ART HISTORY

CRN

 13118

Distribution

 A/C

Course No.

 ARTH 102

Title

Perspectives in World Art II

Professor

 Susan Aberth

Schedule

 Mon Wed 11:30 am - 12:50 pm OLIN 102

This course, the second half of a two-semester survey, will continue to explore the visual arts worldwide. Beginning in the fourteenth century and ending in the present, the class will survey painting, sculpture, and architecture, as well as works in newer media (such as photography, video, and performance). The class will encompass works from Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas, arranged chronologically in order to provide a more integrated historical context for their production. In addition to the course textbook, readings will be chose to broaden critical perspectives and to present different methodological approaches. This course is designed for those students with no background in art history as well as for those who may be contemplating a major either in art history or studio. Students who have taken part one of this course will be given preferential enrollment. First and second years students are encouraged to enroll.

CRN

 13119

Distribution

 A

Course No.

 ARTH 126

Title

Architecture since 1945

Professor

 Joanna Merwood

Schedule

 Mon Wed 1:30 pm -2:50 pm OLIN 102

Through the analysis of built projects as well as theoretical and critical writings, this course will examine a number of themes that have come to dominate our understanding of architecture since World War II. The class will cover both the continuation and transformation of mainstream modern architecture after the war--including corporate modernism, New Brutalism, regionalism, and neo-rationalism --as well as the emergence of new and diverse practices that challenge the modernist legacy. These alternative practices include the ethnographic, sociological, and cybernetic turns of the 1950s; the experimental and "Pop" architecture of the 1960s; the engagement with linguistic theory and the rise of post-modernism during the late '60s and the 1970s; and contemporary experimentation with new programs, sites, materials, and media. The course will pay particular attention to the manner in which architects and architectural institutions have addressed or engaged historical transformations in the aesthetic, socio-economic, political, and technological realms, including the impact of globalization and the emergence of the information age. First year students and prospective majors, as well as anyone interested in architecture, are welcome to enroll.

CRN

 13120

Distribution

 A

Course No.

 ARTH 130

Title

Introduction to Visual Culture

Professor

 Julia Rosenbaum

Schedule

 Tu Th 11:30 am - 12:50 pm FISHER
This course constitutes an introduction to the discipline of art history and to visual artifacts more broadly defined. It teaches students to look at, think about, and analyze visual material. We will consider issues of medium, genre, and style, as well as the role of the visual in shaping personal and social identity. Readings will be drawn from a range of methodological and disciplinary perspectives. Thinking about the visual goes hand in hand with writing about art; frequent short writing assignments will be based both on readings and first-hand observation of objects. The course is designed for anyone with an interest but no formal work in art history. Preference will be given to prospective majors, first-year and arts division students.

CRN

 13125

Distribution

 A/C

Course No.

 ARTH 210

Title

Roman Art and Architecture

Professor

 Diana Minsky

Schedule

 Mon Wed 4:30 pm -5:50 pm OLIN 102

Cross-listed: Classical Studies

This class follows the development of Roman Art and Architecture from the founding of the city by Romulus in 753 BCE to the transferal of the capital to the east by Constantine in 330 CE. Lectures and discussions will explore how Rome incorporated and synthesized the styles and achievements of conquered peoples (including the Etruscans, Greeks, and Egyptians) to produce something entirely new which not only communicated the nature of the empire, but also established a common artistic vocabulary throughout the Mediterranean basin, a vocabulary which continues to influence. The ability of art and architecture to communicate political policy and the conversion of the Classical into the Christian will number among the themes of the class. Open to all students. Requirements will include two papers, a mid-term, and a final.

CRN

 13063

Distribution

 A

Course No.

 ARTH 221

Title

Romanesque and Gothic Art and Architecture

Professor

 Jean French

Schedule

 Mon Wed 10:00 am - 11:20 am OLIN 102

Cross-listed: French Studies, Medieval Studies

Among the topics studied are the aftermath of the millennium, the medieval monastery, the pilgrimage routes and the cult of relics, the age of the great cathedrals (Chartres, Amiens, Reims, etc.), and the waning of the Middle Ages. Emphasis is placed on an analysis of architecture (religious and secular), sculpture, frescoes, stained glass, tapestry, and metalwork within a wider cultural context.

CRN

 13127

Distribution

 A

Course No.

