AMERICAN ART,

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1 AMERICAN ART, :082:351:01 Professor Tanya Sheehan 01:050:351:01 Art History Department Spring 2013 Rutgers University Tu/Th 2:50-4:10pm Zimmerli Art Museum Office: Art History Annex Multipurpose Room 60 College Avenue Room 302 Office hours: Tuesday 4:30-6pm Course description This lecture course surveys art of the United States, from the American Revolution to the Armory Show of Our approach will be to situate the images, visual practices, and artistic styles of this period within their social, historical, and cultural contexts. Among the topics we will consider are art and nationalism, portraiture and the self, picturing war, art and popular culture, race and representation, the idea of the modern artist, and European influences on American art. In exploring these topics we will pay particular attention to the role that artistic production and consumption played in constructing American social identities and culture across the long nineteenth century. In addition to attending lectures, students will make several visits to area museums to view original artworks. These visits will serve as the basis for the three writing assignments in the course. Course materials You are required to purchase the following books, which have been ordered for you at the Barnes & Noble Bookstore at Rutgers: Marianne Doezema and Elizabeth Milroy, eds., Reading American Art (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998; ISBN: ) and Francis K. Pohl, Framing America: A Social History of American Art, third edition (New York: Thames and Hudson, 2012; ISBN: ). Other required readings and course materials, including the syllabus, writing assignments, and the PowerPoint presentations used in class, will be posted on Sakai, the Rutgers course webpage system: Learning goals Upon completion of this course students will be able to: 1) Understand the development of US art across time and place

2 2) Analyze artworks in themselves and in relation to specific histories, values, languages, cultures, and technologies 3) Write critical essays about visual representation These learning goals will be assessed as follows: 10% Class participation; assessment based on attendance, contributions to class discussion, demonstrated effort and commitment to course goals 50% (2) writing assignments based on objects at the Zimmerli Art Museum (including online plagiarism tutorial) 40% (1) writing assignment based on the American Wing at the Metropolitan Museum of Art Class policies Students are expected to attend all classes; if you must miss a class, please use the university s online absence reporting system to indicate the date of and reason for your absence: An is automatically sent to me. Three or more absences will seriously impact your final grade. All assigned readings are required and should be completed before class to enable your full participation. All writing assignments must be submitted in two forms: 1) as a printed copy in class; and 2) as an MS Word document uploaded to the Assignments folder on Sakai. Note that written work will receive a 5% grade reduction per day late; if two classes pass after the due date, your work will receive a failing grade. Exceptions will be made in documented cases of illness, family emergencies, religious holidays, etc. Please make sure to keep me informed of any circumstances that may prevent you from passing in your best work on time. Open communication between students and instructor is very important to me; it also directly contributes to your success in this (as in any other) course. I encourage you to meet with me in office hours or schedule an appointment to discuss any aspect of your performance in the course and/or specific course materials/content. Note that I will also comment on drafts of your written work in person, but not by . Finally, please be aware that Rutgers provides appropriate academic accommodations for students with disabilities; you should inform me within the first two weeks of class of any special accommodations you will require. Plagiarism and academic honesty Please familiarize yourself with the definition of plagiarism in the Rutgers Policy on Academic Integrity: As a student in this course, you are responsible for understanding and adhering to this policy. Any student who violates academic integrity in this course will receive no credit for the given assignment and, in some cases, a failing grade for the semester. All such violations are reported to the Office of Student Conduct and will seriously impact your academic career. IMPORTANT: All students enrolled in this course must complete an online tutorial on plagiarism before submission of the first writing assignment, as noted on the class schedule below. To complete this tutorial, please go to You must register using your Rutgers address. Then read everything in Student Resources and complete the following TWO exercises:

3 Acknowledging Sources (under Knowing Which Sources to Acknowledge ) and Recognizing Plagiarism (under Avoiding Plagiarism ). Your responses will be recorded and delivered to me electronically. This is a course requirement that will be graded (pass/fail). Writing guidelines All of your writing assignments must be typed and should adhere to the following style: 12-point, Times New Roman font; double spacing; single-sided pages; and 1-inch margins on all sides (you will need to set these in MS Word). Please include internal citations when necessary e.g., (Sheehan, 5) as well as a bibliography, both of which should adhere to either MLA or Chicago style. MLA and Chicago style guides are available in libraries throughout campus. All papers must be carefully proofread for typographical errors as well as spelling and grammatical mistakes. Students who do not follow these guidelines will be asked to revise and resubmit their essays, which will then be subject to the penalties for lateness defined above. As already noted, writing assignments will only be accepted through the Assignments folder in Sakai. Library resources The Art Library has designed an online research guide for students enrolled in art history courses: This guide will help you locate books, articles, images, websites, and other resources available at Rutgers. Class schedule TU, Jan 22 Introduction Complete the online plagiarism assignment described above: TH, Jan 24 American history painting Guest lecture by Dr. Barbara Mitnick, independent scholar and Rutgers alumna Barbara J. Mitnick, The History of History Painting, and Paintings for the People: American Popular History Painting, , in Picturing History: American Painting , ed. William Ayres (1993), 29-43, Pohl, TU, Jan 29 Antebellum portraiture and the construction of social identity David Jaffee, A Correct Likeness : Culture and Commerce in Nineteenth-Century Rural America, in Reading American Art, Paul Staiti, Character and Class: The Portraits of John Singleton Copley, in Reading American Art, Pohl,

