GRADUATE ART HISTORY & ARCHITECTURAL HISTORY OFFERINGS – FALL 2008* Please check the Online COD to confirm the following information. Updates can occur at any time and the information here is to be used as a guideline. ARAH LIBRARY METHODOLOGY
9:00-9:50 R
REQUIRED FOR ALL ENTERING GRADUATE STUDENTS IN THE JOINT PROGRAM IN ART AND ARCHITECTURAL HISTORY An examination of the bibliography of the arts, including architecture, archaeology, decorative arts, and photography. Related fields, such as philosophy, history, and literature, will be considered for their relevance to art historical research. Reference & research tools will be analyzed in terms of their purpose, scope, methodology, and applications to specific information needs. Special attention will be given to computerized tools and to developing online searching skills on VIRGO, DIALOG, OCLC, RLIN, and other Internet-accessible resources. ARAH 533 Renaissance Art and Culture
1:00-3:30 T An introduction to various aspects of Renaissance art as seen in a broad context (social, religious, literary, etc.), this class will deal with art in relation to the aesthetics and theology of Dante's "Comedy" and the wide-ranging "Lives" by Vasari. Grounding our investigation in the writings of Burckhardt, Pater, and Berenson, we will focus our attention on early Renaissance Florentine painting through Leonardo. ARH 800 Theories and Methods of Architectural History
3:30-6:05 T This seminar is concerned with the history and practice of architectural history. What are the origins of architectural history as a distinct field? How have the questions and aims of research changed over time? How do historians of architecture define their task? What is the aim of their research, how do they determine their research methods, what shapes their interpretation, and what constitutes evidence? The organization of the course is both thematic and roughly chronological, moving from a consideration of some of the earliest issues to confront writers about architecture to an analysis of questions considered pressing by scholars today. The semester will be punctuated by guest appearances from faculty members in art and architectural history, who will speak about essays or books that have shaped the way they think about what they do. The readings in this seminar, though diverse in date, purpose, and subject, should together form a core that will inform the way you formulate your own research questions and define your relation to the field. ARAH 801 Theory and Interpretation in the Visual Arts
10:00-12:30 M This seminar provides an introduction to the foundations of art and architectural history and to the methodological and theoretical approaches that have structured the discipline. Our historiographic orientation will take off from early authors Pliny and Vasari before considering the eighteenth-century founding of art history as a discrete discipline. Moving outwards from key eighteenth and nineteenth-century figures and modern practices of stylistic analysis and connoisseurship, we will consider more recent approaches including social history, psychoanalysis, feminism, and queer theory, among others. Throughout, we will be attuned to the diverse methods and strategies by which writers account for art objects, understand them within a historical framework, and attend to the particular relations between objects and makers, as well as between objects and viewers. ARAH 802 Theory of Classical Archaeology
3:30-6:00 W This seminar is intended to introduce students of Classical Art and Archaeology to a range of theoretical and methodological approaches. Functioning in part as a pro-seminar, it will encourage students to question interpretation and presentation of the past, as well as to confront a range of ethical and practical issues. Material covered will represent a variety of periods from Greek prehistory to Imperial Roman. The history of the discipline will be covered, as will the relationship of archaeology to classics, art history, and anthropology. Requirements include: a series of short written response papers (4-5 pages), a term paper (c. 20 pages), and oral presentations. Instructor permission is required for this seminar. ARAH 917 Pompeii
10:00-12:30 W An exploration of the life, art (especially wall painting from the domestic realm), architecture, urban development, religion, economy, and daily life of the city destroyed in the cataclysmic eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in A.D. 79. Themes include patronage (including the political implications of patronage), social interaction within the city, meaning of artistic programs, legibility of the urban environment, and influence from Rome. Special attention is given to the Pompeii Forum Project and its research in the forum at Pompeii. Weekly reading and writing, seminar paper; final report. ARAH/ARH 921: From Roman to Romanesque: The Classical Past in Medieval Visual Culture
10:00-12:30 R Prerequisites Open to graduate students in Graduate Arts & Sciences and the School of Architecture. Previous course work in art or architectural history is recommended. Course description This course will explore a range of connections between the classical past and the middle ages. Weekly readings as well as student research projects will analyze such topics as the use of ancient sites, spolia, texts, iconography, and artistic forms in medieval visual culture. Well-known examples of this phenomenon include Charlemagne’s invocation of the Lateran in his palace complex at Aachen, connections between Trajan’s column and the Bayeux Tapestry, as well as antique sculptural vocabulary at Reims Cathedral. Further examples can be found in medieval Islamic culture such as the Great Mosque at Damascus and in the Byzantine Empire. The course will endeavor to explore this issue in examples from medieval Islamic and Byzantine culture as well as that of the Latin West. Requirements Class attendance is required as well as completion of weekly reading assignments. Each student will work on a research project culminating in a 30-minute class presentation and 15-20 page paper. Occasional short (1-2 page) papers) may be assigned. Readings: Assigned readings will include texts by Richard Krautheimer, Peter Brown, Michael McCormick, and Richard Brilliant, They will be available, when possible, through the course Toolkit site. Number of Students Authorized to Enroll: 12 Satisfies Requirement (Building Elective, Preservation Certificate, etc.): This course will satisfy the medieval distribution requirement for students in the Joint Program in art & architectural history and the M.A. program in architectural history. ARAH 931 Mapping Renaissance Europe
