Ambivalence and detachment : a biographical analysis of the life and art of Dod Procter

Dod Proctor (1892-1972) was a prominent member of the Newlyn School of artists and only the second woman to be elected a Royal Academician. Through researching her life and work, I have been able to detect two recurrent themes of ambivalence and detachment which I have explored through biographical analysis. My approach differs from previously published works on Dod in three principal ways: in its application of biographical and visual theory to her life experiences and paintings, in its preferred focus on her life data and documentation and consideration of the ways in which media and artistic criticism have changed in the course of the 20th century, in relation to the ways of seeing of the individual. The principal aim of this thesis is to use Dod as a case study for the application of Diltheyian investigation of personal identity, biography and historical significance. My methodology is outlined in the Introduction and threaded through each of the chapters, integrating theories of auto/biography and identity, narrative construction, artistic consumption and visual methodology. In using the descriptive and analytical psychology of Wilhelm Dilthey as a framework for articulating a view of her life I draw extensively on her personal correspondence, public documents, paintings, contextual data and personal recollections. Primary application of Dilthey’s principles is complemented – and sometimes countered – by consideration of other, more contemporary theories of identity and personal construction. In so doing, these theoretical positions are critiqued and their value considered as a means of establishing the cultural, historical and educational significance of this particular reading of a life lived.