UPCOMING Undergraduate Courses – Summer/Fall 2024
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PLEASE NOTE: Regarding Prerequisites, ARH 3056/3057 are equivalent to the current survey courses ARH 2050/2051. 3056 and 3057 no longer exist. If you see these numbers as prerequisites, 2050 and 2051 are the actual prerequisites.
ARH 4933 is a Special Topics in Art History course with changing topics each term. This course may be repeated to a maximum of twelve (12) semester hours. If you take this course for more than twelve hours (more than four times, in the same semester or in different semesters), any hours over twelve will not count toward earned credit for your degree, though your grade will still count toward your GPA.
SUMMER A (May 13 – June 21, 2024)
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ARH 4933–02 Art of the Iberian Peninsula Dr. Nina Gonzalbez T/R 1:20–4:30pm WJB 2041 This course is an introduction to the art of the Iberian Peninsula and surveys artworks, architecture, and artists from the Roman era to present-day Spain (21st century). Special attention will be paid to cultural identity and transculturation to |
SUMMER B (June 24–August 2, 2024)
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ARH 4800–01 Contemporary Native American Art (Seminar) Dr. Kristin Dowell T/R 1:20–4:30 WJB 2038 Meets Liberal Studies Scholarship-in-Practice and Upper-Division Writing requirements. Focusing on work produced in the last twenty years, this course explores the dynamic field of contemporary Native American art. We examine how Native artists create work in dialogue with the global art world while firmly rooted in local connections to territory, identity, and cultural practices through a variety of forms including: painting, photography, installation art, performance art and experimental media. |
FALL 2024
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ARH 3473–01 Introduction to Modern and Contemporary Art Dr. Tenley Bick T/R 1:20–2:35pm WJB G40 World Arts. What is modern art? When (and where) is the contemporary? This course introduces students to modern and contemporary art as subjects of art historical study. The course addresses major and anti-canonical topics, debates, and movements in the historically Eurocentric and now revisionist, decolonial discourse on modern and contemporary art in international and global contexts. Dominant histories focused on the U.S. and Western Europe will be questioned and expanded through examination of international and transnational movements, as well as discussion of art historiography, cultural geopolitics, and field-changing theory and methods that coincide with the period of study. Topics include, among others: theories of modernism and modernity; histories of the avant-garde; and re-conceptualizations of artistic practice and authorship, including photography and moving-image work, the found object, participatory art, social practice, installation, performance art, conceptualism, and digital art. No prerequisites. Graduate auditors permitted.
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ARH 3930–02 Introduction to Native American & Indigenous Art and Culture Dr. Kristin Dowell T/R 9:45-11:00 am WJB G040 World Arts. An introduction to the range of artistic practices within Native American cultures throughout North America. We explore customary artistic practices as well as continuities between these ancestral practices and contemporary Native American art today. Connections between Native American and global Indigenous art practices will be examined along with Indigenous art historical research methodologies.
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ARH 3930–03 Introduction to Medieval Art Dr. Erika Loic T/R 3:05-4:20 pm WJB G040 World Art. This survey of medieval art and architecture introduces students to some of the major cultural and sociopolitical changes that took place across Afro-Eurasia in the fourth through fifteenth centuries. Topics of special interest include migration, religious iconography, debates on figuration, pilgrimage, monasticism, imperial imagery, and cultural exchange. Prerequisite: ARH 2050. |
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ARH 4352–01 Southern Baroque Art Dr. Robert Neuman T/R 1:20-2:35 pm WJB 2041 This course investigates painting, sculpture, and architecture in Italy and Spain during the 17th century, stressing the theatrical, ecstatic, and virtuoso character of works produced for royalty, the Church, and the rising middle class by such masters as Caravaggio, Bernini, and Velázquez. |
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ARH 4414–01 Modern European Art: Neoclassicism through Impressionism Dr. Adam Jolles T/R 11:35 am – 12:50 pm WJB G040 This course treats European art from 1780–1880, concentrating on the evolving dialogue between academic and anti-academic practices through an investigation of the relationship between theory, criticism, and techniques of representation. Topics of inquiry include: David and Neo-classicism; British landscape painting; Delacroix and French Romanticism; Courbet’s Realism and Manet’s Naturalism; and French Impressionism. Prerequisite: ARH 2051 or instructor permission. |
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ARH 4793–01 Cultural Heritage Dr. Brendan Weaver M/W 9:20-10:35 WJB G041 World Arts. This undergraduate seminar introduces key issues, concepts, and practices in the field of cultural heritage studies, including such topics as tangible and intangible cultural heritage, authenticity and identity, the impact of development and conflict, and the role of policy, public opinion, ethics, and tourism in the protection and interpretation of cultural heritage. |
