The Pygmalion proposition

Masters Research - Master of Philosophy (MPhil)Ovid’s myth of Pygmalion tells the story of the world’s first artist, driven to make the compelling art object, ‘Galatea’. In so doing, he falls in love with his art, colouring it with his creativity and animating it through his longing and fervent prayer. It is this metamorphosis, from object to art work, human being to artist and imagination to meaning, that is embedded in human history and explored in the ‘Pygmalion Proposition’. It asks why, across all time and in all cultures, human beings have felt compelled to create and had the ineffable need to communicate meaning through the objects of their imagination. Explored outward from the core and locus of our being, the brain and senses, through the complexities of our psychology to the socio-cultural forces of the world, it searches for the elements and conditions that may enable (or hinder) human beings’ creativity and ability to make art and ponders how we can (and why we should) develop and promote creativity, art and the arts in individuals and our society