What is it?

Why is it important?

What do you think about it?

 

Looking at art can be a thrilling, comforting, or baffling experience. This course is designed to introduce students to art history, build visual analysis skills and confidence to engage with different kinds of art. Through conversational classes, we will consider some major themes in western art history, such as the treatment of the figure through time; how light can be used as a symbolic device and as a medium for art itself, and different approaches to still life from Renaissance altarpieces to Cezanne’s revolutionary apples and Warhol’s soup cans.

 

This course offers a firm grounding in the Classical or Academic tradition of painting and sculpture, to better understand the ground-breaking innovations of the late nineteenth century, where artists rejected pictorial conventions and burst open the parameters of art.

 

These classes are opportunities for open discussion and the sharing of ideas about art history. Students will gain a sweeping understanding from Michelangelo to Manet, and Caravaggio to [Bill] Culbert. Moreover, students will be empowered to engage with art that may be out of their personal comfort zones, to better understand the visual culture that we live within.

 

This course is designed for anyone interested in art history and no prior knowledge is necessary.