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ARH 4933–03 Art of the Byzantine Empire: New Rome Dr. Lynn Jones T/R 9:45-11:00 am in WJB 2041 World Arts. This course covers the art and architecture of the Byzantine Empire, the empire of medieval Rome. Students will work with artifacts from the period, facilitating hands-on learning. |
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ARH 4933–02 History of American Comics Dr. Mora Beauchamp-Byrd M/W 10:40–11:55 am WJB G040 This course provides an introduction to a cultural history of American comics, examining a broad range of comic forms, including animation, comic books, graphic novels, newspaper comic strips, and webcomics. Course participants will gain a greater understanding of technical language and theoretical approaches for analyzing comics, including interdisciplinary methods drawn from art history, film studies, literature, psychoanalysis, and race and gender studies, for example. Topics covered include: genre studies that investigate detective, science fiction, and superhero comics; the 1954 Comics Code and other issues of comics censorship; and translations of comic forms into film and TV series such as Black Panther, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, The Umbrella Academy, and The Walking Dead. This course will also discuss key figures like George Herriman, whose Krazy Kat strip brought unprecedented conceptual and stylistic innovation to early 20th c. newspapers; pioneering cartoonist Jackie Ormes, who developed the celebrated Torchy in Heartbeats and other comic strips for African American newspapers from the late 1930s through the mid-1950s; and Reina Telgemeier, whose Smile (2010), an award-winning autobiographical graphic novel, was based on an earlier webcomic series. |
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ARH 4933–01 Nineteenth-Century American Art Dr. Karen Bearor M/W 1:20-2:35 pm WJB G040 This course will look at American painting, sculpture, and early photography during the 1800s. We will consider the ways in which Westward expansion fueled grand landscape art, while other artists explored Impressionist landscapes on the East coast, along with domestic interiors. We will conclude the semester with a consideration of the art showcased at the Chicago World’s Fair of 1893. Prerequisites: ARH 2050 and ARH 2051. |
Undergraduate Seminars
Seminars are the capstone courses for the art history undergraduate curriculum. They are research- and writing-intensive courses that give students opportunities to pursue original scholarship. Two seminars are required for the major.
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ARH 4800-01 Social Life of Art Objects Dr. Kyle Killian Fridays 9:20-11:50 WJB G041 Meets Liberal Studies Scholarship-in-Practice and Upper-Division Writing requirements. If a work of art or architecture exists in the present for us to see, then it has had a long and varied life. By considering that life we confront many points of contact between a work of art and the worlds in which it has existed that are not related to its status as art. Yet art retains a particular power as an agent in the changing social networks of which it has been a part. Museum and heritage studies ,the ability of works of art to shape, not just represent, their social contexts, and their role as components of economic systems will among the perspectives we will consider in this seminar. |
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ARH 4800-02 Early Modern Prints Dr. Stephanie Leitch Mondays 12:00-2:30 pm in WJB G041 Meets Liberal Studies Scholarship-in-Practice and Upper-Division Writing requirements. This course will examine some of the issues at stake in the study of prints, such as circulating fake news, early modern prints that inspired today’s social media (Facebook and selfies!), fixing categories of peoples and animals, practices of copying, centers of production, modes of collecting, the print as a work of art, and other instances of reception. |
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ARH 4800–03 Spanish Golden Age Dr. Lorenzo Pericolo Thursdays 4:50 – 7:20 pm, WJB G041.This course will explore the rich production of painting and sculpture in late sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Spain. The work of canonical painters such as El Greco, Diego Velázquez, Francisco de Zurbarán, and Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, will be the object of study. The course will discuss the importance and complexity of certain artistic genres: still-life (bodegón), court portrait, and polychrome devotional sculpture. Emphasis will also lie on the representation of outcasts and children. The course will also focus on the court of the Spanish King Philip IV (r. 1621–1665). |
Recurring Courses