 ARTH 249

Title

Women Artists of the Surrealist Movement

Professor

 Susan Aberth

Schedule

 Mon Wed 3:00 pm -4:20 pm OLIN 102

Cross-listed: Gender Studies

Related Interest: LAIS

The Surrealist Movement ascribed to woman a pivotal and revolutionary role in the life and work of men, in theory if not always in practice. The movement offered women unique roles as both muse and creator and attracted a large number of active female participants. Until recent feminist scholarship, however, the lives and work of these women were overshadowed by those of the male Surrealists. This course will examine the use of female sexuality in Surrealist imagery and then juxtapose it to the writings and art work of such female Surrealists as Dorothea Tanning, Lee Miller, Meret Oppenheim, Leonor Fini, Remedios Varo, Toyen, Claude Cahun, Leonora Carrington, Dora Maar, and others. Issues explored will be female subjectivity, cultural identity, occultism, mythology, dream imagery, artistic collaboration, and the various methodologies employed to interpret Surrealism in general. Students will be required to write an extensive research paper in addition to the usual exams. Pre-requisites for the class include either Perspectives in World Art II, a course in Modern Art, or special permission of the instructor.

CRN

 13121

Distribution

 A/C

Course No.

 ARTH 263

Title

American Art 1900 - 1945

Professor

 Tom Wolf

Schedule

 Wed 1:30 pm -2:50 pm FISHER ANNEX

Th 10:00 am - 11:20 am FISHER ANNEX

Cross-listed: American Studies

This course surveys developments in painting, sculpture, and photography in the United States in the first half of the twentieth century. Beginning with late nineteenth-century figures such as Albert Pinkham Ryder and John Singer Sargent, it moves on to consider Robert Henri and the Ash Can School and then the early modernists (Alfred Stieglitz, Georgie O'Keeffe, and their contemporaries). The course concludes with a consideration of art after World War I, examining the work of both modern and conservative artists such as Stuart Davis and Edward Hopper.

CRN

 13472

Distribution

 A

Course No.

 ARTH 275

Title

American Utopias

Professor

 Joanna Merwood

Schedule

 Tu Th 11:30 am - 12:50 pm OLIN 102

Alternate:Th 11:30 am - 12:50 pm OLIN 301

Cross-listed: American Studies

This course will examine a series of utopian architectural projects imagined for America between 1776 and 1976, focusing on visionary schemes for landscapes, cities, buildings and homes designed by architects, social reformers, writers and enthusiastic amateurs. Placing utopian projects in their cultural and historical context, it will emphasize the multiple and divergent practices and tactics through which urban and architectural form have been employed to shape national identity, thought and behavior. Topics will include; religious communities in the west; nineteenth century feminism and domestic reform; the landscape and architecture of the "Western" film; World's Fairs and the City Beautiful Movement; the skyscraper in reality and in science fiction; suburban living; Los Angeles and other "autotopias"; "X-Urbia" (the office park and the shopping mall); Soho and other projects for urban gentrification. We will examine the writing of Thomas Jefferson, Robert Owen, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Edgar Allan Poe, Edward Bellamy, Daniel Burnham, Frank Lloyd Wright, Victor Gruen, Robert Venturi, Reyner Banham and Rem Koolhaas. The course will involve both lecture and discussion components. It is open to all students, although priority will be given to those with some background in urban and architectural history.

CRN

 13124

Distribution

 A

Course No.

 ARTH 283

Title

Art Since 1945

Professor

 Michael Lobel

Schedule

 Tu Th 4:00 pm -5:20 pm OLIN 102
This course will consider major movements and trends in art since 1945. We will begin by considering the ascendancy of modernism in the immediate postwar period and go on to examine various challenges to the modernist paradigm that emerged in subsequent decades. The course will focus on European and North American art but will also incorporate Asian and Latin American art, particularly in the context of increasing globalization. Particular attention will be paid to issues of identity and difference, uses of new media, and debates about political and ideological critique in recent artistic practices. This class is open to all students, although priority will be given to those with some background in modern art.

CRN

 13122

Distribution

 A/D

Course No.

 ARTH 296

Title

The Arts of Japan

Professor

 Patricia Karetzky

Schedule

 Th 1:30 pm -3:50 pm OLIN 102

Cross-listed: Asian Studies, MES

This course begins with a study of the neolithic period and its cord-impressed pottery (Joman) circa 2000 B.C. when Japanese cultural and aesthetic characteristics are already observable. Next, the great wave of Chinese influence is viewed, including its impact on government, religion (Buddhism), architecture, and art. Subsequent periods of indigenous art in esoteric Buddhism, popular Buddhism, Shinto, narrative scroll painting, medieval screen painting, Zen art, and ukiyo-e prints are presented in a broad view of the social, artistic, and historical development of Japan.

CRN

 13655

Distribution

 A/F

Course No.

