ARTS 399 Outline 2014/15 Spring

COURSE NUMBER:

ARTS 399

COURSE TITLE:

Special Topics in History - 2014/15 Spring - Art Appreciation/Seeing is Believing: Helping Thoughtful Christians Look at Visual Art

NAME OF INSTRUCTOR:

Daniel vanHeyst

CREDIT WEIGHT AND WEEKLY TIME DISTRIBUTION:

credits 3(hrs lect 3 - hrs sem 0 - hrs lab 1)

COURSE DESCRIPTION:

A course on a topic of figure of special interest to a member of the studio arts faculty and offered on a non-recurring basis.

Prerequisites: Three credits of ARTS at the introductory level; some topics may have more specific prerequisites

2014/15 Spring

What is art for? Is there such a thing as Christian visual art? If so, how can you tell? How do we determine excellence when viewing visual art and design? Can visual art and design serve the coming Kingdom of Jesus Christ? How does visual art function in our society? Which thinkers in contemporary Western Christianity is offering the most helpful answers to some of these questions? What do some of the working visual artists in our community have to say about these questions? Learn to see art with new appreciation and talk about it with insight.

REQUIRED TEXTS:

Hilary Brand and Adrienne Chaplin: Art and Soul: Signposts for Christians in the Arts 2001 Piquant Press/Intervarsity Press

MARK DISTRIBUTION IN PERCENT:

Reflective Essay: Visual Art in My Life	5%
Class presentation: Analysis of an art object from my home	10%
Powerpoint essay: Art and Visual Design in a worship space/event OR Interview report on a visit with a Visual Artist	30%
Review of an art exhibition, art periodical or book	25%
Art Criticism Vocabulary Final Examination	30%

	100%

COURSE OUTLINE:

Week One:

Monday: Expressiveness in visual art: Representation and Abstraction, symbol and sign, form and function, medium and message.

Art as communicative transaction involving Artist and intention, Viewer and interpretation, Object and value (set assignment: Reflective Essay, Visual Art in My Life (5%)

Tuesday: Questions to ask of a work of art: building a vocabulary and our critical faculties

Students show work of art brought from home and describes its aesthetic qualities, provenance, function, and meaning. (Art as private property)

Wednesday: (class scheduled to 5pm) Field trip 1: Art as commodity, as public good, as repository of cultural heritage: Visit to commercial galleries and to The Art Gallery of Alberta, including some public art installations. Reflective Essay due.

Thursday: Visual art and The Bible—is there a big biblical idea to lead Christians toward obedience in making and using visual art?

Art idolatries: the consequences of deifying artists, artworks, or the viewer’s opinion.

Friday: Art in worship: visual design of church buildings and worship spaces, visual art elements in liturgy, some traditions and heritages of visual communication in church. (set assignment: Interview report on a studio visit with a local visual artist OR Report on the visual design of a worship space and the visual components of a worship event (30%)

Week Two:

Monday: The elements of style, the meaning of genre, the major movements and periods in the history of art in Western Civilization.

Tuesday: Art and originality: influence, appropriation, pastiche, plagiarism—is art-making a communal and collaborative or an individual enterprise?

Art and innovation: who is doing the R and D in visual art. Do the artists really “get there first”?

Wednesday: (class scheduled to 5pm) Field trip: Art and design in the built environment: seeking the good life through urban design and planning,. Field trip: A neighbourhood walk in three contrasting residential areas.

Reflections on the “natural” and the human-modified landscape as the subject of visual artworks.

Thursday:

Presentations by students (power-point) of studio visits or worship spaces and liturgies.

Friday: The training of visual artists. Artist associations, co-operatives, funding sources, etc.

Reading visual art criticism or analysis in the professional and popular press.

Set assignment: written review of an art exhibition or an art publication.

Week Three:

Monday: Visual art in entertainment: reading visual art and design on TV, in movies, on the web, and in live performance events such as theatre, dance, and concerts.

Tuesday: Art and persuasion: reading visual art and design in advertising, propaganda, product design and packaging and branding.

Wednesday: (class scheduled to 5pm) Field trip to The Nina Haggerty Gallery and studios, a tattoo parlour, and a shopping centre. Visual art as therapy, as indicator of personal identity and group affiliation

Thursday: Visual art and environmental responsibility.

Final exam: 2 hours, 30% Vocabulary test and three 150-word responses to selected works of art.

Required texts, assignments, and grade distributions may vary from one offering of this course to the next. Please consult the course instructor for up to date details.