Course Descriptions

This course studies the history of Western Art beginning with the sculpture, painting and architecture of Ancient Egypt and concluding with the Gothic Cathedrals and Italian fresco paintings of the High Middle Ages in Europe. An understanding and appreciation of art are the aims of this course, and through illustrated lectures, class discussions and assignments, students will develop an eye for seeing and appropriate terms to describe the works shown. Our involvement with the art of the past clearly reveals how changing styles in visual culture are influenced by the historical context and the political, social and religious thought of each period.

This is an introductory survey course of Western Art from the 15th to the start of the 20th Century. Beginning with the art of the Renaissance, this course will study, chronologically, the history of painting, sculpture and architecture of each period. Individual artists including Leonardo, Michelangelo, Rubens, Rembrandt, Goya, Van Gogh and Picasso are studied in addition to the larger period styles. The economic, political, social, and religious ideas of each period will be closely considered.

This course will examine the diverse and rich production of objects by Northwest Coast First Nations people, including the Coast Salish, Haida, Kwakwaka'wakw, Nuu-chah-nulth, Tlingit, and Tsimshian. The characteristics of material culture both before European colonization and up until the present day will be discussed in relation to: traditional visual practices; the impact of colonialism on aboriginal objects; the "salvage paradigm"; constructed notions of "authenticity", "art", and "artifact"; the roles played by art history, anthropology, and ethnology in the preserving and collecting of artifacts; the roles played by museums and galleries in object display, and how the tourist market and art market shape art production.

Using illustrated lectures, discussions, field trips and assignments, participants in this course will be introduced to the means of visual communication that have served the expressive, ritual and commercial needs of diverse cultures and individuals throughout history. We will define the basic terminology of art and visual media, examining the interaction of form and content. We will investigate the many purposes of art through an examination of its past and present roles within different societal and political contexts.

This course thematically examines issues in art history with relevance to contemporary discourse. Topics range from ritual and spirituality in art to representations of gender, sexuality, politics, identity and the body, as well as images of nature, war, death and commemoration. We will also look into aspects of photography, modern architecture, censorship, and the role of museums.

Using illustrated lectures, discussions, field trips, and assignments this course critically situates “nonwestern" art within contemporary socio-historical and art historical discourses such as colonialism and indigenous resistance. Drawing on examples from the rich cultural and material histories of Meso-America, Africa, and the Northwest Coast, we will engage with the complex, and often controversial issues that shape our understanding of these diverse art practices. Topics include “primitivism,” museums and repatriation, the ethics of archaeology, tourist art, gender, photography and film.

Explore exotic Indian temples, ancient Chinese burials and Japanese shrines in this introductory course to Asian art. Indian, Chinese and Japanese works of art will be examined in the light of cultural, religious, social and political issues to emphasize the close connections between art and society. In particular, the impact of Hinduism, Buddhism and Confucianism on the arts will be examined. Students will gain insights into the evolution of important periods, styles and artistic traditions in Asian art. Consideration will be given to a wide range of art forms, including the performing arts and the Japanese tea ceremony.

This course is an examination of how women have been represented in the art of the past, as well as an investigation of women artists throughout history. The focus is on North America and Europe. The course will discuss issues such as how gender differences are upheld and critiqued in visual images, and the obstacles women artists have faced. The significant ways in which feminist inquiry has changed the practice of art history will be a key theme.

This course is designed to explore the art and architecture of Iran (formerly known as Persia) by examining artworks from across media including architecture, painting, metalwork, woodwork, glass, and textile. By completing this course, students will be familiar with the visual vocabulary and artistic practices of Persian art from its ancient to contemporary times, as well as the art produced by Iranian artists in diaspora. They will be able to analyze the visual features of these artworks and contextualize them by applying the appropriate terminology. They will be motivated to expand their knowledge to other artworks from the region and draw comparisons with artistic traditions they are more familiar with.

This course is a chronological, critical history of 19th Century European art, particularly painting. The necessary earlier historical background will be covered at the beginning of the course – Absolutism, the role of the Salon, the French Revolution, and the Enlightenment. The development of individual artists will be considered in relation to major art movements and the shifting socio-political aspects of the period (civic uprisings, the Industrial Revolution, changes in the art market and patronage, etc.). Issues of class, gender, and race will also be emphasized.

This course is a critical history of 20th century European art and traces the subsequent development of art in the U.S. from the 1940s to contemporary times. The aim of this course is to study the assumptions and achievements of modernism. Art will be placed within the context of the rapid aesthetic, social, economic, theoretical and political upheavals of the period.

Artists offer unique perspectives on technologies. The topic of art and technology has recently been given a new impetus as artists have become interested in digital technologies and cutting-edge bio-technologies (cloning, genetic engineering). Yet the relationship between art and technology is not new, but ancient. Examining their interaction is vital, particularly given our current situation of rapid change. The topic will be of interest to students in both the humanities and the sciences.

This course traces the origins of the Early Renaissance in Italy, beginning with the art of Giotto and focusing attention on the creators of the new style, the architects, sculptors and painters of Florence, Arezzo, Mantua and Venice. The intellectual, religious and political climate of the fifteenth century, linked to the expression in this new art, will also be considered, as will the emerging importance of private patronage.

This course studies the art of the High Renaissance and the emerging view of the artist as sovereign genius. The work of Leonardo, Michelangelo and Raphael is examined in depth. Focus is then given to the artists of the Mannerist School, whose highly subjective and artificial style dominates the latter part of the 16th century. The contributions of the Venetians as well as the architecture of Palladio will also be considered.