 ARTH 314

Title

The Body and Its Image

Professor

 Laurie Dahlberg

Schedule

 Fr 10:30 - 12:50 pm FISHER ANNEX

Cross listed: History of Photography

No subject in the history of representation has received more conflicted treatment or reception than the human body. Artists have interrogated it as the site of gender and sexuality, used it to express ideality and aberrance, celebrated it as the source of regeneration, and pushed beyond societal taboos in exploring it as the playground of decay and putrefaction. Seminar participants will study the West's historical ambivalence toward the body and its representation, as expressed in art of the modern period (1780-2000). Beginning with the neoclassical heroic nude, we will study depictions of the body from the past two centuries that reflect the preoccupations and obsessions of their cultural moments in a particularly revealing way. Topics may include: Manet's "Olympia," pornography and early photography, physical abjection in Symbolism and German Expressionism, the "oriental" body in 19th-century art, body art of the 1960s and 1970s, and obsessive treatments of the body by contemporary photographers. Readings will be drawn from philosophy, cultural criticism, and art history. Short writing assignments and oral presentations will culminate in a significant final research paper.

CRN

 13064

Distribution

 n/a

Course No.

 ARTH 321

Title

The" Animal Style" in Art

Professor

 Jean French

Schedule

 Mon 4:00 pm -6:20 pm OLIN 301

Cross-listed: Medieval Studies, Irish and Celtic Studies

This seminar explores the character and the widespread diffusion of the "animal style"-a nonfigural, essentially abstract, and highly decorative art displaying a genius for pattern and fantasy, which was a heritage of the nonclassical cultures of Europe. The course examines the art of the Scythians and Sarmatians, who roamed the steppes of Central Eurasia; various manifestations of this style in the La Téne civilization and among the Germanic tribes of the continent; and the treasures of Celtic Ireland and of Anglo-Saxon England (among them the magnificent Sutton Hoo ship burial treasure). Attention is given to the art of the Vikings, to other aspects of their culture, and to Viking influence in areas as widespread as Ireland and Russia. The course concludes with an investigation of the influence of the "animal style" on the art of Romanesque Europe.

CRN

 13473

Distribution

 A

Course No.

 ARTH 352

Title

Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper

Professor

 Diana Minsky

Schedule

 Th 4:00 pm -6:20 pm OLIN 301

Cross-listed: Italian Studies

This seminar will situate Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper within the tradition of Last Suppers, Renaissance concern with perspective, and depictions of the life of Christ by focusing on Leo Steinberg's Leonardo's Incessant Last Supper. Concurrently, the evolution of iconographic interpretations of art and Steinberg's role in its recent history will be analyzed by situating Leonardo's Incessant Last Supper and Steinberg's other major contributions (including the controversial Sexuality of Christ) within this tradition. The seminar will touch on the issues surrounding the restoration of this painting. Requirements will include short critical essays, a class presentation, and a research paper on another artist's Last Supper.

Pre-requisite: One 100-level art history course or some previous knowledge of Renaissance art, literature, or culture.

CRN

 13131

Distribution

 A

Course No.

 ARTH 378

Title

Contemporary Issues in Architecture

Professor

 Joanna Merwood

Schedule

 Wed 4:00 pm -6:20 pm OLIN 301
This seminar will investigate new lines of inquiry that have informed contemporary scholarship in the history and theory of architecture. The class will not be limited to studying a particular historical period. Rather, we will examine how, through new research and methodological approaches, the conceptual parameters of architectural history have been expanded (i.e. to include non-Western topics, as well as questions of gender, sexuality, and media), canonical figures and their works have been recast in distinct terms (i.e. Louis Sullivan and ornament, Le Corbusier in Algiers, Adolf Loos and fashion), and overlooked or understudied architects, practices, and projects have opened up new problematics. (i.e. the work of Eileen Gray, Frederick Kiesler, Constant and Archigram) In addition we will look at how, in response to such challenges, new forms of architectural practice have emerged (i.e Rem Koolhaas and OMA), and new ideas of spatiality have emerged (virtual space). Topics will include: theories of domesticity; theories of urbanism and spatial politics; history and memory; sexuality and space; architecture and cinema; architecture, fashion and branding; globalization and identity; and the emergence of "information space," the digital and the virtual. Permission of the instructor required.

CRN

 13660

Distribution

 A

Course No.

 ARTH 390

Title

Art Historical Method and the Figure of the Artist

Professor

 Michael Lobel

Schedule

 Tu 10:30 am - 12:50 pm OLIN 301
This course will examine the ways in which various approaches to art history have treated the figure of the artist. Although biographically oriented readings have long contributed to our understanding of artists and their work, such readings have more recently come under intense scrutiny and criticism. The class will examine a range of biographical approaches to art historical interpretation, as well as writings by critics - including feminists and postmodernists - who have challenged those models. We will consider Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytic approach to Leonardo da Vinci; feminist debates about the work of Artemisia Gentileschi; the treatment of Van Gogh in film and popular culture; and poststructuralist responses to Picasso's cubism. Priority will be given to sophomores intending to moderate in art history and junior art history majors. Permission of the instructor required.