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Art History
August 30, 2024

Foundations in Medieval Art

The course addresses the skills, methods and issues essential to building the future Art Historian’s tool kit. To this end, it develops simultaneously on three levels: immersing students in progressively complex assignments and exams; getting students to practice art history as an issue-based analysis of objects; providing students with the historical and methodological frameworks specific to the field. The course lays the foundation for looking at, understanding and working in the visual arts.

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August 30, 2024

Art Historical Thinking

This course is about the art of writing about art, and surveys notable examples. As in any historical study, our understanding of art history is filtered through specific writings. These writings can to be appreciated in themselves for their sensitivity, originality, and craft, and also evaluated critically.

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August 30, 2024

Islamic Art and Architecture

This course surveys the art and architecture of the Islamic world from the 7th to the 13th centuries. The phenomenal rise and establishment of Islamic civilization in three continents- Asia, Africa and Europe- in this period is studied through monumental religious and secular architecture and its applied decoration from mosaics to stucco and wall paintings and through painted ceramics, carved wood and ivories, metalwork, illuminated manuscripts, and embroidered and woven textiles.

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August 30, 2024

Curating Museums and Galleries

The course is designed to introduce students to the history of museums and to curating practices. Classes will discuss the cultural position of the museum, the evolution of its function, the different forms of display, the historical developments of the act of collecting, the position of the visitor and the role of the curator.

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August 30, 2024

Ancient Roman Portraiture

Portraiture in Greece and Rome was a vital currency of social interaction and public engagement – across gender, class, location and context. As new archaeological data and research methodologies are transforming our understanding of its form and impact, the field is one of the most vibrant of ancient art. The course will discuss all aspects of what made a portrait: facial characteristics, hairstyles, body types, and clothing, as well as the inscribed base and placement.

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August 30, 2024

Special Topics in Early Modern Art: Women and the Making of Art

The course focuses on the social agency of women in artistic professions and patronage in the early modern period (c. 1500-1750), taking advantage of an abundance of new scholarship of the Italian context. Through case studies of individual artists and patrons, the course will examine how women negotiated their professional presence, especially in the homosocial spaces of academies that were increasingly important for instruction and theorization.

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August 30, 2024

Special Topics in Modern and Contemporary Art: Art as Nation-Building

The visual arts have served to foster, construct and promote national identity from the very inception of the modern nation. This course aims to broach methodological and historical issues at the intersection of art of politics. Understanding how the visual arts have been instrumentalized, brandished, weaponized and subverted, or have actively chosen to promote a national(ist) agenda is the focus of this course.

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August 30, 2024

Visualizing Gender from Late Antiquity to the Middle Ages

The course investigates the visual construction of gendered identities in the art produced in Europe in late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. The course will discuss how this diverse visual repertoire operates as in an on-going re-definition or re-negotiation of gender as a category. To that end, it addresses both traditional gendered constructs and representations that challenge hetero-normativity as an ideal.

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August 30, 2024

Environmental Archaeology and Paleoclimatology

The course is an introduction to Environmental Archaeology and Paleoclimatology, the studies of the interactions between humans and environment. Human history (like settlement-patterns, migration, and economies) depended on environmental factors, and, in turn, humans had an impact on the landscapes they were living in.

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May 8, 2024

The Art and Architecture of Imperial Rome

A survey of Roman architecture and art (sculpture, wall painting, mosaics and crafts) produced in Italy and the Roman provinces between the 2nd century BC and the 4th century AD. The course addresses such themes as: changing styles and techniques, practical and symbolic function of art and architecture, what it meant to be Roman in a multicultural Empire, and the notions of commemoration, remembrance and nostalgia.

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May 8, 2024

Theories and Methods of Art History

It is not possible to look at art in an entirely direct, pure, way: our understanding is always mediated by a conceptual structure, hence the necessity to be conscious of the methods and theories employed when studying art. This course is an introduction to various historical approaches to the description, analysis, interpretation and evaluation of art from Plato to the present. The biographical approach (Pliny, Vasari)

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May 8, 2024

Venetian Art

A panorama of the history of Venetian art, with special emphasis on painting and the innovations brought about by Bellini, Giorgione, Titian, Tintoretto, and continuing on to 18th-century artists of the Rococo.

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May 8, 2024

World Art I: Visual Culture of the Ancient World

This survey course begins with the very birth of visual representation in the middle and late Stone Age (ca. 32,000 – 11,000 BC) and ends with Late Antiquity (ca. AD 250-400), when the transition from ancient to medieval art began to take shape.

