Catalogue 2022-2023 [ARCHIVED CATALOG]
Art Department
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Chair: Laura Newman;
Professors: Tobias Armborst, Lisa Gail Collins, Eve D’Ambra, Brian Lukacher, Molly Nesbit, Laura Newman;
Associate Professors: Yvonne Eleta;
Assistant Professors: Gordon Hall, Elizabeth Lastrab, Jin Xua;
Lecturer: T. Barton Thurber;
Visiting Assistant Professors: Padma Rajendran, Christina Tenaglia, Luisa Valle;
Adjunct Assistant Professors: James Case-Leal, Abigail Gunnels, Judith Linn, Haohao Lu, Gina Ruggeri;
Adjunct Instructors: Benjamin Degen, Michael Norton.
Art History Major Advisers: The art history faculty.
Studio Art Major Advisers: The studio art faculty.
a On leave 2022/23, first semester
b On leave 2022/23, second semester
Major
Correlate Sequences in Art
Art History: I. Introductory
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ART 105 - Introduction to the History of Art and Architecture Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
Opening with the global present, ART 105 now uses today’s digital universe as a contemporary point of reference to earlier forms of visual communication.Faculty presentations explore the original functions and creative expressions of art and architecture,shaped through varied materials, tools andtechnologies. Within this visual legacy fundamental experiences and aspirations emerge: forms of religious devotion, attitudes toward nature and the human body, and the perpetual need for individual and social definition. Moving through painting, sculpture and architecture of pre-history through great monuments of the Middle East, Egypt, Greece, Rome and Asian Antiquity, we examine the flowering of medieval art and architecture through current research in computer imaging. The print revolution and the Protestant Reformation’s redirection of the role of images then lead us to connections between Renaissance art and science in works by Leonardo da Vinci and Albrecht Dürer. Weekly discussion sections help students develop essential tools of visual analysis through study of original works in the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center. Electing both semesters of ART 105, 106 in chronological sequence is strongly recommended, but each may now be taken individually or in the order that fits a student’s schedule.
NRO available for juniors and seniors.
Open to all classes. Enrollment limited by class.
Three 50-minute periods and one 50-minute conference period.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 106 - Introduction to the History of Art and Architecture Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
ART 106 continues exploration of an accelerating global exchange of images and ideas from Michelangelo in the High Renaissance to contemporary architecture and video. Between then and now, we consider the emergence of the public art museum along with industrializing cultures and mass media in the nineteenth century. As we trace the rise of modernity and the increasing authority assumed by artists and architects, we examine new forms of public space, both urban and natural, and the impact of alternative creative and political practices. In considering American developments, Art 106 provides a focus for analyzing the ongoing dynamic between indigenous and newly arriving cultural forms: Native American, African American, Latino, Asian and European. Such diversity has created a richly layered foundation for today’s efforts to interpret, display and safeguard the world’s irreplaceable cultural heritage, old and new. Electing both semesters of ART 105 ,106 in chronological sequence is strongly recommended, but each may now be taken individually or in the order that fits a student’s schedule.
NRO available for juniors and seniors.
Open to all classes. Enrollment limited by class.
Three 50-minute periods and one 50-minute conference period.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 120 - The Vassar Campus
0.5 unit(s)
(Same as CLCS 120 ) A multidisciplinary exploration of the Vassar College campus. This intensive course is conducted as a succession of local field trips to sites across the college, and walks around campus. With this direct experience of landscape, buildings, and collections, from works of art to natural history specimens, we consider the history of Vassar’s campus, as well as our lived experience of campus spaces. We also approach our own campus in broader contexts, exploring the notion of campus in American culture, the campus as physical space and as idea, and the role of place in higher education. Individual projects allow participants to explore a campus space of their choice in various modes. Students from all majors are encouraged to apply. Yvonne Elet.
Prerequisite(s): Permission of the instructor.
First six-week course.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: INT -
ART 125 - Vassar Collects, 1864-present Semester Offered: Fall
0.5 unit(s)
Since the founding of the College, artifacts, specimens, and works of art have been collected and used regularly for teaching, display, and research. In conjunction with an artist commission for the new Institute of Liberal Arts, students seek, examine, and document original objects across the campus and in diverse holdings for inclusion in the project. Readings draw from the fields of geology, anthropology, archaeology, music, art history, and other disciplines. T. Barton Thurber.
Prerequisite(s): Permission of the instructor.
Second six-week course.
One 2-hour period.
Course Format: INT -
ART 144 - Living in the Ancient City Semester Offered: Spring
0.5 unit(s)
(Same as GRST 144 and URBS 144 ) The great Mediterranean cities of Classical Antiquity, Athens in the 5th c. BC and Rome in the 1st-2nd c. CE (along with some of their satellite cities), are synonymous with the rise of western civilization. The city plans and monumental architecture dominate our view, but this course also focuses on the civic institutions housed in the spectacular buildings and the social worlds shaped by the grand public spaces, as well as the cramped working quarters. Neighborhoods of the rich and the poor, their leisure haunts, and places of congregation and entertainment are explored to reveal the rituals of everyday life and their political consequences. Eve D’Ambra.
