History of American Art 4219-AW041-OG

CLASS ONE. Introduction to the class.
Course requirements and an overview of American art.

CLASS TWO. Colonial art
Native art, America in the European imaginary, colonial architecture and painting.
reading: Christopher Columbus. Letters. (excerpts)

CLASS THREE. The early Republic.
Art and American national identity: West, Singleton, Copley, Peale, Trumbull.
reading: “The Declaration of Independence.”

CLASS FOUR. Imperial expansion West.
19thc. landscape painting: Cole, Bierdstadt, Church.
reading: J. L. O’Sullivan, “The Great Nation of Futurity.”
H. N. Smith on Turner’s hypothesis.
T. Cole, “Essay on American Scenery.”

CLASS FIVE. American Impressionism.
Whistler, Cassatt, Sargent.
reading: “Women Artists,” “Women’s Petition to the Academy,” in: P. Wood. Art in Theory 1800-1899.
O. Wilde, “On Art for Art’s Sake.”
J. Whistler, “The Ten O’Clock Lecture.”

CLASS SIX. Industry and masculinity.
Homer, Peto, Eakins, Whitman.
reading: selection of W. Whitman poetry.
W. Whitman, “On the American Artist.”
W. Homer, “Statement on plein-air Painting.”
T. Eakins, “On the Teaching of Art.”

CLASS SEVEN. The avant-garde.
Demuth, Sheeler, O’Keffee, Hopper, Stieglitz and Hine.
reading: “Georgia O’Keeffe,” in: The Guerilla Girls’ Bedside Companion to the History of Western Art.
A. Stieglitz, “Pictorial Photography.”

CLASS EIGHT. American Scene and Social Realism.
Grant Wood, Thomas Benton vs. Ben Shahn.
reading: G. Wood, from Revolt against the City

CLASS NINE. Abstract Expressionism
Pollock, Rothko, Newman.
reading: H. Rosenberg, “The Fall of Paris.”
M. Rothko et al. “Letter to New York Times.”
B. Newman, “The Sublime is Now.”
J. Pollock, “Answers to the Questionnnaire.”

CLASS TEN. 1960s and beyond
Pop-Art, Artists of the Earth, happening, performance, politically engaged art.
reading: R. Hamilton, “For the Finest Art, Try Pop.”
C. Oldenburg, “I am for an Art…”
J. Klinkowitz, “The Sixties Aesthetic,” in: The American 1960s.

CLASS ELEVEN. Feminist art.
Kruger, Sherman, Chicago, Kelly, Ono.
reading: L. Nochlin, “Why Have There Been no Great Women Artists?”

CLASS TWELVE. Conceptual, minimal, and critical art.
Wodiczko, Walker
reading: K. Wodiczko, “Public Projection.”

CLASS THIRTEEN. Postmodernism.
Koons and LaChapelle.
reading: S. Sontag, “Notes on ‘Camp.’”
selection of articles and interviews with the artists.

Type of course

general courses

Mode

Classroom

Learning outcomes

After completing the course, students will:

1. KNOWLEDGE
Students will be able to identify facts and ideas typical of particular American artistic movements/schools and locate them in connection to the more broadly understood American culture.

2. SKILLS
Students will be able to apply their knowledge in a number of extra-artistic contexts, to demonstrate affinities between artistic practices and related phenomena which manifest themselves in other areas of American culture.

3. SOCIAL SKILLS
Students will be able to discriminate between the nuances of artistic attitudes, and associate artistic facts and ideas with more general categories, and – finally – to assess the quality of artworks in terms of their significance for the development of American art.

Assessment criteria

Final grade depends on the following criteria:

Final exam - 100%

However, class participation will also be taken into account.

Bibliography

There is no one book recommended for the course. Publications listed below may serve as a reference for students attending the course sessions.

Bjelajac, David. American Art: A Cultural History. Upper Saddle River, N. J.: Prentice Hall, 2000.
Craven, David. Abstract Expressionism as Cultural Critique: Dissent during the McCarthy Period. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999.
Doss Erica. Benton, Pollock, and the Politics of Modernism: From Regionalism to Abstract Expressionism, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1991.
Ferrier, Jean-Louis (ed.). Art of the 20th Century: A Year-by-Year Chronicle of Painting, Architecture, and Sculpture. Paris: Chêne-Hachette, 1999.
Frascina, Francis (ed.). Pollock and After: The Critical Debate. London: Harper & Row, 1985.
Golding, John. Paths to the Absolute. London: Thames & Hudson, 2002.
Guilbaut, Serge. How New York Stole the Idea of Modern Art: Abstract Expressionism, Freedom and the Cold War. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1983.
Harrison, Charles. Modernism. London: Tate Gallery Publishing, 1997.
Harrison, Charles, Paul Wood and Jason Gaiger (eds.). Art in Theory 1815-1900: An Anthology of Changing Ideas. Oxford, UK & Cambridge, USA: Blackwell Publishers, 1993.
Harrison, Charles and Paul Wood (eds.). Art in Theory 1900-1990: An Anthology of Changing Ideas. Oxford, UK & Cambridge, USA: Blackwell Publishers, 1993.
Heartney, Eleanor. After the Revolution: Women Who Transformed Contemporary Art. 2007.

Additional information

Information on level of this course, year of study and semester when the course unit is delivered, types and amount of class hours - can be found in course structure diagrams of apropriate study programmes. This course is related to the following study programmes:

Additional information (registration calendar, class conductors, localization and schedules of classes), might be available in the USOSweb system:

Description of 4219-AW041-OG in USOSweb