Art Theory & Critical Studies (ARTCR-GE)

Study of painting & sculpture in America in 1945 to the present with background information concerning development of styles & movements in art in the 20th century. Lectures, discussions, slides, gallery & museum visits.

This course surveys developments in contemporary visual arts since the '60s, from Conceptual Art to Land Art and Art and Activism through to Globalism of the '90s and early 2000s, including developments in performance art, dance, film, photography, and new media in the history of the arts.

This course explores the burgeoning field of social practice art. Today artists working in the field of social practice focus on aesthetics, ethics, collaboration, media strategies, & social activism as central issues that inform their artworks & projects that are designed for public & social spaces. In the United States, visual art that engaged the public directly began in the late 1950s & coincided with the local “decentralization” efforts that, in the arts, resulted in community-based art practices that envisioned the public as diverse, socially-engaged, & contributed to an expansive aesthetic consciousness. Understanding this history contextualizes social practice art & allows us to interrogate the ways artists blur the lines between object making, performance, activism, grass roots organizing & pedagogy.

This class will seek to interrogate the categories of art & activism by looking closely at the following efforts: Occupy Wall Street movement, Gulf Labor Coalition & Global Ultra Luxury Faction (G.U.L.F.), the direct action wing of Gulf Labor Coalition, & the Direct Action Front for Palestine-NYC & Black Lives Matter. These case studies will sketch the possibility of a practice in which artist’s work does not simply add an artistic flair to this or that campaign, but rather theory and research, action & aesthetics, debriefing & analysis. Close readings of texts and visual materials form the core of the class supplemented with field trips, & special guests.

This class surveys theories of contemporary art from the 1970s to the present. Class meetings provide an overview of the parallel appearance of new art forms and the critical theories associated with them. Areas to be explored include contemporary media culture, the politics of the image and identity, social constructions, memory and history as these relate to art theory and criticism.

This seminar consists of readings, writings, and discussion. The course is divided into weekly units covering theories and philosophies relating to art and new media, as well as geo- and spatial politics, social justice, literature, environment, race, gender, and other topics. The course bibliography is tailored specifically to current MFA students and their art practices. Readings span a range of historical periods, with emphasis on how these texts relate to the contemporary moment, exposing students to both canonical and new ideas in art and theory.

A wide range of contemporary visual & critical methodologies used in art criticism are explored, along with an extensive evaluation of writing techniques from a variety of sources including major international newspapers, journals, books, & on-line & print art publications.