ARHA 35, EuroStuds 38 T/Th 10:00 – 11:20 Amherst College Fall 2009 Nicola Courtright Fayerweather 206, X-2123 and Converse 102D Office Hrs in Fay 206: M 2:00-3:00 and by appt ART AND ARCHITECTURE OF EUROPE FROM 1400 TO 1800 This course is an introduction to painting, sculpture, and architecture of the early modern period The goals of the course are: to identify artistic innovations that characterize European art from the Italian Renaissance to the French Revolution, and to situate the works of art historically, by examining the intellectual, political, religious, and social currents that contributed to their creation; and to teach you the art of close looking to gain visual understanding By the end of the course you will be able to see differences between individual artists and between historical movements, and will be able to identify ways of establishing meaning in art and probing its varied character No previous experience with art or art history is necessary LECTURES Attendance is extremely important, for the substance of this course is in lectures and discussions, not in a textbook SECTIONS You’ll meet every other week with me in the Mead Art Museum on Wednesday at 1:00 We’ll be looking closely at original works of art related to the art we’re studying in the classroom The week you’re not in the Mead you’ll be meeting with your section and doing other imaginative activities, TBA READING You can buy: Sylvan Barnet, A Short Guide to Writing About Art, 9th edition: Pearson Prentice Hall and James F O’Gorman, ABC of Architecture, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1997 at Amherst Books, Main Street (and possibly The Option and surely online) Survey books like Hartt, Art, v 2, will be on reserve, or can be found on the shelves of Frost for you to borrow for the semester Required readings, from articles or portions of books, are on electronic reserve You will be charged a fee to cover any copyright permissions costs It is best to read the required assignments soon after the lecture They will serve as the basis for questions in discussions and on exams PAPERS Two kinds of written work are assigned for this course The first type is a graded paper, two 3page formal analyses of works of art you will look at in museums The second type is an ungraded response to the readings Due every weeks or so, this 1-2 paragraph response to questions I pose takes off from issues of artistic creation and historical connections to them explored in the readings In general I will not comment upon them, because I wish you to 1) find what interests you in the material if anything and 2) deal in an unconstrained fashion with unfamiliar ideas We will also talk about the substance either one-on-one, or in class discussion I want you to perform this exercise, however, so your overall grade will suffer if you not hand each one in -1- Graded papers must be typed, stapled, and handed in on the due date in class Late papers will be penalized I urge you to go to the Writing Center with the papers that I grade You are also welcome to talk with me about the works of art to help develop your ideas and build your writing skills Even those of you who write like gods will benefit from consulting with a mortal! EXAMS There will be three exams: two to be taken in class with a take-home essay to follow it, and a final during exam week The in-class exams will consist of identifications of works of art and basic concepts related to them which you have encountered in class and some unknowns I’ll give you an ungraded quiz to get you ready; if you study, it will definitely help you keep up with the material There are no make-up exams (unless you become sick and have been to the Health Center) and no extensions for exams Studying Get to know the works of art as the semester progresses, rather than waiting for the moment before the exam It is very difficult to tell apart and remember different artists' works if you try to cram them in with Red Bull at a.m when the exam is at All of the slides in the lectures will be available online at ARTstor, licensed by the College (http://www.artstor.org/index.shtml ) Here are the steps: 1) enter the ARTstor digital library: click on GO; 2) create a personal password and LOG ON; 3) go to “ORGANIZE” and then “OPEN IMAGE GROUP.” You will need a class password: “courtright35”; 4) click on “ARHA 35, Fall 2009”, then o ARHA 35 [# of lecture] (study folder)” or o ARHA 35, [# of lecture] (slides)”; and o you also have your own space to gather slides and organize them, called “ARHA 35 [your initials] Also, most of the works of art we will be discussing in class are illustrated in a clickable study guide: http://www.amherst.edu/~nmcourtright/ It has a useful slide-show quiz program (called Zoomsoft) which will allow you to look at the works we saw in class sequentially and mix them up to test yourself for the exam The clickable study guide will not match all of the study guides I hand out, nor does Zoomsoft, since I’ve changed the course over time, but you’ll find they are both still useful The best resource for finding images is ARTstor Other online resources are: Artchive (alphabetical by artist, lots