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May 8, 2024

World Art II: Visual Culture of the Middle Ages and Islam

This comparative survey of the arts of Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas during the period between c. 300 and 1400 C.E. aims to equip students with a global mental map of artistic developments in their broader cultural-historical contexts, with special attention to major religious traditions and to the differing media, aesthetics, and representational and functional needs that characterized them.

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May 8, 2024

World Art III: Visual Culture of the Early Modern World

This survey course focuses on the art and architecture of Europe, South and Southeast Asia, China, Japan, and the Americas from the late 1200s to c. AD 1750. The course investigates a range of media including painting, woodcuts, sculpture, and architecture, while considering materials and methods of production. Special attention will be given to the socio-economic and political contexts in which these artifacts were commissioned and produced.

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May 8, 2024

World Art IV: Visual Culture of the Modern and Contemporary World

This survey course focuses on the art of Europe, Africa, the Americas, and Oceania from the 1700s to the present. The course investigates all media, including photography, and considers the impact of globalization and new technologies on contemporary art and evidence of cross-cultural influences. Special attention will be given to the new aesthetic languages, traditional cultural sources, and philosophical background of contemporary art, as well as to the broader cultural-historical contexts of their creation.

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May 8, 2024

Medieval Rome

An examination of the art and architecture of Western Europe from the fall of the Roman Empire through to the 14th century. Special emphasis will be given first to the historical and artistic climate at the end of the Empire and to the changes its collapse brought about, and then to the Carolingian and later classical revivals, and to the Romanesque and Gothic periods.

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May 8, 2024

Medieval Rome and Its Monuments

Rome City Series – An on-site survey of Roman urbanism, as well as developments in figural media and architecture, from the 4th to the 14th century. While the course will naturally emphasize the abundant religious art remaining in the city, it will also examine such secular achievements as towers, housing, defenses, and roads. On site activity fee applies.

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May 8, 2024

Medieval Venice

Venices geographic location at a crossroadsbetween East and West, between mainland Italy and the seashaped a unique character for the art and culture of this city, the wider Lagoon, and the colonies of the Venetian Republic. This course concentrates on the art and architecture of medieval Venice, from the ninth to the sixteenth century.

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May 8, 2024

Selected Topics in Art History

Periodically offered courses that focus on a particular dimension of the history of art. Topics typically cross over established periods, focus on a modern artist or movement (e.g. Picasso), or deal with non-Western art (Islamic Art).

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May 8, 2024

Michelangelo

Michelangelo (1475-1564) was one of the most famous and influential artists in his own time and has continued to be ever since. This seems reason enough to examine his work in detail as it forms an essential facet for understanding not only Italian Renaissance art but art in general, as many of the issues involved in trying to comprehend his imagery are applicable throughout art history.

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May 8, 2024

Modern Rome & Its Monuments

Rome City Series – The urban development and architecture of modern Rome are perhaps the least studied aspects of the city’s history. The 150th anniversary of Italian unity, celebrated in 2011, and recent work on architecture under the Fascist regime have created a new interest in Rome as a modern capital. To many foreign visitors, however, the contemporary city is simply a frame through which to see monuments of a glorious but distant past.

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May 8, 2024

Nineteenth Century French Painting

The nineteenth century in Europe was a period in which the idea of picture-making was radically altered, and imagery transformed and invented under the cultural, political, economic and social pressures of a “modern” society. This course will investigate major trends in Romantic to Neoimpressionist painting, with an emphasis on French painting from the late 18th to late 19th centuries.

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May 8, 2024

Spirituality and Transcendence in Modern Art

While modern art reflects the secularized era in which it has flourished, many modern artists have described their work in terms of a spiritual search: one need only to think of Gauguin, the Symbolists of the turn of the century, Malevich and the Russian avant-garde, Chagall, the Italian Metaphysical artists, the Surrealists, and others. This course examines many varieties of religious and spiritual expression in modern art.

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May 8, 2024

Pagans, Jews and Christians – Art and Religion in Late Antique Rome (On-site

Rome City Series – In the third and fourth century Rome continued to be a stronghold of traditional paganism, but it was also a hub of “exotic” pagan cults imported from the East, home to one of the largest Jewish communities in the Diaspora, and of one of the fastest-growing Christian communities in the Empire. This diversity was matched by an increase in religious feeling that affected Roman society as a whole.

