ART12 Intro to Western Art Renaissance to the Present

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Basic Information ART12 Intro to Western Art Renaissance to the Present Instructor Name Home Institution Gordon Hughes Rice University Course Hours The course has 20 lectures classes in total.

1 Basic Information ART12 Intro to Western Art Renaissance to the Present Instructor Name Home Institution Gordon Hughes Rice University Course Hours The course has 20 lectures classes in total. Each class session is 120 minutes in length. The course meets from Monday to Friday. Each course has a total of 40 class hours (4 credit hours). Course Description: Art 12 surveys the major artistic traditions from the Italian Renaissance through the present in Western Europe and the United States. The focus will be concentrated on painting and sculpture with occasional forays into architecture and photography. We will study artistic tendencies in relation to national, international, social, cultural, and historical contexts, while examining how factors such as patronage, religion, personality, and gender influence artistic representation. This course will also investigate the ways in which works of art convey meaning, and the ways in which art historians discern and question those meanings. The course is designed to teach you to look thoughtfully and sensitively at works of art and to acquire some sense of their role and position within the time and place in which they were produced. You will learn to articulate how many different factors visual, cultural, political, historical come together in each work of art. Requirements: Attendance and active participation in class, completing homework assignments and readings (20%); midterm exam (40%); final exam (40%). All assignments must be completed in order to pass the course. Readings: Gardner s Art Through the Ages: The Western Perspective, (Vol. 2).

2 Photocopied readings on reserve. Assignments: Each student is responsible for completing all of the assigned reading prior to class. Examinations: The mid-term and final exam will test how well you understand and analyze the works of art presented in class and discussed in the readings. Both exams will consist of three parts: slide identifications, slide comparisons, and a short essay on a single work. The first part of the exam will consist of approximately 10 short slide identifications, in which you will be asked to name the artist, title, the date, and culture in which the artwork was produced (i.e. Italian). To understand the history of art you must learn artist names, dates, periods and the titles of artworks. This is the basic information of art history, and without mastering it you will be unable to gain a coherent understanding of the larger movements and issues. In every case, it is important that you learn dates by thinking of how that single work relates to its larger stylistic and cultural context. DATES MAKE SENSE! While it is important to commit names, dates, styles, etc., to memory in order to master the materials of this class, it is equally important that you do more than simply memorize the course material. In order for art history to be more than just an abstract set of historical facts, we must understand how and why works were created in a particular time and place, the circumstances and background behind them, the formal properties that constitute a given style (i.e. what are the visual characteristics that make one work baroque and another Rococo ), and their continuing role in the subsequent history of art. Accordingly, the emphasis in the second and third parts the exams will be visual and historical analysis. In the second part of the exam you will need to compare a series of slide comparisons that will be presented in groups of two. You will need to identify the works, and discuss the differences and similarities that are raised by their comparison. There will 2 pairs of slide comparisons. In the third part of the exam you will be required to write a short essay on a single work that was discussed in class. You will be given a choice of two artworks to write on. This essay will include as much information as you are able to provide about the work. It is important that your

3 answer demonstrate as much depth of understanding as possible, rather than simply stating a set of facts or describing what you see. We we talk more about the exam and what is expected in class. Week 1 July 13. Course overview, requirements, and goals. The Development of the Renaissance in Italy: Giotto and the Proto-Renaissance. Gardner, pp ; E. H. Gombrich, The Renaissance Conception of Artistic Progress and its Consequences July 14. The Early Renaissance in Italy. The High Renaissance in Italy: Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo. Gardner, pp ; Alberti, On Painting Richard Krautheimer, from Ghiberti. July 15. Mannerism and The Art of Renaissance Venice. The Renaissance Outside of Italy; Flanders and Germany Gardner, pp ; ;

4 Erwin Panofsky, Iconography and Iconology: An Introduction to the Art of the Renaissance. Week 2 July 18 The Baroque: Italian Art of the Seventeenth Century. The Baroque in Northern Europe Gardner pp ; ; Erwin Panofsky, What is Baroque? July 19 The Baroque in Spain, Late Baroque in Germany and Italy The Foundations of French Classicism Gardner, pp ; ; July 20 The Rococo Reactions Against the Rocoo and the Rise of French Genre Painting Gardner, pp ; July 21 Neo-Classicism Romanticism

5 Gardner pp ; July 22 The Dawn of Photography Courbet and the Rise of Realism Gardner pp ; Week 3 July 25 MIDTERM EXAM July 26 Manet, Impressionism and Late Nineteenth-Century French Painting Post-Impressionism and Symbolism Gardner pp July 27 Fin-De-Siècle Architecture and Decorative Arts in England, Paris and Vienna Fauvism and Expressionism Gardner pp ; ; ; July 28 Cubism, Orphism, Futurism, and Purism The Turn to Abstraction, Modernist Utopian Models

6 Gardner pp ; July 29 Dada and Surrealism Modern art after World War II: Abstract Expressionism Gardner, pp ; ; ; ; Week 4 Aug. 1 Painting in the Wake of Abstract Expressionism The Divided Legacy of Jackson Pollock Art Since 1900, pp ; ; ; Aug. 2 British and American Pop Art Andy Warhol and the Seriality of the Commodity Form Art Since 1900, pp Alison and Peter Smithson, But Today We Collect Ads Aug. 3 Art in Post-War Europe: France and Germany

7 Art Since 1900, pp ; ; ; pp Aug. 4 Minimalism and Post-Minimalism Conceptualism Art Since 1900, pp ; Aug. 5 Earthworks and Art in the Expanded Field Performance and Body Art Art Since 1900, pp Week 5 Aug. 8 Activist Art and the Politics of Identity The Postmodernism Debates: The Aesthetics of Appropriation Art Since 1900, pp Aug. 9 FINAL EXAM Code of Academic Integrity You must familiarize yourself with the Code of Academic Integrity in the Beijing Jiaotong University. It is your responsibility to ensure your behavior does not violate this code. You must observe the policies regarding various forms of academic dishonesty. The following statement about academic dishonesty has been provided by

8 the Beijing Jiaotong University, Activities that have the effect or intention of interfering with education, pursuit of knowledge, or fair evaluation of a student s performance are prohibited. Academic dishonesty will not be tolerated and may be handled by the Office of Student Conduct. Inappropriate activity during exams (e.g., consulting notes or other students) may result in a zero on the exam and will be submitted to the Office of Student Conduct. As a student in this course, you will be held accountable for your actions.

ART 12 Introduction to Western Art: Renaissance to the Present Summer 2018 (July 13-August 9) Instructor: Marta Becherini

ART 12 Introduction to Western Art: Renaissance to the Present Summer 2018 (July 13-August 9) Instructor: Marta Becherini Course hours This course meets every day from Monday to Friday for two hours each