Professor Margaret Iversen
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Email
miversen@essex.ac.uk -
Location
Colchester Campus
Profile
Biography
Margaret Iversen is one of the leading international authorities in the field of art theory and contemporary art. Her first book was on one of the founders of Art History as a discipline: Alois Riegl: Art History and Theory (1993). Since then she has continued to write occasionally about the history of art history ('Retrieving Warburg's Tradition'), but has made her main areas of study psychoanalytic art theory, publishing Beyond Pleasure: Freud, Lacan, Barthes (2007) and book to be called Photography, Trace and Trauma (2017). Her present and future research is devoted to the overlapping fields of photography and contemporary art. She was director of a large AHRC research project called Aesthetics after Photography (2007-2010), an interdisciplinary project in partnership with Diarmuid Costello of the Philosophy Department, University of Warwick. Other publications include a monograph on the contemporary artist Mary Kelly and an essay on the American painter Edward Hopper which appears in the catalogue of the 2004 Tate Modern exhibition of his work. Recently published work includes a book called Writing Art History (with Stephen Melville) and a number of articles including 'Analogue: On Zoe Leonard and Tacita Dean', 'Index, Diagram, Graphic Trace,' 'Desire and the Diagrammatic,' and 'The World without a Self: Edward Hopper and Chantal Akerman.' Professor Iversen continues to accept and supervise PhD students.
Qualifications
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BA cum laude Wellesley College,
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M. Litt, two-year research degree on Kant's Aesthetics University of Edinburgh,
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PhD Alois Riegl's Historiography University of Essex,
Research and professional activities
Research interests
Contemporary Art and Theory
Photography since the Sixties
Psychoanalytic Aesthetics
Historiography of the History of Art History
Current research
‘Index, Diagram, Graphic Trace,’ for special issue of Tate Papers,18, Special issue: Involuntary Drawing, ed. Iversen, Autumn, 2012
‘Involuntary Photography,’ in Anna Dezeuze and Julia Kelly (eds.), Found Sculpture and Photography from Surrealism to Contemporary Art, edited by Anna Dezeuze and Julia Kelly, Ashgate, 2012
‘Analogue: On Zoe Leonard and Tacita Dean,’ Special Issue on ‘Agency and Automatism: Photography as Art since the 1960s,’ Iversen and Diarmuid Costello, eds. Critical Inquiry vol.38, n.4, Summer, 2012
Chance, MIT Press/Whitechapel Art Gallery, March 2010
Conferences and presentations
Speaker, Twelfth Franklin M. Ludden Lecture in Art History and Criticism, Ohio State University
Lima, United States, 4/4/2013
Convenor and Speaker: Symposium: Involuntary Drawing: Art and Automatism, Art Exchange; paper title: Desire and the Diagrammatic
16/11/2012
In conversation with Brian O’Doherty, Drawing Room, London
London, United Kingdom, 12/10/2012
Conference Lecture, Edward Hopper and the Cinema, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, ‘Trains, Cars, and Moving Pictures: Hopper’s Vehicles of Perception’
19/6/2012
Conference Lecture, Edward Hopper and the Cinema, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, ‘Trains, Cars, and Moving Pictures: Hopper’s Vehicles of Perception’
19/6/2012
Invited Speaker, London Aesthetics Forum at the Institute of Philosophy, University of London, ‘Photography, Trace and Trauma’
London, United Kingdom, 6/6/2012
Invited Speaker, Symposium at Centre for the Study of Contemporary Art, UCL, Sub-object and Studiowork, ‘Falling, dropping, letting go’
London, United Kingdom, 6/2/2010
Symposium Convenor with David Lomas, Involuntary Drawing, University of Westminster
London, United Kingdom, 2010
Invited Speaker, Department of Philosophy, The Queens College, Oxford, ‘Aesthetics of Chance’ in lecture series on ‘Twentieth-Century Philosophy and Theory of the Visual Arts'
Oxford, United Kingdom, 12/6/2009
Keynote Speaker, Kunsthistorisches Institut, Universität Zürich and Centre for Photography in Winterthur,Switzerland, for launch of MA and PhD programme in History and Theory of Photography