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ARH 2050/2051 Art History Surveys Required for Art History majors Sections and times vary; see Student Central Course Search. These foundation courses introduce students to the discipline of art history through a survey of canonical and anti-canonical narratives of the history of art (ARH2050: prehistoric to late-Medieval periods; ARH2051: early Renaissance through global contemporary art). While the courses are organized chronologically, they are also unified by the theme of “encounters,” broadly conceived to address a wide range of unexpected meetings, confrontations, and points of exchange between two distinct entities—artistic, cultural, ideological, and more. Encounters may therefore include meetings of different artistic movements, cultural traditions, and belief systems, among other subjects. The courses address select works of art and creative expression from across history that offer students an opportunity for close object-focused study and skills development that are foundational to the discipline. The courses also teach students to build critical thinking and aptitude through discussion of the overarching course theme in a variety of contexts. |
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ARH 2814 Cultural Heritage in the Digital Age Leah Sherman Online / Asynchronous Liberal Studies Designations: Scholarship-in-Practice, Computer Competency/Digital Literacy. This course introduces students to digital literacy through the lens of cultural heritage. The curriculum of this course includes readings, hands-on activities, discussion posts, quizzes, current events, and a significant final project geared toward the issues and practices of cultural heritage within today’s digital world. This is an online, asynchronous course where students will learn first-hand that digital literacy is not a skillset limited to one field of study or career path alone, and they will find that by gaining new competencies in this arena that they can participate in and help to shape a discourse reaching far beyond their own time and place. Cultural heritage is similarly not limited to one discipline or one culture, and it is not a historical topic – the currency and global nature of cultural heritage are two themes we will continuously see throughout the semester. |
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ARH 3794–01 Museum Basics Dr. Carey Fee Friday 9:20–11:50 am WJB 2040 Reserved for students in the Museum Studies Minor. From cabinets of curiosities to virtual museums, this course addresses museum history, philosophy, practice and careers. Through readings, discussions, guest lectures, field trips to local museums and a number of short topical projects, students will develop a framework for understanding the role of today’s museums. They will also be prepared to evaluate the major issues facing museum professionals today. |
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ARH 2030 Reading & Writing in Art History Dr. Julia Kershaw M/W 3:05–4:20 pm (room tba) This course is a foundation-level, practicum-style class focusing on reading and writing art history as a discipline of study. It is intended for undergraduate students interested in pursuing art history as a major, minor, or track within the Humanities major.It should be taken early in study. Students will develop the ability to read and critique writing about art and execute competent writing in multiple formats. Classes include discussion, group work, structured writing activities, peer review workshops, and lectures. The course is based on the conviction that to write well in the discipline one must be able to read critically and effectively. Prerequisite: ARH 2050 or ARH 2051 |
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ARH 3930–01 Curatorial Activism Grace Ali Tuesdays 1:20–3:50 pm WJB G041 Reserved for students in the Museum Studies Minor. This course examines key exhibitions that have elevated the voices of those historically silenced or omitted from master narratives of art — curatorial projects centering women, artists of color, indigenous and immigrant communities, among others. Through several Case Studies — pioneering examples of exhibitions mounted in the past decade — the course explores how these curatorial projects have countered institutional erasure, broken down boundaries and been enriched and provoked through a curatorial activism lens. (image: Carrie Mae Weems, The Louvre, from “The Museum Series”, 2006.) |
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IDS 3678-01 Apocalypse: The End of the World in Art Dr. Richard Emmerson Online / Asynchronous Liberal Studies Designations: Humanities and Cultural Practice, Upper-Division Writing.
NOTE: Does not count toward the Art History major. This course studies beliefs about how the world will end and how the end is represented in the arts from the Bible to the present. We will analyze how such beliefs influenced history, continue to inform contemporary politics, and are being transformed by fears of nuclear war and environmental disaster. |
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ARH 2000 Art, Architecture, and Artistic Vision – Online Dr. Sarah Buck Online / Asynchronous Liberal Studies Designation: State-Wide; Humanities & Cultural Practice Core. NOTE: Does not count toward the Art History major. ARH 2000 is a fully-online art-appreciation course that introduces students to diverse forms of art and architecture created throughout history. Designed for remote learning since 2014, ARH 2000 is organized into weekly thematic modules that conclude with interactive assignments and discussions designed to encourage learning through role-playing, reflecting, and creating (no artistic skill necessary!). By completing this course’s interactive assignments and participating in this class, students actively practice thinking about art and its relevance to the world in which we live. |
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