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May 8, 2024

Senior Thesis

Thesis supervision for Art History majors in their final year. Students select their research topics in consultation with their thesis advisor.

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May 8, 2024

Pagans, Jews and Christians in Late Antiquity- HONORS

Rome City Series – In the third and fourth century Rome continued to be a stronghold of traditional paganism, but it was also a hub of “exotic” pagan cults imported from the East, home to one of the largest Jewish communities in the Diaspora, and of one of the fastest-growing Christian communities in the Empire. This diversity was matched by an increase in religious feeling that affected Roman society as a whole.

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May 8, 2024

Politics and Power in Roman Architecture – Augustus to Mussolini

This on-site survey investigates the history of Rome primarily through its monumentsits architecture and urban form. This course will provide the student with a clear grasp of how the city of Rome has changed over the course of two thousand years from a modest Iron Age settlement on the Palatine Hill to a thriving modern metropolis of the twentieth century.

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May 8, 2024

Raphael

Raphael (1483-1520) was the youngest member of the famed artistic “trinity” that later art historians have credited with creating the High Renaissance style in central Italy around the turn of the 16th century. While the reputations of other two, Leonardo and Michelangelo, have continuously remained strong over the centuries, Raphael’s, on the other hand, has weakened in recent years, although his contribution to the formation of the new Renaissance imagery and its divulgation is unquestionable.

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May 8, 2024

Renaissance Rome and Its Monuments

Rome City Series – This on-site course will study the monuments of Renaissance Rome: painting, sculpture and architecture produced by such masters as Bramante, Raphael, and Michelangelo, all attracted to the lucrative service of popes, cardinals and nobles of the Roman court.

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May 8, 2024

Research Practicum

This upper level seminar/practicum provides rigorous, practical preparation for the writing of professional art-historical research papers, including the Senior Thesis, through four discrete units: an individual portfolio review; a research tools and methods seminar; intensive, directed bibliographic research; and the formulation of a presentation to the class on the thesis topic, together with a new ‘foundation’ portfolio demonstrating mastery of the research skills, competencies, and bibliography necessary for advanced art-historical research writing.

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May 8, 2024

Rome in the Age of Augustus

This course considers the city of Rome and the Empire during the reign of Augustus. Following an introduction to the political, social and artistic trends of the late Republican period, students are exposed to the politics, ideology, literature, art and architecture of the Augustan period. Themes include memories of Julius Caesar, constructing the Imperial family, Aeneas and the legacy of Augustus.

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May 8, 2024

Rome in the Age of Augustus – HONORS

This course considers the city of Rome and the Empire during the reign of Augustus. Following an introduction to the political, social and artistic trends of the late Republican period, students are exposed to the politics, ideology, literature, art and architecture of the Augustan period. Themes include memories of Julius Caesar, constructing the Imperial family, Aeneas and the legacy of Augustus.

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May 8, 2024

Material Culture Studies and Archaeology

This course is an on-site, practical introduction to the methods and techniques of archaeological artifact studies and interpretation. On-site training and seminars led by specialists provide students with a well-rounded overview of the methods of material culture studies, of archaeological recording methods, and of archaeological artifact research. This is complemented with considerations of museological approaches to archaeology.

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May 8, 2024

20th-Century Western Art – Honors

A treatment of the major artists and artistic issues of the early 20th century, emphasizing modern art as an arena of dialogue and debate. An important aim is that of cultivating skill in seeing in order to achieve direct, personal responses to works of art, along with formal and historical understanding.

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May 8, 2024

Donatello

Donatello (1386-1466) was one of the most important artists of the early Renaissance. Working primarily in Florence, Donatello was a tremendous innovator, particularly in the medium of sculpture. His work would influence many of the most famous artists of the Italian Renaissance. The course will have a global monographic approach, meaning that the artists entire output will be discussed and analyzed from an array of historical, thematic and methodological points of view.

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May 8, 2024

Donatello – Honors

Donatello (1386-1466) was one of the most important artists of the early Renaissance. Working primarily in Florence, Donatello was a tremendous innovator, particularly in the medium of sculpture. His work would influence many of the most famous artists of the Italian Renaissance. The course will have a global monographic approach, meaning that the artists entire output will be discussed and analyzed from an array of historical, thematic and methodological points of view.

