AustLit

'In an arts-based inquiry, an exegesis is that dissertation or thesis that accompanies a creative production (artefact) that may be a novel, a memoir, a computer game, poetry, sculpting, paintings … The examinable outcome for the scholarly artist comprises both the creative work and the thesis. To substantiate the production of knowledge and find recognition as a scholar, the artist must document. As a method of inquiry an exegesis is core documentation. It is the written component that speaks to the production of knowledge. It is the record that makes visible the scholarly artist’s knowing. This paper examines the impulse to write, looks at the memoir and, with self-examples, reveals the exegesis as a type of memoir that gives insight to creative production. In it the researcher describes the process of creating, articulates and searches answers to a research question refined across stages of the study. The exegesis is both a product and a process that involves inward reflection and discernment. As the researcher shapes, substantiates, makes connections between creating art and showing research gains, the emergent exegesis is also a decisive memoir that an examiner must use to determine the logic or illogic of new knowledge through creative art.' (Abstract)