Second six-week course.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 160 - Visual Art and Storytelling Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as AMST 160 ) Stories and storytelling reside at the heart of human experience; they have the power to shape–and shift–our understandings, actions, and imaginations. How do visual artists, makers, and other cultural workers draw on the power of storytelling to deepen seeing and knowing and enable emergent stories and realities? Focusing on generative twentieth and twenty-first century creative projects in the U.S., this first-year writing seminar–a community of practice and care–explores critical arts and acts of storytelling. Lisa Collins.
Open only to first-year students; satisfies the college requirement for a First-Year Writing Seminar.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS
Art History: II. Intermediate
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ART 211 - Rome: The Art of Empire Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as GRST 211 and URBS 211 ) From humble beginnings to its conquest of most of the known world, Rome dominated the Mediterranean with the power of its empire. Art and architecture gave monumental expression to its political ideology, especially in the building of cities that spread Roman civilization across most of Europe and parts of the Middle East and Africa. Roman art also featured adornment, luxury, and collecting in both public and private spheres. Given the diversity of the people included in the Roman empire and its artistic forms, what is particularly Roman about Roman art? Eve D’Ambra.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 -ART 106 or GRST 216 or GRST 217 , or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 215 - The Art and Archaeology of Ancient Egypt
1 unit(s)
(Same as GRST 215 ) Ancient Egypt has long fascinated the public with its pyramids, mummies, and golden divine rulers. This course provides a survey of the archaeology, art, and architecture of ancient Egypt from the prehistoric cultures of the Nile Valley through the period of Cleopatra’s rule and Roman domination. Topics to be studied include the art of the funerary cult and the afterlife, technology and social organization, and court rituals of the pharaohs, along with aspects of everyday life. Eve D’Ambra.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 or one unit of Greek and Roman Studies, or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 219 - The First Cities: The Art and Archaeology of the Ancient Near East
1 unit(s)
(Same as GRST 219 and URBS 219 ) The art, architecture, and artifacts of the region comprising ancient Iraq, Iran, Syria, Palestine, and Turkey from 3200 BCE to the conquest of Alexander the Great in the fourth century BCE. Beginning with the rise of cities and cuneiform writing in Mesopotamia, course topics include the role of the arts in the formation of states and complex societies, cult practices, trade and military action, as well as in everyday life. How do we make sense of the past through its ruins and artifacts, especially when they are under attack (the destruction wrought by ISIS)? Eve D’Ambra.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or 106 or one unit in Greek and Roman Studies, or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 220 - Medieval Art and Architecture Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
This course surveys the art and architecture of Europe and Byzantium during the Middle Ages, a thousand-year period from ca. 400 to 1400. Exploring medieval art and visual culture chronologically, we consider a number of topics central to medieval society including monasticism, icons and iconoclasm, saints and their relics, pilgrimage, and court culture. The course covers the wide range of medieval artistic production, from various forms of painting and sculpture to wood and ivory carving, mosaic, metalwork, textiles, and architecture. Elizabeth Lastra.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 , coursework in Medieval Studies, or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
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ART 221 - Islamic Art and Architecture
1 unit(s)
This course surveys Islamic art and architecture from the beginnings of Islam in the 7th century through the early modern period. We cover Umayyad Jerusalem and Damascus, Abbasid Baghdad, Fatimid Cairo, the period of the Crusades, the impact of the Mongols, and the Gunpowder Empires, as well as a range of media from architecture and monumental decoration to textiles and calligraphy. Throughout the course, we explore the interactions between Islamic art and neighboring peoples and cultures. Elizabeth Lastra.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 , coursework in Medieval Studies, or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 230 - Art in the Age of Van Eyck, Durer and Bruegel
1 unit(s)
The Northern Renaissance. Early Netherlandish and German art from Campin, van Eyck and van der Weyden to Bosch, Bruegel, Dürer and Holbein. This transformative period, which saw the invention of the printing press in the fifteenth century and the explosive turmoil of the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century, generated a profound reassessment of the role of images in the form of new responses toward human representation in devotional and narrative painting and printmaking as well as developments in secular subjects such as portraiture and landscape. Haohao Lu.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 231 - The Golden Age of Rubens, Rembrandt and Vermeer Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
An exploration of painting and printmaking during the Golden Age of the Netherlands. Lectures focus on Rubens, Rembrandt, Vermeer and their contemporary colleagues who specialized in landscape, still life, architectural and marine painting. While examining the effect of differing religions systems in Flanders and the Dutch Republic, we consider how economic triumph, scientific research and global trade stimulated the formation and flowering of Netherlandish art in the Age of Observation. Haohao Lu
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 235 - The Rise of the Artist, from Giotto to Leonardo da Vinci
1 unit(s)
A survey of Italian art c. 1300 - c.1500, when major cultural shifts led to a redefinition of art, and the artist emerged as a new creative and intellectual power. The course considers painting, sculpture and decorative arts by artists including Giotto, Donatello, Botticelli, and Leonardo. Our study of artworks and primary texts reveals how a predominantly Christian society embraced the revival of ancient pagan culture, elements of atheist philosophy, and Islamic science. We also discuss art in the context of nascent multiculturalism and consumerism in the new city-states; the importance of new communications systems, such as print; and artistic exchange with northern Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean centers of Baghdad and Constantinople. Other topics include art theory and criticism; techniques and materials of painting and sculpture; experiments with multimedia and mass production; developments in perspective and illusionism; ritual and ceremonial; and art that called into question notions of sexuality and gender roles. Yvonne Elet.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 , or permission of the instructor; open to students without prerequisites who have taken any courses in Italian.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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ART 236 - Art in the Age of Leonardo, Raphael, and Michelangelo