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May 8, 2024

Age of Giotto

This course will address the development of painting, sculpture and architecture in the churches, civic halls, palaces and homes of the great republics and courts of 14th century Italy. The rise of the city states, the new mendicant orders, the visions of Dante and Petrarch, and the brief flourishing of papal Rome encouraged a new interest in nature and human experience which was explored in the beginning of the century by Giotto, Duccio, and others.

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May 8, 2024

Early Christian and Byzantine Art

This course traces the developments in architecture, painting, sculpture, and mosaic of the Early Christian and Byzantine periods, from the art of the catacombs in the 3rd and 4th centuries to the monuments of Italo-Byzantine art of the Middle Ages. Students are introduced to the early Christian art and architecture of cities such as Rome, Ravenna and Constantinople. Mandatory field trip.

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May 8, 2024

Ancient Roman Portraiture HONORS

In ancient Rome portrait depictions functioned as a sign of individual identity and they were a striking component among the multitude of statues that adorned public and private buildings, and lined the streets and piazzas of the city. Portraiture hence furnishes key insights into the mind-set of ancient Rome. Representation could take many forms, physical resemblance and insight into personality being the most obvious.

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May 8, 2024

Ancient Rome and Its Monuments

Rome City Series – This on-site course considers the art and architecture of ancient Rome through visits to museums and archaeological sites. The course covers the visual culture and architecture of Rome beginning with the late Bronze Age and ending with the time of Constantine. A broad variety of issues are raised, including patronage, style and iconography, artistic and architectural techniques, Roman religion, business and entertainment. On site activity fee may apply.

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May 8, 2024

Egyptian Art and Archaeology

This course covers the development of Egyptian art from the pre-Dynastic period to the age of the Ptolemies. Students will learn about the evolution of royal tombs, statuary, painting and crafts during the Old, Middle and New Kingdoms. There is a focus upon style and iconography as well as ancient Egyptian religion. The course also reveals the mysteries behind the construction of the pyramids.

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May 8, 2024

Foundations in Modern and Contemporary Art

The course addresses the skills, methods and issues essential to building the future Art Historian’s tool kit. To this end, it develops simultaneously on three levels: immersing students in progressively complex assignments and exams; getting students to practice art history as an issue-based analysis of objects; providing students with the historical and methodological frameworks specific to the field. The course lays the foundation for looking at, understanding and working in the visual arts.

Read Full Article
May 8, 2024

Art Crime: Who Owns Antiquity? HONORS

The course examines the complex subject of art and cultural heritage crime, with a particular emphasis on Italy. While examining the international and national normative frameworks determining what constitutes an art/cultural heritage crime, special attention will be paid to the question of what constitutes ownership of art and cultural heritage. The course will consider the development over time of ideas of the value of art (both real and symbolic)

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May 8, 2024

Internship: Art History Field

During class, you will be challenged to reflect on your internship experience within the context of your host company.By creating an intentional time to reflect on your internship, the role you havein your workplaceand the experiences of your peers in their internship placements, you will developbetterawarenessof your strengths and weaknesses and professional skills.Inaddition tosoft skillsdevelopment,you will also have astory to tellyour futureemployers.

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May 8, 2024

Introduction to Art & Architecture: Rome, a Case Study

No city in the world can boast the wealth of art and architecture that Rome possesses. This class will examine the art and architecture in Rome from the time of Augustus to the contemporary works of Massimiliano Fuksas and Renzo Piano. We pass from the Rome of the Caesars, the Rome of the Popes, the Rome of Victor Emanuel, and finish in the present.

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May 8, 2024

Barbarians, Monkes & Kings: Early Medevil Art & Architecture

The gradual decline of Roman Imperial power in Late Antiquity eventually gave way to the unimaginable. In the 400s, Rome itself was sacked by Germanic tribesmen by Visigoths and Vandals and afterward many formerly Roman territories gradually fell to them and to related “barbaric” peoples, the Ostrogoths, Franks, Longobards, and others.

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May 8, 2024

Introduction to Italian Renaissance Art

A survey course covering the innovations of the Early Renaissance to the High Renaissance (14th into the 16th Century). The works of Brunelleschi, Alberti, Donatello, Ghiberti, Masaccio, Botticelli, Ghirlandaio, Pollaiuolo, Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Bramante and Raphael and others will be studied.

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May 8, 2024

Baroque Rome and Its Monuments

Rome City Series – An on-site course that enables the student to visit many of the major and minor monuments of Baroque Rome – churches, palaces,piazze, etc. – and thus to study firsthand important works by such artists as Bernini, Borromini, Caravaggio and Pietro da Cortona, among others. On site activity fee may apply.

