U.C. Berkeley History of Art

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COURSES FALL 2008

R1B

READING AND WRITING ABOUT VISUAL EXPERIENCE (4 units)

Section 1 CANCELLED Intructor: TBA	Section 2 TuTh 9:30-11:00 104 Moffit CCN: 05406 Intructor: Vera Shapirshteyn	Section 3 TuTh 11:00-12:30 104 Moffit CCN: 05409 Intructor: Joni Spigler
Section 4 TuTh 12:30-2 104 Moffit CCN: 05412 Intructor: Christine Schick	Section 5 TuTh 2-3:30 104 Moffit CCN: 05415 Intructor: Meredith Hoy	Section 6 TuTh 3:30-5 104 Moffit CCN: 05418 Intructor: Caty Telfair
Section 7 CANCELLED Intructor: TBA	Section 8 TuTh 5-6:30 308B Doe CCN: 05424 Intructor: Chris Lakey	Section 9 MW 4-5:30 104 Moffit CCN: 05426 Intructor: Vesna Rodic

One objective of this course is to introduce students to the historical study and interpretation of art. If you have already taken a course in the History of Art, you should enroll in an R1B course in another department or in a more advanced course in the History of Art.

This course is an introduction to visuality and the disciplines of art history. Its primary aim is to guide students through the processes of learning to recognize and craft persuasive and elegant arguments about visual experience. We will anchor our inquiry of vision and perception, and our efforts to develop our capacity for interpretation, by focusing on the work of selected artists. We will also expand our inquiry beyond the fine arts, testing the applicability of our perceptual and analytic skills on other kinds of visual phenomena, including film, architecture, and advertising. To begin, we will familiarize ourselves with fundamental concepts and tools for reading and writing about visual experience. These include questions of material and form; models of attention and perception, the relationship between language and vision; the role of description in interpretation; and what constitutes a satisfying and complete account of visual experience. Throughout the semester we will analyze and improve our writing abilities as we move from basic compositional skills to the construction of a compelling and effective argument. Our work will be practical in nature, and a good portion of our class time will be spent talking in small groups and working on in-class writing exercises. At the end of the term, students will write a 7-9 page paper about a single artist or work of art. Reading will figure in this course as significantly as writing. We will devote much of our home preparation and class time to the discussion of short essays, analyzing them both for their rhetorical strategies and for the lessons they have to teach us about our own writing. Students should expect to submit their prose to the same kinds of analysis that will be applied to the work of published authors, counting themselves members of the wider community of writers.

This class satisfies the second half of the Reading and Composition requirement

R1B Descriptions

Section 2
CCN 05406
V. Shapirshteyn
Image and Its Destruction: Vandalism, Censorship,
Iconoclasm.

Section 3
CCN 05409
J. Spigler

Animal Rights (and Wrongs)

This course provides an introduction to the role of visual analysis in the discipline of art history. Its primary aim is to guide students through the process of learning to recognize and craft precise arguments about visual experience. The theme of the course is “Animal Rights (and Wrongs)”. We will begin the semester by discussing the historical role animals have played in Western society and representation since the late 18th century and how shifting attitudes towards animals in the 19th and 20th centuries have led artists, advertisers, and activists to deploy images of animals in an attempt to change or maintain the /human : animal/ status quo. The era we will explore is one of unprecedented social, cultural, scientific and technological development in animal-related areas as disparate as medical and pharmacological experimentation, agricultural production, public zoos, pet-keeping, hunting, experimentation relying on vivisection, the collection of animal specimens from foreign lands, fur and fashion, space exploration, animal communication and the use of animals as performers. This course requires that students engage with actual artworks in local museum spaces (Berkeley Art Museum; SF Museum of Modern Art, etc.) and we will also have the opportunity for a studio visit with a local artist whose work focuses on animal issues. A series of individual and group writing assignments will allow students to hone their analytical, research and interpretive skills. For the final research paper, students will choose an artist or theme and write a careful analysis of several works, drawing upon a few, pertinent outside sources. Much class time will be devoted to reading and discussing student writing.
Nota bene: This course may require that we look at – and think carefully about – images that some students might find disturbing.