1 unit(s)
(Same as ITAL 236 ) An exploration of the works of these three masters and their contemporaries in Renaissance Italy, c. 1485 - c. 1565. The primary focus is on painting and sculpture, but the course also considers drawings, prints, landscape, gardens, and decorative arts, emphasizing artists’ increasing tendency to work in multiple media. We trace changing ideas about the role of the artist and the nature of artistic creativity; and consider how these Renaissance masters laid foundations for art, and its history, theory and criticism for centuries to come. Other topics include artists’ workshops; interactions between artists and patrons; the role of the spectator; ritual and ceremonial; and Renaissance ideas about beauty, sexuality and gender. Yvonne Elet.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 , or permission of the instructor; open to students without prerequisites who have taken any courses in Italian.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 240 - Global History of Modern Architecture and Urbanism I: Race, Capital, and Empire Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as URBS 240 ) A period of emancipations, industrial development, dramatic urban growth, imperial expansion, nation formation, migrations, and cultural exchange, the long nineteenth century (1789-1914) saw the rise of new theories and practices of architecture and urbanism. This course offers analytic tools to investigate canonical and non-canonical buildings and urban landscapes, critical histories of the relationships between local and global culture, race, and space, and the projects of modernization, modernity, and modernism. Luisa Valle
Prerequisite(s): Permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 249 - Encounter and Exchange: American Art from 1565 to 1865 Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as AMST 249 ) This course provides a survey of the visual arts made in the United States (or by American artists living abroad) until 1865, beginning with the first European representations of Native Americans in the 16th century and ending with Alexander Gardner’s images of death and destruction on the battlefields of the U.S. Civil War. It emphasizes the significance of cross-cultural encounter and international exchange to the creation and reception of artworks produced in a variety of media, including painting, sculpture, architecture, photography, and prints. Our approach will be both chronological and thematic, considering topics such as the role of art in the construction of national identity; the origins of the U.S. art market; and the tensions of class, gender, race, and ethnicity in early American art.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 , or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 251 - American Art from Colonial Encounters to the Harlem Renaissance
1 unit(s)
(Same as AMST 251 ) How can we encounter the histories of America in works of art? Why should we care about encountering them? This course explores such questions by surveying some of the most compelling paintings, sculptures, photographs, prints, and decorative arts produced in the United States—from the first encounters between indigenous peoples of this land to New York City’s Harlem Renaissance in the 1920s. Whenever possible, course meetings are held at the Loeb Art Center, and an optional class trip to New York City art museums is organized. In these class lectures and discussions, our goal is to articulate together how works of art from the past shape and construct our sense of American history, and how art continues to matter today. Artists covered include John Singleton Copley, Thomas Cole, William Sydney Mount, Mato-tope (and other Mandan artists), David Drake, Winslow Homer, Mary Cassatt, and Jacob Lawrence, among many others. Caroline Culp.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 or a 100-level American Studies course, or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 256 - The Arts of China Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as ASIA 256 ) This course offers a survey of art in China from prehistory to the present. The remarkable range of works to be studied includes archeological discoveries, imperial tombs, palace and temple architecture, Buddhist and Taoist sculpture, ceramics, calligraphy, painting, and experimental art in recent decades. We examine the visual and material features of objects for insight into how these works were crafted, and ask what made these works meaningful to artists and audiences. Readings in primary sources and secondary scholarship allow for deeper investigation of the diverse contexts in which the arts of China have evolved. Among the issues we confront are art’s relationship to politics, ethics, gender, religion, cultural interaction, and to social, technological, and environmental change. Jin Xu.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 , one Asian Studies course, or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 260 - The Silk Roads: Visual and Material Culture
1 unit(s)
(Same as ASIA 260 ) Stretching some 8,000 kilometers from east to west, the Silk Road is a network of trade routes that provided a bridge between the east and the west. Although the eastern part of the routes had been in use for millennia, the opening of the Silk Road occurred during the first century BCE, when China secured control over the eastern section and began trading with the Roman Empire through intermediary states in Central Asia. From this time until the end of the Mongol Yuan period in the fourteenth century, with periods of disruptions, the Silk Road flourished as a commercial and at times military highway. But more than that, the Silk Road was a channel for the transmission of ideas, technologies, and artistic forms and styles, with far-reaching impact beyond China and the Mediterranean world, extending to Southwest Asia, Africa, the Atlantic shores of Europe, and Japan to the east. This course examines the art forms that flourished along the Silk Road between the first and fourteenth centuries CE, ranging from ceramics, glass, gold and silverware, textiles, to religious art. Special attention is paid to important sites such as Dunhuang (a Buddhist cave-temple site), Chang’an (capital of Han and Tang China), and Shosoin (the imperial art treasure house of Nara Japan). Jin Xu.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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ART 262 - Art and Revolution in Europe, 1789-1848 Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