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May 8, 2024

Introduction to Western Art I: Ancient and Medieval Art

This course offers an introduction to the most significant artistic monuments and trends of European art and architecture. They are designed for the student with no previous art history background, and for the student with some experience seeking a general historical overview. Lectures, class discussion, readings, journal assignments and site visits familiarize students with a variety of period styles and cultures.

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May 8, 2024

Byzantine Art

This course investigates the art and architecture of the Byzantine (Eastern Roman) Empire from the time of Constantinoples foundation as the New Rome in 330 until its fall to the Ottomans in 1453. The course introduces key works in a variety of media, from monumental mosaics and frescoes to portable icons, illuminated manuscripts, metal- and enamelwork, and textiles.

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May 8, 2024

Issues and Trends in Contemporary Art

The course explores Contemporary Art via slide lectures, gallery walks, and encounters with artists, critics, curators, dealers, and museum professionals. The first part of the course will offer on overview on the past 50 years and will introduce to the contemporary art scene, by first treating the prominent art movements (Pop Art, Fluxus, Arte Povera, Minimalism, Conceptual Art, Transavanguardia, Video Art, Public Art, Relational Art).

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May 8, 2024

Caravaggio – Honors

Caravaggio (1571-1610) provides a noteworthy case study of how an artist’s fame changes over time when the works of art do not. Best known for his striking representation of light and use of naturalism, his anecdote-filled biographies led to a negative assessment of the artist and his works. The course looks at the artists output from an array of historical, thematic, and methodological points of view.

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May 8, 2024

Issues and Trends in Contemporary Art-Honors Course

This course focuses upon the major artistic movements since 1960, and an introduction to galleries, museums, foundations, auctions, and other arts organizations in Rome. The course provides direct experience of contemporary art through lectures and field trips and is taught by an independent curator and editor, whose current exhibition projects at museums and festivals in Italy and Europe will provide on-site learning opportunities to students. Guest appearances by critics and other art professionals.

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May 8, 2024

Caravaggio

Caravaggio (1571-1610) provides a noteworthy case study of how an artists fame changes over time when the works of art do not. Best known for his striking representation of light and use of naturalism, his anecdote-filled biographies led to a negative assessment of the artist and his works. The course looks at the artists output from an array of historical, thematic, and methodological points of view.

Read Full Article
May 8, 2024

Italian High Renaissance Art

An extension of the study of Italian art and architecture in the Renaissance through the second half of the 15th century into the first three decades of the 16th. The works of Botticelli, Ghirlandaio, Pollaiuolo and others will be studied, along with works by those whose innovations initiated the High Renaissance style: Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Bramante and Raphael. Numerous on-site visits in Rome are included, as well as a required trip to Florence.

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May 8, 2024

19th Century Western Art

A survey of painting and sculpture in Western Europe from the late 18th to the late 19th centuries, primarily in England and France. Particular attention will be given to the movements of Neoclassicism, Romanticism, Realism, the Pre-Raphaelites, Impressionism, and Post-Impressionism.

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May 8, 2024

Cities, Towns & Villas: Rome, Ostia, Pompeii

Rome, Ostia and Pompeii are three of the best- preserved archaeological sites in the world. Through their study, we are able to comprehend the physical and social nature of Roman cities and how they transformed over the course of centuries. We explore the subjects of urban development, public and private buildings, economic and social history, and art incorporated into urban features (houses, triumphal monuments, etc.).

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May 8, 2024

Keeping the Dead Alive: Roman Funerary Art and Architecture

Rome City Series – Throughout human history the concept of death has been inseparable from that of life, and the commemoration of the dead has traditionally been an important point of convergence and locus of expression for a wide range of cultural, political, religious, and social values, fears and beliefs.

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May 8, 2024

20th-Century Western Art

A treatment of the major artists and artistic issues of the early 20th century, emphasizing modern art as an arena of dialogue and debate. An important aim is that of cultivating skill in seeing in order to achieve direct, personal responses to works of art, along with formal and historical understanding.

Read Full Article
May 8, 2024

Collection Building and Museum Studies- HONORS

The course explores what we do with culturally significant objects and why. It examines the histories and meanings of ownership, collecting and display in private and especially public venues. Thematically chosen case-studies from a variety of periods and places investigate how knowledge, values and power are constructed through classification and display. The course considers antecedents and alternatives to the modern museum.

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