Genesis

Abstract

The doctorate has an eight-hundred-year history (Nobel, 1994). However, the first Doctor of Philosophy was not awarded in an English university until 1920. In New Zealand, after its abolishment in 1926, the Ph.D. was reintroduced in 1944 (Ings, 2014). The country’s first practice-led artistic Ph.D. was not awarded until 2005. This thesis, ‘Talking Pictures’ (Ings, 2005), considered ways in which narrative music videos maintain attention durability over multiple screenings. The project was significant because at the time, short film was moving beyond the confines of the cinema and was accessible on DVDs or recently launched video sharing websites like Vimeo and YouTube. Because these locations allowed for multiple viewings of the same film, the study proposed alternative methods of narration that might extend a short film’s durability and complexity. The thesis was presented in three parts: The Oscar-qualifying short film ‘boy’ (Ings, 2005), an exhibition of props and sets created for the narrative, and a 100,000 word exegesis. As New Zealand’s first practice-led Ph.D., the study required a redesign of policies and procedures related practice-led, artistic doctorates; including the nature of entry criteria, requirements for confirmation of candidature, peer review and examination. The address accompanying this poster unpacks these issues, considering how their redesign enabled the development of subsequent practice-led theses.