10:00-12:30 T TBA ARAH 937 The Greek Symposium II
2:00-2:15 TR The Greek Symposium, Mr. Bell and Ms. Clay. We will explore the symposium as a defining institution in archaic and early classical Greek culture, as a locus for the production of poetry, as a dedicated space in domestic and religious architecture, and as a leading theme in funerary and vase painting. ARAH 954 Transnational Modernisms
10:00-12:30 W
This seminar considers the movements of designers, building forms, architectural ideas, and people across national boundaries, from the late period of colonial
expansion (the end of the nineteenth and early twentieth century) into the more recent past. Our aim will be to consider the methodological and theoretical frameworks that architectural and urban historians have used to understand how buildings, cities, and landscapes have been shaped through cross-cultural exchange
and contestation. Readings will address a wide range of geographical locations, with
particular emphasis on the Mediterranean region. Important issues for discussion will include the architecture and urbanism of colonialism and its legacies; the changing architectural forms and meanings of “modern,” “vernacular,” and “traditional;” reinterpretations of the past through tourist practices and spaces; as well was recent debates regarding regionalism, globalization, transnationalism, and postcolonial theory.
Prerequisites:
• graduate standing
• or significant coursework in architectural history Select Readings:
• Steven Nelson, From Cameroon to Paris (2007).
• Mia Fuller, Moderns Abroad (2007).
• Kwame Appiah, Cosmopolitanism (2006).
• Swati Chattopadhyay, Representing Calcutta (2005).
• Anthony King, The Spaces of Global Cultures (2004).
• Nezar Alsayyad, ed., The End of Tradition? (2004).
• Mark Crinson, Modern Architecture and the End of
Empire (2003).
• Michael Dear, Postborder City (2003).
• Anabel Wharton, Building the Cold War (2001).
• Abidin Kusno, Behind the Postcolonial (2000).
• Patricia Morton, Hybrid Modernities (2000). Requirements:
• Weekly readings & discussion
• Weekly response papers
• Final term paper (20-25 pages) & presentation ARAH 958 Alexander Calder: Physics and Poetry
3:30-6:00 R American sculptors Alexander Stirling Calder (1870-1945) and Alexander Milne Calder (1846-1923). His mother Nanette Lederer (1866-1960) was a painter and, like her husband and father-in-law, trained at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia. Alternatively the youngest Alexander Calder chose to be trained as a mechanical engineer at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken NJ. From there Calder went on to change the definition and experience of sculpture in the 20th century through his radical conceptions of the "Mobile" and "Stabile". This class will examine the range and depth of Calder's unprecedented body of work. We also will explore the artist's lifestyle and connections with the avant- garde from Brancusi to Miro and Mondrian as well as the artist's collaborations in realms of architecture, theatre, and dance. Assigned readings will inform weekly discussions concerning the changing motivations and assumptions in the world of modern art over a span of sixty years that under gird Calder's remarkably pragmatic inventions. Evaluation will be made on the basis of weekly class participation, an oral presentation, and a 15-20-page research paper. ARAH 961 American Art and Memory e
10:00-12:30 R Two events—the American Revolution and the American Civil War—preoccupied artists (and Americans) for much of the nineteenth century. Key figures (such as George Washington and Abraham Lincoln), key moments (such as Washington Crossing the Delaware and Abraham Lincoln’s assassination) and key historical issues (such as slavery) were memorialized as Americans remembered, refigured, and revised their understanding and interpretation of America’s past. This seminar will explore the cultural history of memory as well as the many images—painting, popular prints, and monuments—that surround these two events. AR H 980 / ARAH 980 Wilderness and Rusticity
10:00-12:30 T
Prerequisites
Graduate student standing. Description and Method
The concepts of wilderness and rusticity are major components of American identity and therefore art and design. We will examine and discuss the works of painters (Cole and Bierstadt), writers (Bryant and Burroughs), architects (Richardson and Colter), designers (Stickley and Durant), and landscape architects (Olmsted and) the NPS through the common theme through the common theme and influence of the concept of Wilderness. The seminar will involve readings, discussions, student presentations, and a major paper. All students are expected to read the assigned materials with a critical eye, and to come to class ready to discuss them. Requirements
The final grade will be composed of 25% class discussion, participation; 25% in class report and presentation; 50% final paper and presentation. Readings
Required reading will include:
Roderick Nash, Wilderness and the American Mind (rev. ed. 1973).
Ethan Carr, Wilderness by Design: Landscape Architecture & the National Park Service (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1998). Number of students authorized to enroll: 15    | |||