of images), Art Source, Art History Resources, and Gardner’s Art through the Ages You can also Google searches – there’s a lot on the web DATES TO REMEMBER - Thursday, October 1: practice quiz - Friday, October 9: first formal analysis due - Tuesday, October 20: first in-class exam -2- - Friday, Oct 23: first take-home essay due -Thursday, November 19: second in-class exam -Friday, November 20: second take-home essay due - Friday, December 11: second formal analysis due - Finals week: third exam; optional take-home essay -3- RENAISSANCE (15TH AND 16TH CENTURIES) Week (Sept 10) Early Renaissance in Florence, 1: Reconciling the Expression of Originality with the Revival of Antiquity Brunelleschi, Ghiberti Week (Sept 15, 17) 2a Early Renaissance in Florence, 2: Canons of Art for a Virtuous and Devout Life –Masaccio, Donatello 2b Early Renaissance in Florence, 2, cont’d.: Canons of Architecture Brunelleschi, Alberti READING: *Baxandall, Painting and Experience in 15th-Century Italy (2nd ed., 1988), 29-56 Week (Sept 22, 24) High Renaissance in Florence (and Milan): Uniting the Description of Nature with Philosophy and Beauty Leonardo READING: * Vasari, “Preface to the Third Part,” in Lives of the Most Eminent Painters, Sculptors and Architects, ed Philip Jacks (Westminster, MD: Random House, 2006), 221-6; http://site.ebrary.com/lib/amherst/docDetail.action? docID=10124952&page=7&p00=vasari%20preface%20%20%20third%20part%2C %20lives Early Netherlandish Painting and the Beginnings of the Northern Renaissance: Transmission and Transformation of the Classical Canon –Van Eyck, Dürer Week (Sept 29, Oct 1) High Renaissance in Rome: Art for the Imperial Papacy Bramante, Michelangelo READING: 6-7 *James Ackerman, “The Architecture of Bramante and Michelangelo,” in H Spencer, ed., Readings in Art History (2nd ed., 1976), 87-110 High Renaissance in Rome: Art for the Imperial Papacy, Michelangelo, Raphael Week (Oct 6, 8) Renaissance and Mannerism in Northern Italy: Classicism Transformed by Color and Light Titian, Correggio, Palladio Mannerism and the Counter Reformation: Artistic Innovation and Religious Reform Michelangelo, Pontormo BREAK -4- Week (Oct 13, 15) 10 Renaissance in the Netherlands, part 2: Transmission, Resistance, and Transformation of the Classical Canon –Bruegel READING: *Benesch, The Art of the Renaissance in Northern Europe, Chap 1, 10-23 BAROQUE (17th CENTURY) 11 Early Baroque and the Art of Reform: Merging High and Low Caravaggio READING: *Ignatius Loyola, “Spiritual Exercises,” in Wren, ed., Perspectives on Western Art, v 2, 76-78 *Panofsky, “What is Baroque?” in Panofsky, Three Essays on Style, ed I Lavin (1995), 17-88 Week (Oct 20, 22) Oct 20: FIRST IN-CLASS EXAM 12 Early Baroque, cont’d: Reform and the Classical Tradition Bernini, Maderno Week (Oct 27, 29) 13 High Baroque in Rome: Art Constructing the Center of the Universe Bernini, Borromini READING: 14 * Chantelou on Bernini, in Art in Theory, 1648-1815: An Anthology of Changing Ideas (Oxford and Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2000), ed Charles Harrison et al 150-59 : http://books.google.com/books? id=p_ZXZd3fH6kC&pg=PA150&lpg=PA150&dq=chantelou, +bernini&source=bl&ots=MF8Sr0cuKr&sig=bVfVtVo8KuF4tVG0iZRqddbY28&hl=en&ei=kcCSrT7BdGptgfL_6nFCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5#v=onepage&q=c hantelou%2C%20bernini&f=false Classicism in Rome and Paris: Antiquity Revered Poussin, Claude, Bernini READING: *Nicolas Poussin, "Observations on Painting," in E Holt, ed., A Documentary History of Art, v (1982 ed.), 141-46 Week (Nov 3, 5) 15 A Northern High Style in the Netherlands Rubens READING: 16 * Pieter Paul Rubens, "On the Imitation of Sculpture," in Art in Theory, 1648-1815: An Anthology of Changing Ideas (Oxford and Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2000), ed Charles Harrison et al., 144-46 http://books.google.com/books? id=p_ZXZd3fH6kC&lpg=PA144&ots=MF8Sr0buOq&dq=rubens%20on%20the %20imitation%20of%20sculpture&pg=PA144#v=onepage&q=&f=false Monumentalizing Everyday Life in the United Provinces landscape, portrait, genre painting Rembrandt -5- Week 10 (Nov 10, 12) 17 Elevation of the Humble in 17th-Century Spain Velazquez 18 Louis XIV and the Apogee of Absolutism in France Versailles READING: *Peter Burke, The Fabrication of Louis XIV (1992), ch 2, 15-37 Week 11 (Nov 17, 19) 18TH CENTURY 19 France: Rococo, the Play of Love in Society Watteau, Boucher, Fragonard Nov 19: SECOND IN-CLASS EXAM BREAK Week 12 (Nov 27, 29) 20 France: The Depiction of Middle-Class Virtue and the Rise of Neo-Classicism Chardin READING: 21 *Honour, Neo-Classicism, Intro., Chap 1, 13-42 England: Neo-Classicism and the Picturesque at Home and in the Garden Adam, Kent, Brown Week 13 (Dec 1, 3) 22 France Neo-Classicism and a Visionary Society: Public Architecture –Soufflot, Boullée, Ledoux 23 France—Neo-Classicism, Revolution, and a Visionary Society: Painting Vigée Lebrun, Canova, David READING: * J.-L David, "The Painting of the Sabines," in E G Holt, ed., A Documentary History of Art, vol 3, 4-14 Week 14 (Dec 11) 24 Neo-Classicism and Revolution to Romanticism Piranesi, Goya FINAL EXAM DURING EXAM WEEK -6-