2009
Teaching and supervision
Previous supervision
Degree subject: Art History and Theory
Degree type: Doctor of Philosophy
Awarded date: 1/2/2021
Degree subject: Art History and Theory
Degree type: Doctor of Philosophy
Awarded date: 11/7/2017
Degree subject: Art History and Theory
Degree type: Doctor of Philosophy
Awarded date: 9/9/2015
Degree subject: Art History and Theory
Degree type: Doctor of Philosophy
Awarded date: 5/6/2015
Degree subject: Art History and Theory
Degree type: Doctor of Philosophy
Awarded date: 4/2/2015
Degree subject: Art History and Theory
Degree type: Doctor of Philosophy
Awarded date: 30/1/2015
Degree subject: Art History and Theory
Degree type: Doctor of Philosophy
Awarded date: 23/1/2015
Degree subject: Art History and Theory
Degree type: Doctor of Philosophy
Awarded date: 14/4/2014
Degree subject: Art History and Theory
Degree type: Doctor of Philosophy
Awarded date: 28/2/2014
Degree subject: Art History and Theory
Degree type: Doctor of Philosophy
Awarded date: 31/1/2014
Publications
Journal articles (11)
Iversen, MD., ‘Index, Diagram, Graphic Trace,’. Tate Papers. 18
Iversen, M., (2021). The Diaristic Mode in Contemporary Art after Barthes. Art History. 44 (4), 798-822
Iversen, M., (2021). Steinberg’s Other Criteria. Oxford Art Journal. 43 (3), 387-402
Iversen, MD., (2018). The World without a Self: Edward Hopper and Chantal Akerman. Art History. 41 (4), 742-760
Iversen, M., (2016). Desire and the Diagrammatic. Oxford Art Journal. 39 (1), 1-17
Iversen, M., (2012). Analogue: On Zoe Leonard and Tacita Dean. Critical Inquiry. 38 (4), 796-818
Iversen, M., (2009). Auto-maticity: Ruscha and Performative Photography. Art History. 32 (5), 836-851
Iversen, M., (2005). The Discourse of Perspective in the Twentieth Century: Panofsky, Damisch, Lacan. Oxford Art Journal. 28 (2), 191-202
Iversen, M., (2004). Readymade, Found Object, Photograph. Art Journal. 63 (2), 44-57
Iversen, M., (1998). In the Blind Field: Hopper and the Uncanny. Art History. 21 (3), 409-429
Iversen, M., (1994). What is a photograph?. Art History. 17 (3), 450-463
Books (9)
Iversen, M., (2017). Photography, Trace, and Trauma. University of Chicago Press. 022637016X. 9780226370163
Costello, D., (2012). Agency and Automatism: Photography as Art Since the Sixties
Iversen, M. and Melville, S., (2010). Writing Art History Disciplinary Departures. University of Chicago Press. 0226388263. 9780226388267
Iversen, M., (2010). Chance. The MIT Press. 0262513927. 9780262513920
Costello, D. and Iversen, M., (2010). Photography After Conceptual Art. Wiley-Blackwell. 1444333607. 9781444333602
Iversen, M., (2007). Beyond Pleasure: Freud, Lacan, Barthes. The Pennsylvania State University Press
Arnold, D. and Iversen, M., (2003). Art and Thought. Wiley-Blackwell. 0631227148. 9780631227144
Kelly, M., Iversen, M., Crimp, D. and Bhabha, HK., (1997). Mary Kelly. Phaidon Inc Ltd
Iversen, M., (1993). Alois Riegl. MIT Press (MA). 0262090309. 9780262090308
Book chapters (6)
Iversen, MD., (2013). ‘Involuntary Photography'. In: Found Sculpture and Photography from Surrealism to Contemporary Art. Editors: Dezeuze, A. and Kelly, J., . Ashgate. 171- 184. 9781409400004
Iversen, MD., (2009). ‘Automaticity: Ruscha and Performative Photography’. In: Photography after Conceptual Art. Editors: Iversen, M. and Costello, D., . Wiley - Blackwell. 12- 27. 978-1-444-33360-2
Iversen, MD. and Costello, D., (2009). Introduction: Photography after Conceptual Art. In: Photography after Conceptual Art. Editors: Iversen, M. and Costello, D., . Wiley-Blackwell. 1- 11. 978-1-444-33360-2
Iversen, M., (2007). ‘Following pieces: On performative photography’. In: Photography Theory. Editors: Elkins, J., . Routledge. 91- 108. 0415977835
Iversen, MD., (2006). The surrealist situation of the photographed object. In: The lure of the object. Editors: Melville, S., . Sterling and Francine Clark Institute; Yale University Press. 181- 192
Iversen, MD., (2004). ‘Hopper’s melancholy gaze’,. In: Edward Hopper,. Editors: Wagstaff, S., . Tate Publishing. 1854375334. 9781854375339
Grants and funding
2006
Aesthetics after Photography
Arts And Humanities Research Council
