Courses (Art History 082)

21:082:101 Introduction to Art History I (3) Emphasizes the significance and meaning of art in our civilization; selective overview of Western and some non-Western art from prehistoric times to the Renaissance; the important arts of major cultures and periods addressed through illustrated lectures, readings, and museum visits. Recommended for nonmajors.

21:082:102 Introduction to Art History II (3) Survey of art of the past few centuries; emphasis on tendencies leading to modern developments; develops the ability to respond to and to feel at ease with contemporary art forms, and to gain familiarity with major works of art and important artists. Illustrated lectures and readings, museum and gallery visits. Recommended for nonmajors.

21:082:201 Art beyond the West (3) Examines the form, function, content, and style of art in several cultures and civilizations around the world from past to present: Asian, Pacific, African, Islamic, and Native American. Slide lectures, museum visits, and research paper. Recommended for nonmajors.

21:082:202 History of Design (3) Focuses on graphic design from the 19th century to present. Includes analysis of the arts and crafts movement, art nouveau, art deco, de Stijl, and later developments such as the international style, modernism, postmodernism, and beyond. Slide lectures, research papers, and museum and gallery visits. Open to nonmajors. Prerequisites: 21:082:101, 102, or permission of instructor.

21:082:207 Art and Women (3) First half of the course examines the manner in which women have been represented in art, primarily by male artists. The second half concentrates on the 20th century, with a focus on the art of women. Feminists' theory considered. Slide lectures. Open to nonmajors. Prerequisites: 21:082:101, 102, or permission of instructor.

21:082:210 Introduction to Architectural History I: Prehistory to 1800 (3) An overview of the history of architecture from prehistory to the 19th century. Through analytical study students will explore social, environmental, behavioral, aesthetic, technological, and political forces that influence and affect architectural forms, ideas, and urban patterns. A number of different teaching formats will be used. Students will also be responsible for contributing to course material. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:211 Introduction to Architectural History II: 1800 to the Present (3) This survey of the Western tradition in architecture is an overview of the history of architecture from the 19th century through today. Through analytical study students will explore social, environmental, behavioral, aesthetic, technological, and political forces that influence and affect architectural forms, ideas, and urban patterns. A number of different teaching formats will be used. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:215 Global Modern Art (3) This course traces how modern art movements, like Impressionism, Orientalism, and Abstraction, manifested globally, investigating the parallel ways modernisms in places like Turkey, Japan, and Nigeria responded to shared philosophical, political, and technological developments. Primary sources, classic texts, and new scholarship on global modernisms will pair with museum visits to develop students' skills of critical visual analysis and equip them with a vocabulary to discuss modern art, anywhere in the world. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:220 African Photography (3) This course chronologically explores the development of photography in Africa, since its 19th-century appearance as a technological import of colonialism up until the proliferation of contemporary photographic practices. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:225 Contemporary African Arts (3) This course considers the development of contemporary African arts from the 1980s up to the present, and the major critical discourses that have accompanied it. By focusing on different geographical regions, the course examines multiple art practices in a variety of media--painting, sculpture, performance, photography, video, and installation--situating them in the postcolonial, local, and global contexts in which they are produced. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:230 Gender and Women in Photography (3) Provides an introduction to feminist theory in relation the photographic medium. Examines the history of photography from the 19th century up to the present exclusively through the lens of women, and through close readings of feminist criticism by authors such as Judith Butler, bell hooks, or Laura Mulvey. We will zoom in on a number of practitioners, such as Julie Margaret Cameron, Cindy Sherman, Lorna Simpson, Shirin Neshat, while engaging key issues that have been at the center of their works: the notions of gender, gaze, difference, performativity, the body, and more. Special attention given to the intersectionality of gender and race, in a diversity of geographical regions with a focus on Africa and the USA.

Open to nonmajors.

21:082:240 Baroque Art (3) European art and architecture from 1580 to 1800; emphasis on the great masters of the period: Rembrandt, Rubens, Caravaggio, Bernini, Velazquez, and others; survey of the transformation of the baroque style into the rococo. Slide lectures and museum visits.

