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Description
This
class is the first of a two-part lecture course that focuses on the history of
art and architecture after WW II. The
period of focus for this portion of the course is the first twenty years after
the war, from 1945 to 1965. In this
short span of time we will see radical transformations in art and architecture:
from the triumphalist bravado of the prewar avant-garde to the existential
crises of mid-century abstractionists; from Cold War-era American
suburbanization to student riots in the streets of Paris in May, 1968. Together we will investigate the greater
political economy of individual objects, buildings and events of the recent
past, our goal being an understanding of how they are constitutive of the
greater political, social and economic network of forces in which we live
today. The course is made up of weekly
lectures and readings, films, museum visits, four written assignments, and a
midterm and final examination.
Lectures and Readings
You are required to attend every lecture that is
scheduled on the syllabus and complete the assigned reading prior to
class. The reading assignments come
from your two textbooks as well as other books that are on reserve at the
library. The following two texts are
available for you to purchase at the bookstore:
1.)H.
H. Arnason. History of Modern
Art: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture, Photography. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2004.
2.) Kenneth Frampton. Modern Architecture: A
Critical History. London: Thames and Hudson, 1992
The following texts are available for you on
reserve at Hamon Arts Library:
1.) Donald
Albrecht and Robert Schonfeld. Russel Wright: Creating American Lifestyle. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2001.
2.)Marshall
Berman. All That Is Solid Melts Into Air: The Experience of Modernity. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1982.
3.)Martha
Buskirk and Mignon Nixon, Eds. The Duchamp Effect: Essays, Interviews and
Round Table. Cambridge, MA: MIT
Press, 1996.
4.)Sarah
Williams Goldhagen and Réjean Legault, Eds.
Anxious Modernisms: Experimentation in Postwar Architectural Culture. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2000.
5.)Sarah
Williams Goldhagen.Louis Kahn’s Situated Modernism. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2001.
6.) Serge
Guilbaut, Ed. Reconstructing Modernism:
Art in New York, Paris, Montreal, 1945-1964. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1990.
7.) Charles
Harrison and Paul Wood, Eds.Art in Theory, 1900-1990. Oxford: Blackwell Press, 1993.
8.) Allan
Kaprow.Essays on the Blurring of Art
and Life. Berkeley, CA: University
of California Press, 1996.
9.) Thomas
Kellein. Fluxus. London: Thames and
Hudson, 1995.
10.) Barbara
Kelly. Expanding the American Dream: Building and Rebuilding Levittown. Albany, NY: State University of New
York Press, 1993.
11.)Edward
Lucie-Smith. Late Modern: The Visual Arts Since 1945. London: Thames & Hudson, 1975.
12.) Esther
McCoy. Case study houses, 1945-1962 Los Angeles: Hennessey &
Ingalls, 1977.
13.) David
Robbins, Ed. The Independent Group: Postwar Britain and the Aesthetics of Plenty. Cambridge,
MA: MIT Press, 1990.
14.) Leo
Steinberg. Other Criteria: Confrontations with Twentieth-Century Art. London: Oxford University Press, 1972.
15.) Mary
and Russel Wright. Mary and Russel Wright’s Guide to Easier Living. New York: Gibbs Smith Publisher, 2003.
