Through a series of case studies, this course examines the importance of art as cultural expression across time and from a global perspective.  Each course section will cover basic issues and approaches to art, including stylistic analysis, patronage, art's relationship to religion, ideology, society and economy, gender roles, and the interaction of cultures. Case studies will include architecture, sculpture, painting, and other arts, such as ceramics, textiles, and photography.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts and Human Diversity core requirements.

Consult the department website for details about the specific sections offered.

An introduction to the methods and problems of art history, including the theoretical approaches to art and its history, the examination and analysis of the work and its medium, the role of the museum and gallery in the study of art, and bibliographic tools of the different disciplines of the field.

Prerequisite: ARTH 110 or 151 or 152 from earlier catalog(s) or permission of chair.

The history of the ancient world - its politics, philosophy, and literature -is mostly silent or slanderous about the lives of women. In most times and places their role in public life and their ability to express themselves were severely circumscribed. However, a study of archaeological material, representations in art and literature, and the occasional writing of women themselves allows us to look behind the curtain that veiled their lives. This class will examine the evidence to reconstruct a picture of what the life of women was like in Egyptian, Greek, and Roman culture throughout the ancient Mediterranean.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts and Human Diversity requirements in the core curriculum.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts and Human Diversity requirements in the core curriculum.

This course covers traditional as well as contemporary sculpture, painting, architecture, and body arts of Melanesia, Island Southeast Asia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Students will learn how material culture, along with the concepts of mana and tapu sustained highly stratified cultures in places such as Hawaii and New Zealand. They will also study more egalitarian societies in which cultures maintained a balanced relationship with their environment through beliefs and social practices. Examples of such societies include the Asmat, Komoro, and culture groups that inhabit the Geelvink Bay region. Students will have the opportunity to work with objects from the American Museum of Asmat Art at the University of St. Thomas (AMAA@UST).

This course fulfills the Fine Arts and Human Diversity requirements in the core curriculum.

Following a brief introduction to the origins of Buddhist art in India, this course will examine a selection of primary monuments and objects associated with Buddhism as practiced in China and Japan. The historical context, iconography, style and religious function of individual sites and objects will be considered in roughly chronological order.  Larger topics relating to the production and reception of Buddhist art, such as its functional/ritual context, patronage and iconographical development, will be examined in class discussions of select articles. The goal of this course is to provide students with a foundational knowledge of the art and issues associated with the practice of Buddhism in traditional China and Japan.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts and Human Diversity core requirements.

Throughout history, humans have set aside spaces for religious purposes. Frequently these are the most visible remains or representatives of a culture and are keys to understanding the place of humans within the world and universe. This course examines sacred architecture and spaces from a variety of perspectives, including materials and structure, ritual function and liturgy, decoration, symbolism, physical context, and social/religious context. The course will examine not only Christian churches, but will also examine non-Christian and non-western traditions of religion and architecture.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts requirement in the core curriculum.

A survey of high style and vernacular architecture in the United States from the Native Americans to the present day. Upon completion of this course, the student will be able to: identify the major themes and styles in American architecture; recognize major monuments and their designers; and understand how an American identity was projected in architecture. This includes understanding American architecture and its relationship to corresponding developments in art, landscape, and the urban fabric. Emphasis will be placed on structures in Minnesota and the upper Midwest.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts requirement in the core curriculum.

This course surveys the diverse arts produced by people of African descent in the Diaspora (Suriname, Brazil, Cuba, Haiti, the United States and England) from the Colonial period to the present. An examination of selected West and Central African cultural practices and art forms will serve as a basis for an understanding of creative transformations in the African Diaspora. Important issues to be addressed include art and resistance, survivals and transformations, and the construction of race and diasporic identity.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts and Human Diversity requirements in the core curriculum.

The continent of Africa presents a world of contrasts: from the powerful trading empires of the Sahel to the small scale, nomadic societies of the Kalahari. This course will survey the arts and cultures of sub-Saharan Africa, drawing on recent breakthroughs in archaeology, anthropology and art history to explore the diversity and creativity of past and present African artists. This course will explore material culture in its original context and seek to understand the social roles that art plays in all aspects of life, from religion and politics to personal relationships.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts and Human Diversity requirements in the core curriculum.

This course number covers a range of offerings in the art and architecture of Asia, Africa, Oceania and Latin America. Offerings will vary from year to year, but will usually provide a comprehensive survey of the arts of a wide region such as Asia or Africa or of a major religion such as Buddhism or Islam. A more detailed examination of a single country such as China or Mexico may also be included among offerings.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts and Human Diversity requirements in the core curriculum.

2 credit(s)

The subject matter of the course will vary from year to year, but will not duplicate existing courses. Descriptions of these courses are available in the Searchable Class Schedule on Murphy Online, www.banner.stthomas.edu/pls/banner/prod/bwckschd

 4 credit(s)

The subject matter of the course will vary from year to year, but will not duplicate existing courses. Descriptions of these courses are available at www.stthomas.edu/registrar/onlineschedule.html.

Topics listed under 297 fulfill the Fine Arts requirement in the core curriculum.

A survey of the art and architecture of ancient Greece from the fall of the Bronze Age civilizations to the end of the Hellenistic period. Particular attention will be given to sculpture, vase painting, and the relationship of art to the broader culture, to the art of the ancient Near East and Egypt, and to gender relations in ancient Greece.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts requirement in the core curriculum.

A survey of the art of the Roman Republic and Empire to the emperor Constantine in the early fourth century C.E. Issues include the use of art and architecture as an expression of imperial political programs, the creation of urban architecture and the everyday environment of the Romans, and Rome's relationship to Greece and the Near East.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts requirement in the core curriculum.

This course examines the art and culture of Mexico from Independence through Revolutionary and post-Revolutionary periods (c. 1824-1940). Painting, sculpture, architecture and popular arts are investigated in the context of broader political and intellectual movements during this period of tremendous societal change. The class begins with an overview of art history from the pre-Hispanic and Colonial periods. The core course content focuses on academic and popular arts following Mexico's independence; in this context we discuss the intense search for national identity, or mexicanidad, that marks the modern era. This class also explores the impact of the Mexican Revolution on the work of Diego Rivera, David Alfaro Siquiros, Jose Clemente Orozco, Frida Kahlo and other artists of the period. Through critical readings of the biographies and autobiographies of Kahlo and Rivera alongside scholarly and popular texts, the course raises questions about the role of artist biography in our understanding of art works. In this course, Mexico is not seen in isolation: readings and discussions also investigates the work of Mexican-born artists in the United States and Europe as well as the ways in which outsiders conceived of and represented Mexico during the Revolutionary Period. 

This course fulfills the Fine Arts and Human Diversity requirements in the core curriculum.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts and Human Diversity requirements in the core curriculum.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts and Human Diversity requirements in the core curriculum.

The goal of this course is to engage students in a comprehensive examination of the historical development of Chinese painting from the Paleolithic period to the 20th century. The issues to be addressed will include the stylistic development of figure and landscape painting; the major figures and the “monuments” of painting; the influence of format on Chinese painting; the classification of subject matter and favored themes of Chinese painters; the early emergence of art history in Chinese painting and its later effects; changes in the socio-political influences on painters and their work; and methodological differences between modern Chinese and Western art historians.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts and Human Diversity requirements in the core curriculum.

This course examines the formation and development of the first Christian and Islamic art and architecture during the first millennium C.E. of Europe and the Mediterranean. The class will examine the development of religious structures for these new religions, the role of visual images in both religious and secular contexts, and the influences that these cultures exerted on each other. Areas to be covered include: the Early Christian period; the Germanic, Celtic, Anglo-Saxon, Scandinavian cultures of the sixth to eighth centuries; the Carolingian and Ottonian periods; Byzantine art and architecture; Islamic art and architecture.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts requirement in the core curriculum.

A survey of the arts in Europe during the Romanesque and Gothic periods, c. 1000-1400. Emphasis will also be given to contemporaneous currents in Byzantine and Islamic art and their influence on the art of the West.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts requirement in the core curriculum.

Clothing is not simply functional, but is also an expression of body ideals, class structure, gender, and historical development of technical and artistic change. This course looks at the materials, design, and use of textiles and garments from the early to the contemporary period in the West, with special stress on understanding the role of artistic representation and methodology in defining social status and standards of beauty. Attention will also be paid to the treatment of historic dress, both by authors of the period, and in popular culture.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts requirement in the core curriculum.

A survey of the art and architecture of Italy, Spain and Portugal from the fourteenth through the sixteenth centuries. The course will focus on issues of style, patronage and iconography.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts requirement in the core curriculum.

A survey of the art and architecture of western Europe in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Emphasis will be given to issues of iconography, patronage, and style.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts requirement in the core curriculum.

This course will investigate the history of European painting and sculpture from 1800 to 1880. It will consider the major trends of Neoclassicism, Romanticism, Realism, and Impressionism. It will also address art's response to and role in a European society marked by colonialism, industrialization, and the rise of urban mass culture.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts requirement in the core curriculum.

This course will investigate the history of the visual arts (primarily painting and sculpture) in the United States from 1776 to 1960. Artists to be considered include colonial portraitists; Romantic landscape painters; Neoclassical sculptors; Realist, Luminist, and Impressionist painters; artists associated with New York Dada and the Harlem Renaissance; Precisionists, Regionalists and Social Realists; and Abstract Expressionists. Participants will consider artists' responses to key historical developments such as the founding of the nation, westward expansion, the Civil War, industrialization, and emergence as a superpower. Several issues will run throughout the course: What is the relationship between the art of Euro-Americans and that of Europe -- and that of Native Americans? Is there something "American" about American art? How do the visual arts reinforce or challenge our sense of American history and identity?

This course fulfills the Fine Arts requirement in the core curriculum.

Modernist artists strove to find a visual language of expression appropriate to their time; yet many contemporaries found their works incomprehensible, as do many people today. An open-minded and historically informed investigation of modern art helps to make sense of it. This course will explore the history of European painting and sculpture from 1880 to 1940. It will consider the many movements that characterized modernism, such as Post-Impressionism, Symbolism, Fauvism, Cubism, Futurism, Expressionism, Dada, Surrealism, and Constructivism. Issues to be addressed include the rejection of tradition, the development of abstraction, the impact of World War I and its aftermath, the influence of science and technology on art, and the fate of modernism under Hitler's and Stalin's regimes. Particular attention will be paid to the theoretical underpinnings of modern art.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts requirement in the core curriculum.

This course will investigate the history of the visual arts since 1960, from Pop Art and Minimalism through recent trends. Art from around the globe will be considered, but primary emphasis will be placed on art in the United States. In addition to surveying the most significant artists, works, and trends, participants will consider issues such as: the commodification of art; the dematerialization of the art object; art's role in sociopolitical discourse; definitions of postmodernism; the legitimating institutions that comprise the "artworld;" and the relationship of aesthetic or critical theory to artistic creation.

This course fulfills the Fine Arts requirement in the core curriculum.

2 credit(s)

These courses allow students to gain credit for certain non-classroom experiences. (These do not include studio art courses.) Normally open to junior and senior students. Permission of the department chair is required. Credit for experience is normally sought prior to its occurrence.

See the complete description of these courses at the beginning of the "Curricula" section of the course catalog, here.

2 credit(s)

These courses allow students to gain credit for certain non-classroom experiences. (These do not include studio art courses.) Normally open to junior and senior students. Permission of the department chair is re-quired. Credit for experience is normally sought prior to its occurrence.

See the complete description of these courses at the beginning of the "Curricula" section of the course catalog, here.

0 credit(s)

During the senior year or earlier, art history majors are expected to write a major research paper with an abstract and to describe the results of their research in a short oral presentation. The purpose of this paper and presentation is to allow the student to demonstrate competency in art historical methodology and to gain some experience from presenting the results to a group of peers.

Normally, this requirement is done in lieu of the regular paper assignment for one of the upper-level courses. The topic should be chosen in consultation with the instructor of the course by the end of the second week of the semester and should be completed no later than six weeks prior to graduation. In addition, students will present a short oral report on their research to a departmental symposium to be held prior to graduation. Registration for 480 should be made during the semester that the student anticipates writing the paper.

A mark of pass or fail will be assigned upon completion.

Prerequisite(s): ARTH 110, ART 211, and permission of department chair.

2 credit(s)

See the description of these courses at the beginning of the "Curricula" section of the course catalog, here.

Prerequisite(s): varies by year.

4 credit(s)

See the description of these courses at the beginning of the "Curricula" section of the course catalog, here.

Prerequisite(s): varies by year.

2 credit(s)

The subject matter of these courses will vary from year to year, but will not duplicate existing courses. Descriptions of these courses are available at www.stthomas.edu/reqistrar/onlineschedule.html

Prerequisite(s): varies by year.

2 credit(s)

The subject matter of these courses will vary from year to year, but will not duplicate existing courses. Descriptions of these courses are available at www.stthomas.edu/reqistrar/onlineschedule.html

Prerequisite(s): varies by year.

2 credit(s)

See the description of these courses at the beginning of the "Curricula" section of the course catalog, here.

Prerequisite(s):

2 credit(s)

See the description of these courses at the beginning of the "Curricula" section of the course catalog, here.

Prerequisite(s):

2 credit(s)

See the description of these courses at the beginning of the "Curricula" section of the course catalog, here.

Prerequisite(s): permission of the instructor or supervisor and previous work in art history

2 credit(s)

See the description of these courses at the beginning of the "Curricula" section of this catalog.

Prerequisite(s): permission of the instructor or supervisor and previous work in art history