Art History

Buddhism is an important cultural force in contemporary Japan, and has been a constant presence in Japanese culture since its introduction from China (through Korea) in the 6th century. This course selectively traces the development of Buddhist sculpture, painting and architecture in Japan over the course of this nearly 1,500 year span, always trying to view objects in light of their original ritualistic context.

This course follows Buddhist art from its origins in India to its development in China, primarily from the 2nd through the 14th centuries. We will study the evolution of sculpture, painting, and architecture produced for Buddhist functions with attention to the original contexts of the visual imagery. Many examples of Chinese Buddhist art have been moved from temples to sites of secular display in fine art museums around the world, and the class will consider the shifts and conflicts in values, religious as well as aesthetic and monetary, created by this movement of Buddhist art objects.

This course is an introduction to the major traditions, messages, and styles of the art of ancient Italy, from the era of the Etruscans through the Roman Republic and Empire to the reign of Constantine the Great. Emphasis will be placed upon such topics as the emergence and function of portraiture and the ideology and art of the Augustan period.

Prerequisites: None, but ARH 204 strongly recommended

Virtually all extant artifacts from China predating the 3rd century CE have been found in burials. This course examines Chinese mortuary art and architecture, especially from the neolithic period through the Han dynasty, which ended in 220 CE; some later examples of funerary practices, as exemplified by such sites as the Ming imperial tombs and the mausoleum of Chairman Mao, will also be introduced.

In the late Bronze and early Iron Ages (first millennium B.C.E.), the Eurasian steppe zone between China and Greece was dominated by related semi-nomadic peoples, sometimes referred to as Scytho-Siberians or Early Nomads. We know their culture through their art:

This course covers the history of photography from its origins as a new medium in the early 19th century through the introduction and uses of digital today. While surveying the major technological innovations and careers of key photographers, the course material emphasizes understanding the multiple, pervasive roles played by photographic imagery throughout the modern, industrialized era. Topics range from the social function of photography to its place as an art form with purely aesthetic concerns.

With the work of artists such as George Seurat, Vincent van Gogh, Paul Gauguin, and Paul Cézanne in the 1880s, a radical shift began away from the representational paradigm that had governed Western art since the fourteenth- and fifteenth centuries. The changes in form and content that came to be characterized as "modernist art" culminated in the abstract art produced in the immediate aftermath of World War II. This course will provide a broad overview of visual art produced during the modernist era in Europe and North America.

Beginning with the rise to prominence of Jacques-Louis David and Francisco Goya in the 1780s and ending with the death of Paul Cézanne in 1906 (covering the artistic movements of neoclassicism, romanticism, realism, and impressionism) this course offers a broad overview of visual art made during the nineteenth century in Europe and North America. Although its focus is primarily on painting and sculpture, it also examines architecture, photography, printmaking, and the decorative arts.

This course examines the history of western printmaking in Europe, fourteenth through nineteenth centuries, and its development in the United States to about 1960. The unique aesthetic qualities of prints as exemplified by outstanding masters, the impact of prints on local social history, and the power of prints to reveal cultural history will be discussed. Also the evolution and character of various media, the ebb and flow of print popularity in Europe and America, and the impact of commercialism will be investigated.

The Middle Ages is often perceived by students and others as a distant period, either barbarous and backward or as the world of King Arthur and Lancelot, jousts, the Crusades, or the age of Epic Heroes and courtly love. Neither perception is accurate. The descriptive title, "Middle Ages" itself is misleading and poorly describes this time that is close to one thousand years in length and is composed of a healthy number of uniquely diverse cultures.