Museum Visits and Written Assignments
There are four short written assignments
that are organized in conjunction with the exhibition – Dialogues:
Duchamp, Cornell, Johns, Rauschenberg – at the Dallas Museum of Art
opening on September 4. For each, you must choose a work of art and
write a critical analysis. The focus of the first will be a work by
Duchamp; the second a work by Cornell; the third a work by Johns; and
the fourth a work by Rauschenberg. While describing is essential to
these assignments, your end product in each instance should be
synthetic. That is to say, you should make a statement about the work
of art – take a position – and write about the elements of the work as
they relate to your argument. Your description should be part of your
main idea. By “taking a position” your argument might take up one
of the following points:
-what the work of art means
-how the work of art makes meaning
-how the work of art relates to the artist’s life
-how the work of art relates to our contemporary world
-how the materials carry or don’t carry the intent of
the artwork
-how the artwork is or is not political
-how the artwork functions as “form”
Each
essay must comply with the following requirements:
-identification of the work by title and date
-double-spacing, 10 or 12 pt. font
-1” margins
-2-3 pages
The
essays are due on the following dates:
-Assignment #1 on Duchamp – October 12
-Assignment #2 on Cornell – October 24
-Assignment #3 on Johns – November 2
-Assignment #4 on Rauschenberg – November 16
Tips: In terms of writing style, please avoid the passive voice,
hyperbole and cliché. Simplistic and unfounded descriptions of art,
such as “it is beautiful,” “he is a genius,” or “this is an amazing
masterpiece,” are banned from this writing assignment. Your textbooks
will be helpful to you. Though it is not mandatory, you are welcome to
do extra research on the artists. In preparation for these written
assignments you should familiarize yourself with the art criticism of
the New York Times. It is the voice and stance of the critic
(art, architecture, film and book) that you will assume for this
writing. Remember that plagiarism is grounds for expulsion from
the university. The written assignments must be submitted in
paper: I will not accept electronic documents.
Exams
There
are two exams in the course: a mid-term
that will be held Wednesday, October 5 during regular class time and a final
which will be held Saturday, December 10, 3:00-6:00. The exams will consist of slide identification and essay
questions. The exam material will be
culled from the lectures, reading assignments and class discussions. The final exam will be cumulative.
Graduate Students
In addition to fulfilling all of the requirements of the class, the
graduate students enrolled in the class are required to write a 17-page
research paper on a topic approved by the professor. Please meet with
the professor during office hours.
Grading
Your
grade in the course will be calculated from the following percentages:
| Undergraduates: Written Assignments =
40%
Midterm Exam = 25%
Final Exam = 35%
|
|
Graduates:
Written Assignments = 20%
Midterm Exam = 20%
Final Exam = 30%
Research Paper = 30% |
Policy on Make-ups, Lateness, and Attendance
Students are expected to attend all class sessions. If you will not be
able to attend a specific session, you must make arrangements with
another student to get copies of notes, etc. You are allowed two
unexcused absences, after which your grade will be lowered one half
grade. Assignments must be turned in on time; for each 24-hour period
an assignment is late, one full grade will be deducted (e.g., an “A”
paper will become a “B” paper). Appropriate medical and family excuses
will be accepted in order to establish new dates for assignments.
Make-ups for the Final Exam will require substantial justification.
Students participating in an officially sanctioned, scheduled University
extracurricular activity will be given the opportunity to make up class
assignments or other graded assignments missed as a result of their
participation. It is the responsibility of the student to make
arrangements with the instructor prior to any missed scheduled
examination or other missed assignment for making up the work.
(University Undergraduate Catalogue) Religiously observant students
wishing to be absent on holidays that require missing class should
notify their professors in writing at the beginning of the semester, and
should discuss with them, in advance, acceptable ways of making up any
work missed because of the absence. (See University Policy No. 1.9.)
