The address of spirituality in contemporary art

The thesis explores the use of religious themes and the notion of self-design in contemporary art practice. It argues that art today that addresses religion does so primarily for its rhetorical function: for a recognizable pattern of persuasiveness, which is ultimately defined by its established mechanisms of belief. Furthermore, it suggests that it is through an engagement with this secularized rhetoric that the art viewer today can potentially be provoked to re-create oneself in ones own terms; or, in Richard Rorty's terms, to 'revocabularize'.

The thesis is supervised by Dr Andrea Phillips, of Goldsmiths College and was completed as a written report accompanied by two films with sound.