Research Interests
I have published on topics such as animation aesthetics, film cognition, evolutionary theories of art, avant-garde film, narratology and film sound. In addition, I am the author of Lessons in Perception: The Avant-Garde Filmmaker as Practical Psychologist (2018), and also the coeditor of Cognitive Media Theory (2014) and Experimental Animation: From Analogue to Digital (2019). Forthcoming publications include the edited anthology Introduction to Screen Narration: Perspectives on Visual Storytelling and the authored book Animated Visions: Theory, History and Aesthetics.
PGR Supervision - areas of interest
I would particularly welcome applicants with an interest in any of the following:
· Experimental film and animation
· Cognitive film theory
· Screen narration and storytelling
· Animation aesthetics
· Film sound
· Analytic Philosophy and Film
Current PGR supervision
Ben Oakley (with Professor Paul Ward and Dr Tom Walsh), 2019-
Past PGR supervision/completions
Carla Mackinnon (with Professor Paul Ward and Dr Tom Walsh), 2015-2022
Marc Bosward (with Professor Paul Ward and Dr Tom Walsh), 2015-2022
PGR examining experience
Glasgow School of Art, 2021
Recent and Forthcoming Publications
Authored Books
(2022) Animated Visions: Theory, History and Aesthetics. Berghahn. [FORTHCOMING]
(2018) Lessons in Perception: The Avant-Garde Filmmaker as Practical Psychologist. Berghahn.
Edited Books
(2022) The Stories We Tell: Perspectives on Screen Narrative. Routledge. Co-edited with Catalina Iricinschi. [FORTHCOMING]
(2019) The New Experimental Animation: From Analogue to Digital. Routledge. Co-edited with Miriam Harris and Lilly Husbands.
(2014) Cognitive Media Theory. Routledge. Co-edited with Ted Nannicelli. Routledge.
Recent Journal Articles
(2021) Defining Experimental Animation: A Follow-up. Animation Practice, Process and Production.
(2019) Style, Structure and Allusion in Lucifer Rising. Open Screens Journal.
(2018) A General Aesthetics of American Animation Sound Design. animation: an interdisciplinary journal.
Recent Anthology Chapters
(2022) Music Visualisation and Medium Expansion: Key Themes in Experimental Animation. In A Companion to Experimental Cinema. (Ed. Federico Windhausen). Palgrave. [FORTHCOMING]
(2019) It is Alive if You Are: Defining Experimental Animation. In The New Experimental Animation: From Analogue to Digital. (Eds. Harris, Husbands and Taberham). Routledge.
(2018) Experimental Animation. In The Animation Studies Reader, Routledge. (Eds. Dobson, Honess Roe, Ratelle, Ruddell)
(2018) Bottom-up processing, Entoptic Vision and the Innocent Eye in the Work of Stan Brakhage. In Stan Brakhage: The Realm Buster, John Libbey Publishing.
Keynote Presentations
(2022) “Realism, Time and Ambiguity: Narration in Art Cinema” at a PhD Research Symposium, Southampton University, UK. 6th July.
(2019) “It is Alive if You Are: Defining Experimental Animation” at the Experimental Animation Symposium, Auckland University of Technology, New Zealand, 4th May.
Guest Lectures
(2022) “Anime: History, Aesthetics, Ideologies”, Franklin and Marshall College. Online, 27th April.
(2022) “Cognitive Science and the Arts”, Salford University. Online, 29th March.
(2016) “Cognitive Media Theory” at the CAM research group, University of Copenhagen, Denmark