A survey of major movements and figures in European art, 1789-1848, focusing on such issues as the contemporaneity of antiquity in revolutionary history painting, the eclipse of mythological and religious art by an art of social observation and political commentary, the romantic cult of genius, imagination, and creative self-definition, and the emergence of landscape painting in an industrializing culture. Brian Lukacher.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 , or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 263 - Painters of Modern Life: Realism, Impressionism, Symbolism Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as GNCS 263 ) A survey of major movements and figures in European art, 1848-1900, examining the realist, impressionist, and symbolist challenges to the dominant art institutions, aesthetic assumptions, and social values of the period; also addressing how a critique of modernity and a sociology of aesthetics can be seen developing through these phases of artistic experimentation. Brian Lukacher.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 , or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 264 - The Metropolitan Avant-Gardes Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as MEDS 264 and URBS 264 ) Radical prototypes of creativity and self-organization were forged by the new groups of artists, writers, filmmakers and architects that emerged in the first decades of the twentieth century. They based themselves in the new metropolitan centers. The course studies the avant-gardes’ different and often competing efforts to meet the economic transformation that industrialization was bringing to city and country alike. Afterward, the role of art itself would be seen completely differently. Molly Nesbit.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 , or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods and one weekly film screening.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 265 - Modern Art and the Mass Media: the New Public Sphere
1 unit(s)
(Same as MEDS 265 and URBS 265 ) When the public sphere was reset during the twentieth century by a new order of mass media, the place of art and artists in the new order needed to be claimed. The course studies the negotiations between modern art and the mass media (advertising, cinema, TV), in theory and in practice, during the years between the Great Depression and the liberation movements of the late 1960s–the foundation stones of our own contemporary culture. As a consequence, the physical spaces of culture would be reimagined and designed. Molly Nesbit.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 .
Two 75-minute periods and one film screening.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 266 - Art, Urgency, and Everyday Life in the United States Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as AFRS 266 and AMST 266 What is this thing called socially-engaged, social practice, activist, and/or community-centered art? Where does it come from, who makes it, who is it for, how does it work, and what can it do? What are some of the ways this interdisciplinary practice–often woven within struggles for justice and healing–is defined and deployed? And how might its success be assessed? Dwelling together on these questions by way of dynamic case studies, we consider how a range of U.S. based creators are grappling with urgent issues of our time. Lisa Collins.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 or coursework in Africana Studies, American Studies, Women’s Studies, or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 268 - After 1968: Sustainable Aesthetics Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as MEDS 268 and URBS 268 ) This course studies the emancipation of the visual arts after 1968, here and abroad, together with the political and philosophical discussions that guided them. Theory and practice would form new combinations. The traditional fine arts as well as the new media, performance, film, architecture and installation art are treated as part of the wider global evolution creating new theaters of action, critique, community and hope. Molly Nesbit.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 .
Two 75-minute periods and one film screening.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 272 - “All That Is Solid Melts Into Air”: Modernity’s Global Story Through Architecture (1800s-1930s) Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as URBS 272 ) While the ideas that gave rise to an era that today is spoken of as the age of Modernity originated in the Enlightenment or even the Renaissance; architecture’s account of Modernity took an acute and unprecedented turn at the end of the nineteenth century, which coincided with the rise of the Industrial Revolution. Adolf Loos and F.T Marinetti rejected past architectural forms and championed minimalist structures that spoke to the new technological age. Antonio Gaudi and others created an ornate architecture known as Modernistá. In other parts of the world, Modernity’s tale involved movement of former slaves recasting Classical, Renaissance and Baroque architecture as their own, modern architecture. This class explores how the advent of Modernity into the world assumes many guises if narrated through the architecture people created. Adedoyin Teriba.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 273 - A Mirror Image: The Search for Self, Place & Home in Contemporary Architecture in the World, 1980s+
1 unit(s)
(Same as URBS 273 ) One could imagine that in the 1970s, the architectural movement known as the International Style looked back at the twentieth century with glee, surveying its spoils. It was after all, a style of architecture that held the century in thrall for almost 50 years; determining the built forms for much of the world in steel, glass and concrete. Le Corbusier for instance, likened architecture to a machine with parts that could be erected and function anywhere. Yet voices arose to articulate local architectural responses to such a paradigm, where the interrelationship between self, place, identity and home needed to be articulated in built form. The phrase that became the rallying cry for such a movement was “Critical Regionalism” and this course analyzes how many architectural projects in Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas embodied an approach to a more humane architecture. Adedoyin Teriba.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 or permission of the instructor.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 274 - Buildings and Cities in Early Modern Italy Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as URBS 274 ) A history of architecture and urban design on the Italian peninsula, c. 1300-1700. We focus on the influential centers of Florence, Rome, and Venice, with reference to parallel developments elsewhere in Europe and the Mediterranean. Buildings and urban spaces are considered in social and political contexts, looking at the social structures as well as the patrons for which they were designed: governments, trade guilds, popes, nobles, and merchants. We study architectural and urban forms in relation to their functions, considering quotidian and ceremonial uses, the public and private spheres, and gendered spaces. Visual and textual evidence of performance, navigation, ritual, and sound reveal the varied ways that interior and exterior spaces could be experienced. Other topics include the changing role of the architect; individual versus collaborative design methods; the relation between theory and practice; new media; the transmission of memory; patterns of urban information exchange; manifestations of the ideal city; and the relation of urban, suburban, and rural topography. We investigate the designs and built work of such figures as Brunelleschi, Leon Battista Alberti, Leonardo da Vinci, Bramante, Raphael, Michelangelo, Palladio, Bernini, and Borromini. We also consider multimedia ensembles that blur traditional boundaries among art, architecture, urbanism, and landscape. Yvonne Elet.