Section 4
CCN 05412
C. Schick
Not Available

Section 5
CCN 05415
M. Hoy

Aesthetic Revolutions in the History of Art

This course will examine moments of revolution in the history of art. Our recognition of “images,” “pictures,” or “works of art” is dependent upon convention. We must understand the kinds of images we see in artworks not as direct copies of the world, but as mediated interpretations. Interpretations, through repetition, become solidified into pictorial norms that govern the shape and content of images and artworks. However, these norms change according to the historical, geographical, cultural situation of the artist and of the viewer. This course uses the notion of revolution to illustrate how drastic changes to accepted codes of representation not only reveal the deeply encoded nature of images, but also expose the coded infrastructure of images that have come to seem “natural”. Periods of revolution destabilize or even overturn our notions about what counts as a picture, and more generally, what counts as art. If constant repetition of familiar codes of inscription has led us to believe there is one natural or correct way to make images, moments of aesthetic revolution show us that constructed images, ostensibly transparent copies of the world, appear familiar to us only because they reference and draw from existing pictorial conventions.
This course draws its source material from a variety of artifacts—paintings, photographs, films, and installations—representative of a series of revolutionary moments and avant-garde movements in art. Although the selections are arranged in a loosely chronological order, this course is not meant as an exhaustive survey. Rather, I have selected a few movements altered viewers’ “ways of seeing” by changing the norms and expanding the boundaries of visual representation. Some of the genres, movements, and theoretical topics covered during the semester include: Paleolithic cave drawing, Renaissance Perspective, Impressionism, Cubism, Photography, Film, Conceptual Art and Digital Art.
Over the course of the semester, students will develop the skills to read, interpret, and analyze both texts and artworks. Papers will range from short, descriptive analyses to close readings, to longer exegeses, and will culminate in a research project on a topic of the student’s choosing due by the end of the semester. Frequent blog postings and collaborative group discussions will encourage students to develop effective spoken and written arguments.

Section 6
CCN 05418
C. Telfair

“There is no more fascinating surface on earth than that of the human face.” - Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

The portrait is one of the most common forms of depiction in Western art history. From era to era, its basic formats have stayed in many ways remarkably consistent, but the significance, the purpose, and the intended destination for the portrait have been in constant flux. These changes, among others, allow for tremendous insight into ideas of the self, of society, of expectations about interpersonal relationships, and of the role of representation in different places and times. Writing successfully about a portrait is tricky, as it involves constant attention to the roles of subject, artist and viewer, rigorous research in the cultural milieu of the work, and close attention to iconographic choices. It also involves thinking very carefully about the relationship between the sitter and the way the artist chooses to manifest in a representation what they feel to be important about that person: What makes a person worth depicting in that moment and place? How is it different for men and women, for adults and children? If there are multiple figures in the portrait, how can their relationship be described? What are the philosophical ideas that inflect the impression a sitter wishes to make in his or her portrait? And formally speaking, how does the artist either reinforce or comment on the intentions of the subject being depicted?

In this class, we will be reading a selection of art historical literature focused on the investigation and meaning of portraits. The literature on portraiture is tremendously varied both methodologically and theoretically, and we will therefore also be introduced to the broader spectrum of ways to look at, think, and write about art. We will also be practicing the basic skills involved in both reading and writing effectively in an academic context.

Section 8
CCN 05424
C. Lakey

This section will focus on sculpture, both pre-modern and modern, and will encourage students to think and write about sculpture as they experience it in real spaces (museums, the Berkeley campus, etc). The purpose of this class is to introduce students to the materials and principles of sculptural production and to guide them through the process of writing about sculpture as three-dimensional form. The paragone - the historical debate concerning the differences between painting and sculpture - will be a central concept of investigation throughout the semester. Students will be exposed to primary sources, basic research skills, and will improve their critical reading and writing skills through weekly writing assignments. For the final research paper, students will investigate a specific sculpture located in a Bay Area museum (SFMOMA, BAM, etc).

Section 9
CCN 05426
V.Rodic
Not available