4 TH, Jan 31 TU, Feb 5 Class visit to the American Galleries at the Zimmerli Museum The art of observation and deception: the Peale family Roger B. Stein, Charles Willson Peale s Expressive Design: The Artist in His Museum, in Reading American Art, Pohl, TH, Feb 7 The idea of the American artist: Morse Peter John Brownlee, A New Look: Samuel F. B. Morse s "Gallery of the Louvre exhibition brochure (National Gallery of Art, 2011) Pohl, TU, Feb 12 Nature and nation I: Cole and the rise of American landscape painting Thomas Cole, Essay on American Scenery, American Monthly Magazine 1 (January 1836): 1-12 Pohl, TH, Feb 14 NO CLASS (Prof. Sheehan at CAA Conference) Paper #1 must be submitted to Prof. Sheehan s mailbox in the Art History Dept. AND to Sakai by 3pm. The plagiarism tutorial must be completed online by this date. TU, Feb 19 Picturing Native Americans: King and Catlin Kathryn S. Hight, Doomed to Perish: George Catlin's Depictions of the Mandan, in Reading American Art, George Catlin, Letter No. 1, in Letters and Notes of the North American Indians, Volume 1 (1841), 1-11 Pohl, , TH, Feb 21 Comic genre painting: Mount and Spencer Pohl, , TU, Feb 26 Studio portrait photography and the American middle class Object lesson: early studio portraits Andrea Volpe, Cartes de Visite Portrait Photographs and the Culture of Class Formation, in The Middling Sorts: Explorations in the History of the American Middle Class, ed. Burton J. Bledstein and Robert D. Johnston,

5 Pohl, 136 TH, Feb 28 Bodies on the battlefield: Photography and the Civil War Brady s Photographs: Pictures of the Dead at Antietam, New York Times (October 20, 1862): 5 Alan Trachtenberg, Albums of War: On Reading Civil War Photographs, in Critical Issues in American Art: A Book of Readings, ed. Mary Ann Calo, Pohl, TU, Mar 5 Nature and nation II: The romantic landscape tradition Pohl, TH, Mar 7 Slavery to freedom I: Johnson and Homer Marc Simpson, The Bright Side: Humorously Conceived and Truthfully Executed, in Winslow Homer: Paintings of the Civil War, Pohl, , TU, Mar 12 and Th, Mar 14 Class visit to the Morse Center (On view: prints by Winslow Homer) Lloyd Goodrich, The Graphic Art of Winslow Homer, in The Graphic Art of Winslow Homer, 9-19 TU, Mar 19 TH, Mar 21 TU, Mar 26 TH, Mar 28 NO CLASS (Spring Recess) NO CLASS (Spring Recess) NO CLASS (in lieu of field trips) Slavery to freedom II: Sculpture Joy S. Kasson, Narratives of the Female Body: The Greek Slave, in Reading American Art, Pohl, , TU, Apr 2 Art and science in the circle of Eakins William C. Brownell, The Art Schools of Philadelphia, Scribner s Monthly XVIII, no. 5 (September 1879):

6 Elizabeth Johns, The Gross Clinic, or Portrait of Professor Gross, in Reading American Art, TH, Apr 4 (En)gendering the modern artist I: Eakins and Cassatt Paper #2 must be submitted in class AND to Sakai Martin Berger, Manly Associations, in Man Made: Thomas Eakins and the Construction of Gilded Age Manhood, 7-46 Griselda Pollock, Mary Cassatt: Painter of Women and Children, in Reading American Art, Pohl, , TU, Apr 9 International style I: American Impressionism William H. Gerdts, Americans and Impressionism: At Home and Abroad, in American Impressionism (second edition), TH, Apr 11 International style II: Aestheticism Guest lecture: Justin McCann, PhD candidate, Art History Dept, Rutgers James McNeill Whistler, Ten O Clock lecture, 1885 Pohl, TU, Apr 16 (En)gendering the modern artist II: Sargent and Beaux Sarah Burns, The Earnest Untiring Worker and the Magician of the Brush: Gender Politics in the Criticism of Cecilia Beaux and John Singer Sargent, Oxford Art Journal 15, no. 1 (1992): Pohl, TH, Apr 18 African American art in the late-19 th century: Tanner Judith Wilson, Lifting the Veil : Henry O. Tanner s The Banjo Lesson and The Thankful Poor, in Critical Issues in American Art: A Book of Readings, ed. Mary Ann Calo, Pohl, TU, Apr 23 Urban vision I: The Ashcan School Rebecca Zurier, Another Look at the Ashcan School, in Picturing the City: Urban Vision and the Ashcan School, 23-44

7 Pohl, TH, Apr 25 Urban vision II: Early documentary photography Alan Trachtenberg, Camera Work/Social Work, in Reading American Photographs, TU, Apr 30 Fashioning an American avant-garde: The Armory Show The Armory Show, in Sources & Documents: American Art, , ed. John W. McCoubrey, Primary sources include: Walt Kuhn, Letter to Walter Pach (1912); Frederick James Gregg, Preface to the Catalogue for the International Exhibition of Modern Art (1913); Theodore Roosevelt, A Layman s Views of an Art Exhibition (1913); Kenyon Cox, The Modern Spirit in Art (1913) Pohl, , FR, May 3 Class visit to the Newark Museum: American Galleries (10am-12pm) Field trip details TBA FR, May 10 Paper #3 must be submitted to Prof. Sheehan s mailbox in the Art History Dept. AND to Sakai by 3pm