Two 75-minute periods.
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ART 277 - Visual Psychedelia Semester Offered: Fall
0.5 unit(s)
The youth oriented counter-culture of the 1960s and early 1970s was defined in part by the ”altered states” induced through hallucinogenic drugs. This phenomenon resulted in a complicated array of new forms of visual culture. We will examine these developments in the art movements (op-art and others), poster art/graphic design, album covers, and cinema associated with the drug culture of LSD. The popular revival and recovery of the work of earlier artists (Bosch, Blake) and artistic trends (art nouveau) that were deemed “visionary” will also be considered. The creative theories of the mind and higher consciousness associated with hallucinogens are examined, from Coleridge, Baudelaire, and Huxley, to Leary, Bateson, and Casteñeda. Brian Lukacher.
Prerequisite(s): ART 106 or permission of the instructor.
Second six-week course.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 279 - Landscape History and Conservation at Matthew Vassar’s Springside Semester Offered: Spring
0.5 unit(s)
(Same as ENST 279 ) Springside, Matthew Vassar’s summer home in Poughkeepsie, was originally a 47-acre, park-like estate comprising a network of buildings in a verdant landscape, with an orchard and farm. Winding carriage paths gave artfully planned vistas of flora, fauna, and garden elements: fountains, sculpture, duck ponds, meadows with grazing sheep, and wooded knolls. Designed in 1850 by the pioneering American landscape architect Andrew Jackson Downing, assisted by his partner Calvert Vaux (who later partnered with Frederick Law Olmsted to produce Central and Prospect Parks), Springside is Downing’s only extant landscape, created a National Historic Landmark in 1969. Downing translated the forms of European villas and English landscape gardens to American needs and democratic ideals, designing for people of varied means, reflected in his motto: “a home to every man and a garden to every home”. Matthew Vassar embraced Downing’s belief that well designed homes and gardens were a force for public good, opening Springside to visitors, which prefigured the public park.
Today, the estate is much reduced in scale and scope, although it now boasts many large, mature trees of varied species. We consider the important history of Downing’s work, and the goals and challenges of historic landscape stewardship. Through a field trip to Springside, visits to Special Collections and the Loeb, and discussions with landscape preservation specialists, we consider the significance of this historic site, and confront the question: how can it survive in an altered form, and exist for a very changed time?
Other topics include nineteenth-century responses to indigenous landscape, the rural cemetery movement, poetry and music dedicated to Springside, Downing’s and Vaux’s writings and architectural designs, intermedial designs for architecture and landscape, the emerging role of the landscape architect, and the legacy of Downing’s ideas in the Vassar campus. Yvonne Elet.
Prerequisite(s): Permission of Instructor. Students in Art, Environmental Studies, Urban Studies, Geography, History, and English are especially encouraged to apply.
Second six-week course.
One 2-hour period.
Course Format: INT -
ART 290 - Community-Engaged Learning Semester Offered: Fall or Spring
0.5 to 1 unit(s)
Projects undertaken in cooperation with approved galleries, archives, collections, or other agencies concerned with the visual arts, including architecture. The Department.
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 -ART 106 and one 200-level course.
Open by permission of a supervising instructor.
May be taken either semester or in the summer.
Course Format: INT -
ART 292 - Collecting Antiquities at Vassar: Lost and Found in the Loeb Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as GRST 292 ) This intensive is designed as a directed independent study conducted in the Loeb Antiquities storeroom for close study of ancient art and artifacts. The intensive aims to impart skills involved in identifying fakes and establishing authenticity, to consider the ethics and politics of collecting, and to explore the changing role of ancient art in the museum and its display in galleries. Eve D’Ambra.
Prerequisite(s): Permission of the instructor.
One 2-hour period.
Course Format: INT -
ART 293 - Asian Art in 100 Objects
0.5 unit(s)
(Same as ASIA 293 ) This intensive offers students an opportunity to study Asian art with real objects. Together, we critically analyze potteries, bronzes, ceramics, stone carvings, and other art forms from China, Japan, and Korea. This shared experience provides an in-depth examination of objects that are often studied for their visual qualities alone. Jin Xu.
Second six-week course.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: INT -
ART 295 - Paper Protests: Printmaking as Activism Semester Offered: Fall
0.5 unit(s)
Throughout history, artists have protested war and injustice, critiqued the privileged and powerful, and struggled for peace and progress. Many have turned to printmaking as a reproducible and cost-effective means of delivering social messages to the broadest audience possible. Spanning the 18th century to the present, this course considers printmaking as a form of activism, drawing on the collection of the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center. We consider how artists such as William Hogarth, Francisco Goya, Käthe Kollwitz, Elizabeth Catlett, and the Guerrilla Girls have used printmaking as a medium to protest and provoke, to encourage empathy and action, and to promote positive social change. John Murphy
Prerequisite(s): ART 105 or ART 106 .
Second six-week course.
One 2-hour period.