Open to nonmajors.

21:082:265 American Popular Film of the 1970s (3) This course explores American popular film from the late 1960s through 1980. Working primarily with films and important scholarly and critical texts, lectures and discussions will focus on the major themes of American film within the context of shifting cultural and social spheres of the era. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:270 American Art (3) Focuses on American painting, sculpture, and photography within the context of the developing society and its tastes; emphasis on art and artists in the 19th century through the early 20th century. Slide lectures and museum visits. Open to nonmajors. Prerequisites: 21:082:101, 102, or permission of instructor.

21:082:275 Black Art in America (3) Examines both the high-art and folk-art aspects of black-American art from a historical and contemporary point of view; emphasis on the aesthetics of the works and their relation to social and intellectual history. Field trips to New York and within the Newark area to see folk art and to visit artists. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:280 Art of the Far East (3) History of art in Japan, India, and China from the earliest periods to modern times; emphasis on understanding the aesthetics of Asian art. Slide lectures and museum trips to outstanding Asian collections at the Newark Museum and in New York. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:281 Global Asias (3) Explores the concept of Global Asias and the different framings of Asian diasporic and transnational art histories including hemispheric approaches. Begins with New Jersey and the New York City area and explores artists and movements based in the local region that interconnect to global circulations, theory, art practices, and other contexts.

Open to nonmajors.

21:082:285 Arts of Africa (3) The classical traditions of sculpture and related arts of the black people of Africa; impact of African forms on modern Western art and on the cultural traditions of the new nations of Africa. Slide lectures and museum trips to the Newark Museum and New York collections. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:289 Islamic Art and Visual Culture (3) This course is an introduction to the art and visual culture of the Islamic world from the late seventh century to the present, covering a geography that extends from Central and South Asia to North Africa and Spain. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:290 Islamic Architecture (3) This course is an introduction to the architecture of the Islamic world from the late seventh century to the present, covering a geography that extends from Central and South Asia to North Africa and Spain. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:291 Representing Gender in the Modern Middle East (3) Exploration of the construction of gender--feminine, masculine, and transgender--in art and visual culture of the Middle East from 1800 until the present. Focus on orientalism, postcolonialism, Islamic modernism, feminism, and the contemporary art market. Course will include frequent trips to local museums to examine original artworks. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:292 Picturing the Middle East: 19th Century Art of the Mediterranean (3) In the nineteenth century, as British and French empires expanded and the Ottoman Empire contracted, the Mediterranean region became increasingly connected through politics, travel, media, and communication. Artists around the region responded by incorporating techniques, imagery, and materials of the imagined "other". French orientalist painters imagined exotic harems, and Ottoman artists used photography to document their secularizing modernity. This course looks at art movements on both sides of Orientalism, which responded to parallel shifts in technology and contact, but within differing power dynamics. In doing so, the course seeks to dismantle the static binary of East and West by framing these arts within a connected cultural network.

21:082:305 Problems in Art History (3) Addresses specific topics in the history of art. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:306 Core Topics in Art History (3) Addresses specific topics in the history of art. Fulfills NCAS core arts and media requirement. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:310 Ancient Art (3) Arts of the civilizations of Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece, and Rome as reflections of the ideas and ideals of these cultures; study of architecture, sculpture, painting, ceramics, and other arts; the contributions of these great cultures of antiquity to the later Western world. Slide lectures and museum trips. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:320 Medieval Art (3) History of art from the fall of Rome to the Renaissance: early Christian and Byzantine; Romanesque and Gothic; sculptural and architectural monuments, as well as objects created by migratory cultures of the period. Slide lectures and museum trips. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:330 Renaissance Art (3) Examines European painting, sculpture, and architecture from about 1400 to 1580; emphasis on the major masters of the period--Jan van Eyck, Donatello, Leonardo da Vinci, Dürer, Michelangelo, El Greco, and others--whose artistic legacy provides a visual record of this important period in Western civilization. Slide lectures and museum trips. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:333 Newark: A History of Art, Architecture, and Cultural Institutions (3) Weekly seminar meets primarily off campus to examine and analyze various sites and institutions throughout the city. Each class period spent exploring a different aspect of Newark's cultural legacy, often in lectures and discussions led by leading local specialists from the city's most influential cultural institutions. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:350 Development of Modern Art (3) Traces the development of modern art from 1770 to 1945, focusing on major trends from neoclassicism to surrealism. Slide lectures and museum visits. Open to nonmajors. Prerequisites: 21:082:101, 102, or permission of instructor.

