Art History

The course discusses the various expressions of popular culture within 20th-century art and media. Collaboration between different media is emphasized. The main focus is on contemporary western culture, the latter years of the 20th century, and the expressions of postmodern culture, although several episodes in the cultural history of the whole century are studied historically. Advertising, television, music videos, movies, literature, and music are analyzed. Theoretical tools are introduced from the foundations of intermedia studies, cultural sociology, hermeneutics, and semiotics. Several examples are presented for analysis and discussion. Students identify basic concepts, ideas, and terminology in intermedia studies, and describe popular cultural conditions that account for some of the processes that shaped the postmodern art of the 1900s and its relationship to popular culture. 

This course analyzes the main contemporary art manifestations in their various forms of expression. It focuses on their origin, evolution and meaning, and plastic and stylistic values within their historical and social contexts. 

This course examines the relationship between art and political struggle in the 20th and 21st centuries, exploring how practitioners around the globe have contributed to socio-cultural change and forged new ways of seeing. It addresses how artists, architects, photographers, and designers have responded to the increasingly industrialized and fast-paced nature of modern and contemporary experience, and how this has led to a constant re-evaluation of what might be expected of art. Each week is devoted to a specific theme, including modernism, the metropolis, materiality, protest, dissent, and globalization.

This course examines the development of Chinese classical gardens; the characteristics of Chinese feudal society and the historical causes of the development of Chinese classical gardens; the cosmology and the realm of Chinese classical gardens; the principle of "neutralization" in Chinese classical aesthetics; the art of framing Chinese classical gardens' and the high degree of self-improvement of Chinese traditional cultural system and its influence on garden culture.

This course explores the development of Pop Art in the U.S. throughout the 1960s, with particular focus on its most prominent practitioner, Andy Warhol. It discusses how artists of the era created a new paradigm of modern art that often depicted consumerism and banality. This course also examines the ways some pop artists engaged with social issues such at the Vietnam war and the Civil Rights movement.

This course introduces Greek art and architecture in the period 2500-50 BC. In the context of abroad chronological survey, the focus is on three main themes: the relationship between Greek art and society; addressing current problems in Greek art history, reception of Greek art and contemporary society; and extensive training in visual analysis and the different lenses to look at Greek art. Through images, videos, and 3D models, but also through museum visits to the British Museum, students engage in detailed and in-depth object analyses and discussions.

This course studies and examines Chinese Buddhist art from historical and cultural perspectives to explore its origin, evolution and influence. The course also studies the transmission of Buddhism as well as its transformations through the investigation of the various art treasures found along the Silk Road. A study of these archaeological artifacts, religious monuments, and art and sculpture from the area reveals the fascinating story of the development of Buddhism from India to Central Asia and eventually to China, Korea and Japan. Assessment: short essay with 2,500-3,000 words (50%), 2 short quizzes (10%), presentation (25%), attendance and participation (15%)