Schedule
Monday August 22
Introduction: The Terms of Modernity
Berman, 15-36
Lucie-Smith, 7-24
Wednesday August 24
Greenbergian Modernism: Abstract Expressionism
Arnason, 410-445
Monday August 29
Greenbergian Modernism: Abstract Expressionism
Greenberg in Harrison & Wood, “Avant-Garde and Kitsch,” 529-540
Greenberg in Harrison & Wood, “Modernist Painting,” 754-760
Wednesday August 31
The
Body in Space: Jackson Pollock, Happenings and the Architecture of
Brutalism
Kaprow, “The Legacy of Jackson Pollock,” 1-9
Kaprow, “Happenings in the New York Scene,” 15-26
Monday September 5
Labor Day: no class
Wednesday September 7
The
Body in Space: Jackson Pollock, Happenings and the Architecture of
Brutalism
Frampton, 238-246; 262-268
Goldhagen, Louis Kahn’s Situated Modernism, pp TBA
Monday September 12
Mid-Century Modernism: Architecture and Lifestyle in the 1950s
Wright and Wright, Mary and Russel Wright’s Guide to Easier Living,
pp TBA
Albrecht and Schonfeld, Russel Wright: Creating American Lifestyle,
pp TBA
Wednesday September 14
Suburbia, the Cold War and Case-Study Houses
Barbara Kelly, Expanding the American Dream: Building and Rebuilding
Levittown, pp TBA
Esther McCoy, Case study houses, 1945-1962, pp TBA
Monday September 19
The
Architectures of Reconstruction in Europe
Monique Eleb in Goldhagen and Legault, eds., “An Alternative to
Universalist Functionalism: Écochard, Candilis and ATBAT-Afrique,”
55-74.
Wednesday September 21
The
European Scene: Painting in Europe after WW II
Arnason, 446-477
Monday September 26
In-Class Film: Jacques Tati’s Mon Oncle/My Uncle [1958]
Wednesday September 28
In-Class Film: Jean-Luc Godard’s Deux ou trois choses que je sais
d’elle/Two or Three Things I Know about Her [1966]
Monday October 3
The Duchamp Effect: Neo-Dada, Collage, Assemblage and Combines
de
Duve in Buskirk and Nixon eds., “Echoes of the Readymade: Critique of
Pure Modernism,” 93-129
Steinberg, “The Flatbed Picture Plane,” 82-91
Wednesday October 5
MID-TERM EXAM
Monday October 10
FALL
BREAK: NO CLASS
Wednesday October 12
Fluxus: The Art of Anarchy
Kellein, Fluxus, pp TBA
DUE
WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT #1
Monday October 17
British Pop! The Independent Group
Robbins, ed., The Independent Group: Postwar Britain and the
Aesthetics of Plenty, pp TBA
Wednesday October 19
Brisith Pop! The Independent Group
Robbins, ed., The Independent Group: Postwar Britain and the
Aesthetics of Plenty, pp TBA
Monday October 24
American Pop! The Irony and Ecstasy of the Mass Consumerism
Arnason, 478-507
DUE
WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT #2
Wednesday October 26
American Pop! The Irony and Ecstasy of the Mass Consumerism
Crow in Guilbaut,
ed., “Saturday Disasters: Trace and Reference in Early Warhol,” 311-331
Monday October 31
SuperRealism
Arnason, 625-634
Lucie-Smith, 250-260
Wednesday November 2
French Pop! Nouveau Réalisme
Arnason, 508-516
DUE
WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT #3
Monday November 7
Art,
Architecture and Revolution in Paris: Lettrisme, the Situationist
International and May 1968
Debord, Society of the Spectacle, pp TBA
Wednesday November 9
Post-painterly Abstraction
Arnason, 523-542
Lucie-Smith, 94-118
Monday November 14
Minimalism
Arnason, 543-560
Wednesday November 16
Minimalism
Judd in Harrison and Wood, “Specific Objects,” 809-813
Fried in Harrison and Wood, “Art and Objecthood,” 822-834
DUE
WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT #4
Monday November 21
Land
Art and Conceptualism
Arnason, 588-620
Lewitt in Harrison and Wood, “Paragraphs on Conceptual Art,” 837-839
Buren, Mosset, Parmentier and Toroni in Harrison and Wood, “Statement,”
850
Wednesday November 23
THANKSGIVING HOLIDAY: NO CLASS
Monday November 29
Art Povera: Pop! Process and Conceptualism in Postwar Italy
Celant in Harrison and Wood, excerpt from Art Povera, 886-889
Monday December 1
Postmodernism: Architecture and Quotation
Frampton, 280-343
Arnason, 655-666
Saturday December 10
FINAL EXAM
3:00-6:00
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