21:082:360 Art since 1945 (3) Explores art since 1945. Emphasizes styles such as abstract expressionism, minimalism, pop, conceptual art, feminist art, performance art, neo-expressionism, and postmodernism as well as new and developing trends in art. Slide lectures, and museum/gallery visits. Open to nonmajors. Prerequisites: 21:082:101, 102, or permission of instructor.

21:082:370 Ecoart I: Global Activism (3) Introduces students to the history of EcoArt from the 1960s-70s Land Art movement to contemporary Global EcoArt Activism. Explores current issues and thematics in environmental and climate art activism studying the work and practices of artists based in the New Jersey/New York area to those working globally. Delves into the current literature on human relationships to nature and the environment including on the topic of climate disaster. Incorporates intensive arts writing practice and digital curation. Includes scheduled site visits to exhibitions and with artists engaged in EcoArt practices. Can be taken by those who have little to no background in art history.

Open to nonmajors.

21:082:371 Ecoart II: Ecoart and the Anthropocene (3) This interdisciplinary class will investigate the current framings of our time as the Anthropocene, Capitalocene, and Chthulucene. Among them, with a rethinking of our relationships to nature and situated narratives of past, present, and future sites of environmental degradation and remediation in the New York/New Jersey area. Investigates art histories and practices in parallel with ecology, literature, science fiction, critical theory, and entwined histories to think about the changing coastlines of Newark and New York City and the impact of urbanism on the natural environment.

Open to nonmajors.

21:082:375 Why Museums Matter (3) Provides an in-depth examination of the role of museums in contemporary society, studying the form and function of museums, and learning about their history and key staff areas. Analyzes the organizational framework of museums and how they uphold cultural narratives in the United States, exploring the ethics behind their collecting, organization, and funding. Includes classes at The Newark Museum of Art, and required visits to museums in New York City, like the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art. By the end of the course, students will have a firm grasp on the arc of museum history and will have also developed skills to think critically about cultural institutions.

Open to nonmajors.

21:082:380 Art, Design, and Style: 19th- and 20th-Century Decorative Arts (3) Explores the relationship between the fine arts of painting, sculpture, and architecture and the decorative, or applied arts, of the 19th and 20th centuries. The course includes museum trips in New York and New Jersey. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:382 History of Photography (3) Surveys technical and aesthetic development of photography from prephotography optical inventions to contemporary photographic art. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:391,392 Individual Study in Art History (3,3) Special work in art history research for students who have already completed some upper-level coursework in art history. Directed by faculty member; designed to meet specific interests. Prerequisite: Permission of instructor.

21:082:393,394 Internship in Art History (3,3) Opportunity to explore career possibilities. Limited to students interested in developing curatorial and exhibition skills through museum or gallery work; intern in the Paul Robeson Gallery on the Newark Campus or in other locations, under departmental supervision. Prerequisite: Permission of adviser.

21:082:405 Problems in Contemporary Art (3) Examination of significant ideas and problems in contemporary painting, sculpture, and multimedia; emphasis on the current scene. Open to nonmajors.

21:082:497,498 Senior Seminar in Art History (3,3) Culminating courses for students majoring in art with a specialization in art history. Thesis topic selected in consultation with the adviser. Open to majors only. Prerequisite: Completed coursework in area of specialization.