Course Format: INT -
ART 296 - Art and an Archive
0.5 unit(s)
(Same as AMST 296 ) The Smithsonian Institution’s Archives of American Art claims to be “the world’s preeminent and most widely used research center dedicated to collecting, preserving, and providing access to primary sources that document the history of the visual arts in America.” Its vast holdings include original materials such as diaries, scrapbooks, letters, manuscripts, financial records, preliminary sketches, photographs, films, and recordings. The Archives also boasts the largest collection of oral histories anywhere on the subject of art. Its Oral History Program has sought and sustained the distinctive voices and memories of artists and other cultural workers in more than 2,300 oral history interviews since its establishment in the 1950s; and this program persists. Collection specialists continue to seek sources that document the stories at the heart of artmaking in the US; two recent oral history initiatives include the Visual Arts and the AIDS Epidemic: An Oral History Project (2016-18) and the Pandemic Oral History Project (2020). In this collaborative, project-based workshop, we immerse ourselves in the Archives’ online resources, paying particularly close attention to the in-depth oral histories, life stories, and other firsthand accounts by visual artists. Together, we closely analyze sources, freshly interpret artwork, piece together stories, and engage key questions of interpretation, evidence, and the limits and possibilities of an archive. Lisa Collins.
Prerequisite(s): Permission of the instructor.
Second six-week course.
One 2-hour period.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: INT -
ART 298 - Independent Work Semester Offered: Fall or Spring
0.5 to 1 unit(s)
Open by permission of the instructor with the concurrence of the adviser in the field of concentration. Not included in the minimum for the major.
Course Format: OTH
Art History: III. Advanced
Studio Art: I. Introductory
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ART 102 - Drawing I: Visual Language Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
Development of visual ideas through a range of approaches to drawing. Emphasis is placed on perceptual drawing from life through subjects including landscape, interior, still life, and the human figure. In the second semester, figure drawing is the primary focus. Throughout the year, students work in a range of black and white media, as the elements of drawing (line, shape, value, form, space and texture) are investigated through specific problems. This course is suitable for both beginners and students with drawing experience. Gordon Hall, Joshua Marsh, Gina Ruggeri, Christina Tenaglia.
Open to all classes.
Yearlong course 102-ART 103 .
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 103 - Drawing I: Visual Language Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
Development of visual ideas through a range of approaches to drawing. Emphasis is placed on perceptual drawing from life, through subjects including landscape, interior, still life, and the human figure. In the second semester, figure drawing is the primary focus. Throughout the year, students work in a range of black and white media, as the elements of drawing (line, shape, value, form, space and texture) are investigated through specific problems. Joshua Marsh, Gina Ruggeri, Christina Tenaglia.
Open to all classes.
Yearlong course ART 102 -103.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 108 - Color Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
To develop students’ understanding of color as a phenomenon and its role in art. Color theories are discussed and students solve problems to investigate color interactions using collage and paint. Padma Rajendran.
Open to all classes.
Course Format: CLS
Studio Art: II. Intermediate
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ART 202 - Painting I Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
An introductory course in the fundamentals of painting, designed to develop seeing as well as formulating visual ideas. Working primarily from landscape and still life, the language of painting is studied through a series of specific exercises that involve working from observation. Activities and projects that address a variety of visual media and their relationship to painting are also explored. Gina Ruggeri.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -ART 103 and permission of the instructor.
Yearlong course 202-ART 203 .
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 203 - Painting I Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
A variety of painting strategies are explored, working primarily from the human figure, including representation, metaphor, narrative, pictorial space, memory, and identity. Gina Ruggeri.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -ART 103 .
Yearlong course ART 202 -203.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 204 - Sculpture I Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
Sculpture 204 is the first half of a year-long course that introduces the fundamental concepts of making sculpture: objects, space, materiality, and bodies. How do we co-exist with objects in space? How do objects hold meaning and affect us? Students will learn to think three-dimensionally in terms of form, scale, weight, spatiality, and materiality. Over the course of the year, we engage in a series of project-based assignments to develop our artistic languages and acquire proficiency in making with wood, plaster, fabric, metal, paper, mold-making, assemblage, and many other materials and techniques, both traditional and non-traditional. Simultaneously, we engage in discussions about the core issues in sculpture, engage with a range of theories of materiality and bodies, and learn from the examples of a diverse group of sculptors, both historical and contemporary. Students are encouraged to take risks, get messy, and bring their interests, passions, identities, and investments to use as materials in their artistic work. The course is punctuated by organized group critiques, in which we develop our capacities to offer and accept critical constructive feedback within a diverse group. No pre-existing experience working with sculpture is required. Gordon Hall.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -ART 103 and permission of the instructor.
Yearlong course 204-ART 205 .