This course will survey modern architecture from its roots in the later Industrial Revolution through present-day production, taking into account changes in technology, socio-cultural context, architectural theory and paradigms of globalism and environmental awareness. Many prominent architects will be discussed as well how broader trends and movements such as the Arts-and-Crafts, International Modernism, Brutalism and Postmodernism have impacted the architecture of Greater Vancouver.

This course takes an in-depth look at art and the environment, in particular the changing perceptions of nature in art through time and, more currently, art activism and art collaboration in relation to climate change, ecological crisis, and the anthropocene. This course looks at how artists have examined the human relationship to the landscape and the planet, from earth art, to repurposing trash, to developing visual strategies to accompany protests and enhance advocacy. The course includes examples of contemporary First Nations art and local Vancouver artists.

This course examines the intersections of art and the market, how art becomes an investment, how auction houses function, and the criminal element that tries to cash in through art theft and forgery. We will examine a number of case studies to understand the world of art and business, from Sotheby’s to museum intrigues to critical reviews to the elite world of experts, art collecting, and donor gifts.

Always in the vanguard of global exchange, the dynamic and multicultural metropolis of Vancouver is an exciting model of the trans-global city of the future. Using illustrated lectures, discussions, and assignments, students participating in Art History 252 will be introduced to the history, culture and artistic accomplishments of Greater Vancouver. Multiple on-site visits make this course an enriching, participatory and interactive experience for both local and international students, allowing them to better understand the West Coast and Canadian culture, in which they are living and working, as well as discovering contemporary Indigenous art in public spaces. By surveying selected examples from various genres and media we will investigate the many functions of art through an examination of its past and present roles in the diverse societal and political contexts of Vancouver.

For thousands of years humans have made cloth to serve functional, decorative, expressive and communicative needs. This course will explore the myriad ways in which fabric has been used socially, politically and aesthetically. Topics will include: textiles as narratives, identity, social status, spirituality, political affiliation or protest and technological development. Through studies drawn from a selection of ethnic, social or historical groups from around the world students will be introduced to the rich study of textiles from the Paleolithic period to the present day.

This course surveys the history of photography from its technical beginnings in the 1830s to the use of photographic technologies in current postmodern practice. The course focuses on selected practitioners and aesthetic movements from the 19th and 20th centuries as well as the interaction of photography with mass media, including commercial photography and photojournalism. Emphasis is placed on the socio-political and aesthetic roles photography plays in culture and its use as "evidence" in classification, photojournalism, anthropology, and forensics.

The Art of the Baroque examines the rise of the Baroque as a style and an ideology from its origins in the art and architecture of Counter-Reformation Rome, and follows the dissemination of Baroque tendencies through the countries of 17th-century Europe, including Flanders, Spain, France, the Dutch Republic, and England. The course traces the close interrelationships between art, architecture, politics, religion, and science at the start of the modern period.

This course examines major examples of art activism from the mid-twentieth century to the present and uses a variety of readings to shape understandings of both historical and contemporary issues in relation to art production: war and conflict, poverty and homelessness, the environment and climate change, technological change, corporate capitalism, neo-liberalism, and globalization.

Through close reading and discussion of influential art-historical texts this course will critically survey various approaches that have characterized the interpretive discourse on art from the Renaissance to the present day. Topics will include (auto-) biography, stylistic/formal analysis, connoisseurship, iconography and iconology, patronage and reception, social history, Marxist perspectives, psychoanalytic approaches, semiotics and structuralism, postmodernism, postcolonialism, deconstruction, feminism and gender studies.

When faced with trauma and atrocity, what can art do? This class focuses on the role of representation in relation to trauma, particularly with the theoretical concept of post-memory in mind (the trauma of those who did not directly experience the event). We will predominantly examine the 20th Century and some of its cataclysmic events as they have been imaged by artists, including painters, printmakers, sculptors, graphic novelists, and photographers. The course will appeal to anyone interested in how art can facilitate or impede individual and collective memory, and how we deal with or repress events (historical amnesia), and Truth and Reconciliation. It will also be useful for students intending to work in organizations that advocate for and empower marginalized populations.

This course will examine how the visual arts have been implicated in the construction of Canada as a nation. Indigenous, French, and British traditions have contributed to contemporary understandings of Canada as a nation distinct from all others, but at the same time, inextricably linked to wider histories of settler colonialism, nationalism, and globalization. These broad themes will be illuminated through a critical analysis of specific topics and media, including photography, landscape, gender, ethnicity and the role of museums/art galleries.

This course provides an in-depth look at how museums and galleries structure perceptions of art and function as public and/or private spaces. Students will examine a number of case studies to better understand the diversity of practices and institutions.

This course critically analyzes images of the so-called "Other" in Western art. Western art is crowded with bodies that dominant powers have violently suppressed. In considering case studies from medieval times to the present, we re-evaluate maligned societal “types” - witches, criminals, peasants, shepherds, beggars, prostitutes, homosexuals, non-Europeans and non-Christians, the mentally ill and disabled – who have typically been marginalized or excluded from dominant culture. Select readings and images will be studied to expose the ideologies that privilege some people and subordinate others. The contexts include colonialism, xenophobia, patriarchy, religious strife, psychiatry, and medicalization of sexuality, and race.

Graphic books are a special breed of storytelling. This course, through power-point presentations, seminar-style class discussions, readings, and drawing exercises, examines the unique contributions of graphic novels, memoirs, and histories. Major examples will be examined and interpreted. Students will become familiar with their stylistic innovations, the image-text relationship, and how artists use the concepts of time and space in this visual medium.

Students will work with an Art History faculty member to guide them in the development of a research-based project. Specific course details will be arranged between individual students and faculty members. See the Department of Art History website for complete details on the application process.