Introdução à História da Arte (not translated)
Code
711061054
Academic unit
Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas
Department
História da Arte
Credits
6
Weekly hours
4
Teaching language
Portuguese
Objectives
The course will introduce students to the basic concepts of the discipline and encourage critical thinking. The students, at the end of the course, should be able to distinguish between periods, styles, geographical areas and the general concepts traditionally employed in the discipline of art history. Apart from that, the course will present many of the theoretical and methodological concepts that will be later developed in the more specialized courses of theory of art. Additionally, they will learn to use the basic tools of the discipline, ranging from artists dictionaries, on-line repositories of images, how to put together a bibliography etc. An important part constitutes in the assisted reading (of pre-assigned texts) and their analysis in class, as well as the writing of short texts (abstracts). The course will include museum visits, essential for the students´ perception that art historians work with concrete objects.
Prerequisites
Not applicable.
Subject matter
The course will proceed both chronologically and thematically, in an effort to avoid a linear history of art. Subjects covered will include: What is art history; the artists biography; the concept of style and the problems that arise from it; subject matter analysis (iconography/iconology); periodization of art history and the problems of time; geography of art history (regions, centers, peripheries, provinces etc.); narratives in museology; exhibitions and art criticism; market value and the work of art as commodity; etc. All of these will be illustrated through concrete case studies, and the emphasis will be on specific problems surrounding specific objects, and not on the theoretical development of these concepts.
Bibliography
1. The Art of Art History: A Critical Anthology, ed. Donald Preziosi, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.
2. Elizabeth Mansfield, ed. Art History and its Institutions. Foundations of a Discipline. London and New York: Routledge, 2002.
3. Marxism and the History of Art. From William Morris to the New Left, ed. Andrew Hemingway, London: Pluto Press, 2006.
4. David H. Solkin, Painting for Money: The Visual Arts and the Public Sphere in Eighteenth-Century England. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1993.
5. Albert Boime, Art in an Age of Bonapartism 1800-1815. Vol. 2: A Social History of Modern Art. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1993.
6. Svetlana Alpers, The Art of Describing. Dutch Art in the Seventeenth Century. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1983.
7. Giovan Pietro Bellori, The Lives of the Modern Painters, Sculptors and Architects. Translated by Alice Sedgwick Wohl. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
Teaching method
The course will be taught with an extensive recourse to visual material, but it will insist on students participation, with questions and observations requested at each step. On-line research will be encouraged early on, as well as the actual, physical searching for books and articles in various libraries. A lot of importance will be placed on the knowledge of foreign languages, especially English, which is why a lot of the reading material will be in English. The students will also be asked to write a number of short texts, as exercises in classroom or at home.
Evaluation method
Evaluation will depend on a combination of attendance and participation, including the completing of written assignments to be presented in class (50%), and one final exam (50%).