http://erl.canberra.edu.au/public/adt- AUC20070510.151236/index.html). I have placed some of my text/images in this paper to provide a taste of the work in my thesis.
My paper reflects on performative work in the context of academic research, and the resilience, determination and sense of humour needed to complete a doctorate successfully in this valuable area of endeavour.

A palinode is a place on a curve where it crosses itself, where a poem retracts something previously written. The autobiographical process is a palinode where memories are revisited, articulated into physical forms and altered during the process. Autobiographical work alters memories and, with them, self-perceived identity. Nevertheless, the process creates a meaningful space in which lives can be re-framed, making personal history intelligible in the present.
I made an artist’s book, Tissue, for my revisionist autobiography using bricolage and action research as my methodologies, making do with the finite and heterogenous material at hand in my memories. An a/r/tographical approach using text, images and text/images allowed me not only to condense and crystallise both my story and my memories, but to add a visual dimension beyond language forming a matrix that is a space of realisation, an experience of the in-between.

Erst vor Kurzem habe ich meine performative ("kreative") Doktorarbeit an der School of Creative Communication (mittlerweile Faculty of Design and Creative Practice) der University of Canberra (Australien) abgeschlossen, an der solche Arbeiten erst seit 2002 moglich sind. Seit ich die Arbeit 2006 abgegeben habe, denke ich uber einige Dinge nach, die im Laufe des dreieinhalbjahrigen Forschungsprozesses meine Aufmerksamkeit erregt haben. Im Verlauf meines Kontakts mit anderen Promovierenden und Kolleg/innen von drei englischen Universitaten wurde mir dann nach und nach klar, dass viele der Probleme, die sie erlebt haben, meinen eigenen ahnelten und insoweit nicht einfach der innovativen Phase des eigenen Arbeitens geschuldet sind/waren, sondern Teil eines weitergehenden Szenarios zu sein scheinen. An meiner eigenen Universitat beinhalten die Anforderungen an eine "kreative Doktorarbeit" eine "kreative" Komponente (ein Aquivalent von ca. 60.000 Worten) und ...