Spring 2023

Course Code Title/Instructor Meets
ARTH 101-01 An Introduction to the History of Art
Instructor: Melinda Schlitt
Course Description:
This course is a critical survey of western art beginning with the Ancient Near East (approximately 4000 B.C.) through the Gothic period in Europe (early 1300s). Emphasis will be placed on the analysis of style, subject-matter, and function within an historical context, and especially on the student's ability to develop skills in visual analysis. Developing appropriate vocabularies with which to discuss and analyze works of art and imagery will also be stressed, along with learning to evaluate scholarly interpretations of them.
10:30 AM-11:20 AM, MWF
WEISS 235
ARTH 122-01 Fundamentals of Composition and Drawing
Instructor: Eleanor Conover
Course Description:
Working from observation and using a variety of media, this basic studio drawing course will explore issues common to both representational and non-representational art. This course serves as the foundation to upper-level two-dimensional offerings.
01:30 PM-03:29 PM, MW
WEISS 343
ARTH 123-01 Fundamentals of Sculpture
Instructor: Amy Boone-McCreesh
Course Description:
A studio course covering basic elements of three-dimensional composition and sculpture. Students will construct sculptures examining a range of media and fabrication techniques.
09:30 AM-11:30 AM, TR
GDYRST DOWN
ARTH 205-01 Japanese Architecture
Instructor: Wei Ren
Course Description:
Cross-listed with EASN 205-01. This course is intended to introduce students to the scholarly study of Japanese architecture and urbanism, covering both the premodern and modern eras. Each session will be devoted to the examination of one significant Japanese architectural site, coupled with an important concept or methodological concern in the study of the Japanese built environment. The sites and issues chosen for study are intended to provide students with a broad knowledge base with which to pursue further studies in architectural history, design history, environmental history, and East Asian history. Participants will be introduced to each of the major typologies of Japanese architecture: shrines, temples, imperial villas, castles, tea houses, merchant houses (machiya), and farm houses (minka), as well as the two of the most historically significant city forms in the archipelago, the imperial grid city and the castle town. In addition, the nature and culture of advanced timber-frame architecture will be studied from the vantage point of design, engineering, source materials and process, as well as the sustainability issues inherent to the materials. More general themes that inform the course throughout include the relationship of architecture to the natural landscape, historical and contemporary issues of sustainability, the concept and design of the city, and the significance of the body.
10:30 AM-11:45 AM, TR
WEISS 235
ARTH 216-01 Goddesses, Prostitutes, Wives, Saints, and Rulers: Women and European Art 1200-1680
Instructor: Melinda Schlitt
Course Description:
Cross-listed with WGSS 201-01. How has the representation of women been constructed, idealized, vilified, manipulated, sexualized, and gendered during what could be broadly called the Renaissance in Europe? How have female artists, such as Sofanisba Anguissola (1532-1625) or Artemisia Gentileschi (1593-1653), among others, represented themselves, men, and other familiar subjects differently from their male counterparts? How have female rulers, like Queen Elizabeth I of England, controlled their own political and cultural self-fashioning through portraiture? What role do the lives and writings of female mystics, like Catherine of Siena (1347-1380) or Teresa of Avila (1515-1582) play in depictions of their physical and spiritual identity? How was beauty and sexuality conceived through the imagery of mythological women, like Venus, or culturally ambivalent women, like courtesans and prostitutes? What kind of art did wealthy, aristocratic women or nuns pay for and use? Through studying primary texts, scholarly literature, and relevant theoretical sources, we will address these and other issues in art produced in Italy, France, Spain, Northern Europe, and England from 1200-1680. The course will be grounded in an understanding of historical and cultural contexts, and students will develop paper topics based on their own interests in consultation with the professor. A screening of the documentary film, A Woman Like That (2009), on the life of Artemisia Gentileschi and a trip to the National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. will take place during the second half of the semester. Offered every year.
01:30 PM-02:45 PM, TF
WEISS 221
ARTH 221-01 Introduction to Photography
Instructor: Andy Bale
Course Description:
Cross-listed with FMST 220-02. An entry-level course in black-and-white photography emphasizing theory, history, and practice. Students learn how to create images, use cameras, develop film and make prints using conventional darkroom processes. Students will also be introduced to Photoshop as well as the basics of scanning and digital printing.
09:30 AM-11:30 AM, TR
GDYRST 101
ARTH 223-01 Digital Studio 1: Image Manipulation and Experimental Processes
Instructor: Amy Boone-McCreesh
Course Description:
Cross-listed with FMST 220-01. This course will focus on 2-dimensional studio processes in the digital environment. It will also explore how digital processes can be used in conjunction with traditional processes like drawing, painting, and printmaking. The initial goal of this class will be to gain a thorough understanding of Adobe Photoshop for image manipulation. As the semester progresses, the class will explore uses of digital technology in contemporary art practice, including experimental processes. *Please note: this is not a photography course, some photo related processes will be part of the class, but those students looking for a more traditional approach to photography should consider the 221 Intro to Photography class. Prerequisite: 122, 221, or permission of the instructor.
01:30 PM-03:29 PM, TR
GDYRST 101
ARTH 224-01 Wheelwork Ceramics
Instructor: Rachel Eng
Course Description:
A studio course exploring expressive possibilities offered by the potters wheel. Students will examine both utilitarian and sculptural aspects of the medium. A variety of clays, glazes and firing approaches will be examined.