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 205 - Sculpture I Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
Introduction to the language of three-dimensional form through a sequence of specific problems which involve the use of various materials. We explore the nature of form, object, space, structure, and materiality. As we think about and work within these concepts of three dimensions, we will breach ongoing considerations and methods that come into play: sound, time, light, smell, utility, site, installation, process, permanence, performance, audience, and audience interaction. Issues of context (formal, cultural, historical, present) and placement will be addressed constantly. Does your work have edges? Where and what are they? Does it begin and end? What has come before it? How does your work engage with its immediate and broader surroundings? Gordon Hall
Yearlong course ART 204 -205.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 206 - Drawing II Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
This course explores drawing as a process, as a thinking space, as a record, as a response, as a practice, and as a way to investigate and sustain ideas. Students generate independent drawing inquiries that may shift, change and grow while taking an interpretive approach to assignments. Short and long term projects are developed, with an emphasis on working through both perceptual and conceptual concerns alongside material investigations. Working together, we attempt to place drawing into a broader way of thinking and communicating. Expected and unexpected drawing materials and methods are encouraged, definitions of drawing are actively questioned and explored. Christina Tenaglia.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -ART 103 and permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 207 - Drawing II
1 unit(s)
This course promotes the opportunities, openings, and possibilities that arise over time through an immersive, sustained drawing practice. Students embark on a drawing or a series of drawings working on them throughout the semester while pursuing prompts and accidents to arrive at a destination impossible to preconceive. Peter Charlap.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -103 .
Two 2-hour periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 208 - Printmaking: Relief Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
An exploration of printing practices and concepts, this course explores the fundamentals of printmaking as techniques as well as conceptual processes - repetition, replication, mirroring, transferring, layering, pressure, orientation, reduction, reuse, opacity, transparency, chance, systems, distribution and collaboration. Focusing primarily on relief techniques including linocut, woodcut, monotype, stencil, stamping and collagraph, we explore the possibilities as well as push up against the constraints of each of these processes. We consider the making of multiples and sequences within inclusive contexts of image making, art making, communicating, messaging and viewing. Studying prints pulled from the Loeb’s collection is an underlying component of this course. Christina Tenaglia.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -ART 103 and permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 209 - Printmaking: Intaglio Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
This course is designed to explore the fundamentals of printmaking focusing primarily on Intaglio techniques including collagraph, drypoint, etching, and embossing. While drawing and mark making are at the core of these printmaking techniques, pushing up against the constraints of each process is encouraged. We will explore various monotype techniques both on their own and as layers for multi plate printing. We will play with the making of multiples and sequences and consider how they operate in a broader view of image making, art making, communicating, conceptual thinking and viewing. Repetition, replicability, mirroring, transferring and layering will be investigated as printmaking techniques as well as concepts within the making of an image. Christina Tenaglia.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 , and permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 212 - Photography Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
An investigation of the visual language of black and white photography. The technical and expressive aspects of exposing film, developing negatives, and printing in the darkroom are explored. No previous photographic experience is necessary. Students are required to provide their own camera, film and photographic paper. Judith Linn.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -ART 103 and permission of the instructor.
One 4-hour period.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 213 - Photography II Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
This course explores the development of an individual photographic language. Technical aspects of exposure, developing and printing are taught as integral to the formation of a personal visual esthetic. All students are required to supply their own camera, film, and photographic paper. Judith Linn.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -ART 103 and/or permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 214 - Color Digital Photography Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
This course examines how color in light delineates space and form. The goal of this class is to record this phenomenon as accurately as possible. Scanning traditional silver gelatin film and digital capture systems are utilized. Digital color prints are produced using Photoshop and inkjet printing. Some of the topics covered are the documentary value of color information, the ability of the computer program to idealize our experience of reality, and the demise of the latent image. James Case-Leal
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -ART 103 and permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 217 - Video Art Semester Offered: Fall and Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as FILM 217 ) Video continues to document, illuminate, and instruct our lives daily. New channels of accessibility have opened it to a broad range of alternative practices, always in relation to its online or televised utility. In this studio, students make videos to better understand the affects and formal potential of video as an opportunity for critique. Technical experimentation covers the major tools of video production and post-production. Workshops examine set, keying, montage, sound, pacing, composition, and the cut. Regular assignments address a range of structural problems, at once conceptual and plastic (topics include the question of the subject, politics of visibility, satire, abjection, abstraction, psychedelia, performance and humiliation). Work by artists who have harnessed or perverted video’s components is screened bi-weekly. Abigail Gunnels.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -ART 103 or a 100-level Film course and permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 222 - Digital Art Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as MEDS 222 ) The course introduces students to the computer as a medium and a tool for artistic production through a series of studio projects. A variety of approaches to digital art are explored as students learn software skills to develop artwork alongside screenings, critiques and discussions. The course is aimed at students with previous experience in studio art. James Case-Leal
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -ART 103 or a 100-level Media Studies course and permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 275 - Architectural Design I Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as URBS 275 ) A studio-based class introduction to architectural design through a series of short projects. Employing a combination of drawing, modeling and collage techniques (both by hand and using digital technology) students begin to record, analyze and create architectural space and form. Tobias Armborst.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -ART 103 and permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 276 - Architectural Design II Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as URBS 276 ) A studio-based course aimed at further developing architectural drawing and design skills. Employing a variety of digital and non-digital techniques students record, analyze and create architectural space and form in a series of design exercises. Jesse McCormick.
Prerequisite(s): Permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
Studio Art: III. Advanced
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ART 300 - Senior Essay Preparation Semester Offered: Fall or Spring
0.5 unit(s)
Prerequisite(s): Permission of the Chair of the Art Department.
Optional. Regular meetings with a faculty member to prepare an annotated bibliography and thesis statement for the senior essay. Course must be scheduled in the semester prior to the writing of the senior essay. Credit given only upon completion of the senior essay. Ungraded.
