A. PROPOSAL
The longevity of the American piano’s status as an iconic object is due in part to its ability to propagate evolving meanings across multiple cultural times and spaces. As an instrument which rose to prominence during the Victorian age, the piano continued to maintain its relevance during the early twentieth century when traditional values of Victorianism were shifting towards an ethos of modernity.
Drawing upon Rom Harré’s principles for theorizing objects (2002) and Woodward and Ellison’s methodology as employed in their case study of Penfolds’ Grange Wine (Alexander, Bartmañski, and Giesen 2012), this paper will examine the piano (in the early twentieth century) as an iconic commodity, an object in process whose narrative, while maintaining its core identity, adapted to a rapidly approaching consumer society. The narrative utilizes particular myths from the Victorian era that continue to be relevant in the new age, while creating new powerful cultural storylines which it needs for its continued existence and meaning. In turn, the piano gives material expression and form to these myths. Although I will argue for a discursive theory of the piano as icon, the aesthetic quality of the instrument, as described by piano manufacturers, critics, and consumers of the time, will also be analyzed as a feature of iconicity.
The purpose of this study is to contribute to the literature on iconology (Mitchell 1986) with reference to the sociological theory of iconic consciousness (Alexander 2008).
B. REFERENCES
Alexander, Jeffrey C. 2008. “Iconic Experience in Art and Life: Surface/Depth Beginning with Giacometti’s ‘Standing Woman.’” Theory, Culture and Society 25(4): 527-573.
Alexander, Jeffrey C., Bartmañski, Dominik, and Bernhard Giesen, eds. 2012. Iconic Power: Materiality and Meaning in Social Life. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Harré, Rom. 2002. “Material Objects in Social Worlds.” *Theory, Culture and Society *19 (5/6): 23-33.
Mitchell, W. J. T. 1986. Iconology. Image, Text, Ideology. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
About the presenterAmy Gajadhar
Amy Gajadhar is an active music teacher and pianist whose research interests include piano pedagogy, music semiology, the Trinidadian Calypso and the history of improvisation in Western Art Music. After receiving an undergraduate degree in music from the University of Western Ontario, Amy continued her education by completing an Artist Diploma and a Master of Music degree in Piano Performance and Pedagogy. She is currently enrolled in the PhD Musicology program at York University.