01:30 PM-03:29 PM, MW
GDYRST CERAMICS
ARTH 226-01 Ceramic Sculpture
Instructor: Rachel Eng
Course Description:
This introductory course examines the principal attributes of sculpture with a focus on clay as the primary fabrication material. Students will examine a range of firing, glazing, and construction techniques. Satisfies 3D requirement for the studio art major.
09:30 AM-11:29 AM, MW
GDYRST CERAMICS
ARTH 228-01 Printmaking Survey
Instructor: Todd Arsenault
Course Description:
A studio course in which students will gain a working knowledge in each of the three major areas of printmaking: intaglio, lithography, and relief-printing. Prerequisite: 122 or permission of the instructor.
03:30 PM-05:29 PM, TR
WEISS 340
ARTH 230-01 Life Drawing
Instructor: Eleanor Conover
Course Description:
The course will be devoted to working from the human form during which the students will be expected to develop a sense of two-dimensional line and three-dimensional illusionistic form through the use of such graphic media as pen and ink, pencil, charcoal, Cont crayon, etc. Prerequisite: 122 or permission of the instructor.
09:30 AM-11:29 AM, MW
GDYRST UPST
ARTH 235-01 Post Studio Projects
Instructor: Amy Boone-McCreesh
Course Description:
The course provides an introduction to a variety of art making processes and philosophies outside a traditional studio context. Projects focus on individual and collaborative experiences that are not media specific; students create site-specific interventions, text-based installations, and performances, among other explorations, to consider critical and conceptual approaches to art.Prerequisite: One studio course or permission of instructor.
01:30 PM-04:30 PM, F
GDYRST DOWN
ARTH 300-01 Artists, Audience, Patrons: Art & Architecture of the Italian Renaissance
Instructor: Melinda Schlitt
Course Description:
This course examines painting, sculpture, and architecture in Italy from 1250 to 1570. The work of Giotto, Lorenzetti, Donatello, Masaccio, Brunelleschi, Ghiberti, Botticelli, Leonardo, Raphael, Titian, and Michelangelo, among others will be addressed. Students will study the significance of style, subject-matter, function, patronage, and artistic practice within historical and cultural contexts, and will also address Renaissance interpretations and responses to works of art. Discussion of art-historical theory and criticism as well as Renaissance theory and criticism based in primary texts will be an intrinsic part of the course. Students will acquire the ability to analyze and interpret works of art from the period within the framework outlined above, and will gain a working knowledge of the most significant works and the meaning(s) they have acquired over time. Analysis of primary and secondary sources will be a central focus of the research project, and students will be expected to construct a clear and well-supported interpretive argument over the course of the semester. The course includes a field trip to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., which has the largest collection of Italian Renaissance painting outside of Europe. Prerequisite: 101 or 102 or permission of the instructor. Offered every year.
09:00 AM-10:15 AM, TR
WEISS 221
ARTH 305-01 Topics on Modern Design in East Asia
Instructor: Wei Ren
Course Description:
Cross-listed with EASN 305-01. Traditional Chinese and Japanese art and design served as an important source of inspiration for European modernism. But what happened to art and design within China and Japan during the modern period? Despite Chinas traditional stronghold in modular design and Japans current prestige in design culture, the two countries faced incredible challenges during the late 19th and early 20th century as they struggled with their own cultures pasts and the modern concept of art and design. This class offers a multidisciplinary approach to the study of modern East Asian art and examines how the concept of design emerged and developed in Japan and China in relation to both fine arts and industry in a broad cross-cultural nexus. While design connected modern China and Japan in ways unprecedented, the two cultures also adopted different design strategies defined by their respective cultural and historical conditions. The class is discussion based and is supplemented by a fieldtrip to Washington D.C. Prerequisite: ARTH 108 or ARTH 209 or two art history or two non-language EASN courses.
03:00 PM-04:15 PM, MR
ALTHSE 206
ARTH 327-01 Advanced Painting
Instructor: Todd Arsenault
Course Description:
A second-level studio painting course concentrating on the figure, and covering advanced techniques, alternative materials, and aspects of contemporary and historical practice. Prerequisite: 227.
09:30 AM-11:29 AM, TR
WEISS 342
ARTH 330-01 Advanced Life Drawing
Instructor: Eleanor Conover
Course Description:
Advanced problems and issues in drawing the human form. Prerequisite: 230 or permission of the instructor.
09:30 AM-11:29 AM, MW
GDYRST UPST
ARTH 360-01 Searching for Soul: The Photographic Portrait
Instructor: Andy Bale
Course Description:
This course will be an in-depth investigation of the photographic portrait. Using different photographic formats, lighting equipment and materials, student will explore the many was in which a camera can be used access the soul of a human subject.
03:30 PM-05:29 PM, TR
WEISS 327
ARTH 411-01 Senior Studio, Part 2
Instructor: Eleanor Conover
Course Description:
Second half of the required, yearlong capstone for senior studio art majors. This course will continue with the critique-based model of independent studio practice as established in the first semester. The main focus of this course will be completing a fully developed body of thesis work for exhibition in the Trout Gallery, and the production of a supporting catalog. Prerequisite: 410
01:30 PM-04:30 PM, F
GDYRST DOWN
ARTH 500-01 Weiss Prize Independent Study
Instructor: Eleanor Conover
Course Description:

ARTH 500-02 Sculptural Forms & Surfaces
Instructor: Rachel Eng
Course Description:

ARTH 500-03 Advance Wheel Throwing and Functional Objects
Instructor: Rachel Eng
Course Description:

ARTH 500-04 Wheel Forms and Surface
Instructor: Rachel Eng
Course Description: