ARTH 110 Course Information
Our core introductory art history course breaks from the tradition of the western survey course that emphasizes chronology, style, slide tests, and European art. Rather, this class focuses upon issues and problems in the arts, particularly how the arts express cultural, religious, and social ideas and issues.
Individual sections will examine a variety of broad themes such as the human body, archaeological investigation, and religious architecture. Each class will have five distinct learning units with associated assignments. Rather than emphasizing memorization and slide tests, these classes will focus upon papers and oral presentations and assignments that seek to solve problems involving the arts.
The content of individual sections will vary considerably according to the expertise of the instructor. Click on the instructor's name below to see a synopsis of the content for each of the five learning units in her or his sections.
All sections of 110 meet both the fine arts requirement and the human diversity requirement of the core curriculum.
Unit 1: Visual Mechanics: How Art Works
Unit 2: Four Great Cultures of Ancient Mesoamerica
Unit 3: Roman Architecture in St. Paul?
Unit 4: Survivor: Asmat
Unit 1: Fresco Painting and Restoration
Unit 2: Contemporary Native American Voices
Unit 3: Modern Art and Ideas
Unit 4: Warriors Between Worlds: Asmat Art and Collections
Unit 1: The Ancient World
Unit 2: Arts Of China, Korea & Japan
Unit 3: Creating The 19th Century Landscape
Unit 4: The Rise Of Modernism: Cubism, Primitivism & Expressionism
Unit 5: After Modernism: Postmodernism, Multiculturalism, Feminism
Unit 1: Landscape Painting and Land Art
Unit 2: The Iconography of Buddhism
Unit 3: Class Structure, Religious Strife, & European Baroque Painting
Unit 4: Contexts of West African Art
Unit 1: Art Before History
Unit 2: The City as Theatre from the Ancient Near East to the Italian Renaissance
Unit 3: Paradise: The Idea of the Garden in the Islamic World
Unit 4: In Our Image and Likeness: Portraits of/by Women
Unit 5: Light and Meaning from Plato to Us
Unit 1: Ancient Near East and Egypt; Propaganda and Structure
Unit 2: Women Artists; Obstacles and Accomplishments
Unit 3: Reformation to the Counter-Reformation; Christianity and Politics
Unit 4: China and Japan; Art, Architecture and Religion
Unit 1: Formal Analysis: The Portrait: From Ancient Akkad to the Digital Selfie
Unit 2: Contextual Analysis: Patronage, Emotion, and Illusion in Baroque Art
Unit 3: Primary Research: Illuminated Manuscripts
Unit 4: Power, Design, and the Spiritual: Highlights of Islamic Art and Architecture
Unit 5: Orientalist Art: Eugène Delacroix to Henri Matisse
Unit 1: Northwest Coast Native American Art
Unit 2: Indigenous Australian (Aboriginal) Art
Unit 3: Ancient Egyptian Art
Unit 4: Dutch Art in the “Golden Age” (1600 – 1700)
Unit 5: Asmat Art
Unit 1: Buddhist Art: the Silk Road, India, China, and Japan
Unit 2: Architecture of the Gods: Temples, Palaces and Castles
Unit 3: The Tale of Genji: Gender and Art in Japan
Unit 4: East and West: Artistic Intersections
Unit 1: Exhibitions & Power
Unit 2: Graffiti & Street Art
Unit 3: South African Art & Cultural Landscape
Unit 4: Monuments & Memorials
Unit 1: Power in African Arts
Unit 2: Identity in Contemporary Art of the African Diasporas
Unit 3: Gender in Art
Unit 4: Monuments & Memorials
Unit 1: Nineteenth-Century French Art
Unit 2: Paris and the Modern City
Unit 3: The Ancient Near East and France
Unit 4: Decorative Arts Across Cultures
Unit 1: Art and Architecture of the Ancient Near East and Egypt
Unit 2: Mesoamerican Art and Architecture
Unit 3: The Art and Architecture of Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome
Unit 4: Renaissance and Baroque Art and Architecture
Unit 5: The Early Art of India, China, and Japan
Unit 1: Power and Identity in Ancient Egypt
Unit 2: The Power of Images in the Near East
Unit 3: The Greco-Roman Inheritance: Society, Religion and Politics
Unit 4: The Politics of Plunder: Looting, the Antiquities Trade and the Destruction of Cultural Property
Unit 1: First Civilizations
Unit 2: Ancient Greek and Roman Civilizations
Unit 3: Arts of China
Unit 4: Arts of Africa
Unit 5: Modern Art