Course Format: INT -
ART 301 - Senior Project Semester Offered: Fall or Spring
1 unit(s)
Supervised independent research culminating in a written essay or a supervised independent project in studio art.
Course Format: INT -
ART 302 - Painting II Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
This course investigates painting through a series of assigned open-ended projects. Because it is intended to help students develop a context in which to make independent choices, it explores a wide range of conceptual and formal approaches to painting and considers various models through which painting can be considered, such as painting as a window, a map, or an object. Laura Newman.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -103 and two 200-level studio art courses, or permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 303 - Painting II Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
This course investigates painting through a series of assigned open-ended projects. Because it is intended to help students develop a context in which to make independent choices, it explores a wide range of conceptual and formal approaches to painting. It examines the idea of painting as an ongoing development of thought; its projects are organized around the question, “How do you make the next painting?” Laura Newman.
Prerequisite(s): ART 202 -ART 203 or ART 102 -ART 103 and two 200 level studio art courses, or permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
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ART 304 - Sculpture II Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
“Research and Production,” is a student-centered advanced sculpture seminar organized around independent artistic production. Students will challenge themselves to expand their sculptural practices materially and conceptually, producing several ambitious sculptural projects over the course of the semester. Weekly course materials are determined in relation to each student’s interests, and each class-member is responsible for engaging their peers in discussion about the questions, themes, and histories relevant to their individual artistic work. The course is punctuated by rigorous group critique, with the aim of strengthening one’s practice and gaining fluency in the skill of giving and receiving critical feedback within a diverse community. The heart of this course is to support each participant in developing as an artist by identifying and exploring the guiding questions motivating their work through research, conversation, and hands-on making. Gordon Hall.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -ART 103 and any two 200-level studio art courses, and permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 305 - Sculpture II Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as URBS 305 ) ART 305, “Space and Place,” is an advanced sculpture seminar in which students deepen and expand their practices of making in three dimensions. A series of independent sculpture projects are punctuated by rigorous group critique, with a focus on supporting each student carving out the unique constellation of ideas embodied in their artistic work. In conjunction with this constant studio production, each week we engage with the work of artists and writers who offer theories of space and place, including phenomenology, site-specificity, performance, multi-media installation, architectural interventions, and public art. We analyze space and place in relation to our bodies as sites of difference, looking at the ways the built environment is always social, political, and subject to transformation. Emphasis is equally placed on the formal and the conceptual, which we discuss as fundamentally interwoven in the practice of sculpture. Gordon Hall.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -ART 103 and ART 204 -ART 205 or permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 306 - Studio Critiques Semester Offered: Fall and Spring
0.5 unit(s)
Students produce independent artwork and participate in bi-monthly critiques where students and studio faculty discuss the student work as well as other art issues. May be repeated for credit. Gordon Hall, Laura Newman.
Prerequisite(s): ART 102 -103 and one 200-level Studio Art class.
Course Format: INT -
ART 322 - Digital Art Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as MEDS 322 ) The course continues to explore the computer as a medium and a tool for artistic production through a series of studio projects. A variety of approaches to digital art are explored as students learn software skills to develop artwork alongside screenings, critiques and discussions. The course is aimed at students with previous experience in studio art.
Prerequisite(s): ART 222 or permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
ART 375 - Architectural Design III
1 unit(s)
(Same as URBS 375 ) Visual Constructs. An examination of a number of visual constructs, analyzing the ways architects and urbanists have employed maps, models and projections to construct particular, partial views of the physical world. Using a series of mapping, drawing and diagramming exercises, students analyze these constructs and then appropriate, expand upon, or hybridize established visualization techniques. Tobias Armborst.
Two 2-hour periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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ART 379 - Computer Animation: Art, Science and Criticism
1 unit(s)
(Same as CMPU 379 , FILM 379 , and MEDS) 379 An interdisciplinary course in Computer Animation aimed at students with previous experience in Computer Science, Studio Art, or Media Studies. The course introduces students to mathematical and computational principles and techniques for describing the shape, motion and shading of three-dimensional figures in Computer Animation. It introduces students to artistic principles and techniques used in drawing, painting and sculpture, as they are translated into the context of Computer Animation. It also encourages students to critically examine Computer Animation as a medium of communication. Finally, the course exposes students to issues that arise when people from different scholarly cultures attempt to collaborate on a project of mutual interest. The course is structured as a series of animation projects interleaved with screenings and classroom discussions.
Prerequisite(s): Permission of the instructor.
Two 2-hour periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS
Other Courses
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ART 387 - Representing American Cityscapes Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as URBS 387 ) From the visual and written descriptions of Tenochtitlán, the capital of the Aztec Empire (today’s Mexico City), to Google Maps, this course explores representations of American cities from the colonial encounter to the present. Visual and written interpretations of urban landscapes have shaped the practice of planners, builders, artists, and activists in cities across the Americas. Introducing students to philosopher Henri Lefebvre’s theory of space as materially, socially, and symbolically produced, the course invites students to reflect critically on the role of representation in the meaning of built environments in North and Latin American cities.
Prerequisite(s): Permission of the instructor.
One 2-hour period.
Course Format: CLS
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