As a stimulus to the imagination, method of investigation, or as a basic means of communication, drawing is a fundamental process of human thought. This class will examine various kinds of drawings from the history of art and visual culture moving chronologically from the medieval to the post-modern. Our studies will have a hands-on approach, meeting behind the scenes in the collections of the RISD Museum. Working from objects directly will be supplemented by readings and writing assignments as well as active classroom discussion. This seminar is recommended for THAD concentrators and students especially interested in drawing.

Open to Sophomore, Junior, Senior or Graduate Students.

Elective

Renaissance depictions of the body range from muscular, idealized nudes to decaying, but ambulatory, corpses.  In Europe, artists dissected human cadavers and, for the first time since antiquity, reflected the use of living models in their workshops and studios.  In this course, we examine works that embodied early modern ideas about power and dependence, race and class, gender and sexuality, death and disease, the divine and demonic, the marginalized and the fantastic. Focusing on the artist's studio and early modern practice, we consider a diverse set of bodies as they were represented in paintings, sculpture, drawings, decorative arts, books and prints in relation to contemporary spiritual, political, and social concerns.  We also consider the role of the artist in `documenting' travel, conquest, and empire from approximately 1450-1700.

Open to Sophomore, Junior, Senior or Graduate Students.

Elective

In this course, we will examine art in Rome from the end of the 16th century to the beginning of the 18th century, a dynamic period that shaped much of the fabric of the city as we know it today. While analyzing urbanism, architecture, sculpture and painting by many of the major artists of the period (Caravaggio, Bernini, Borromini, Artemisia, Pietro da Cortona), we will also discuss commemoration of the ritual and ceremonial life of the city portrayed in engravings, drawings, printed books and on film.

Elective

An Icon has been described as an image or work that has achieved such exceptional levels of widespread recognizability among people across time & cultures as to transgress or transcend the parameters of its initial making, function, context and meaning (Martin Kemp, 2012). Iconoclasm has been recently defined as a principled attack on specific objects, aimed primarily at the objects' referents or at their connection to the power or values they represent. (Anne McLanan, 2019) Iconoclastic acts, therefore, engage with both the materiality of the object and the power structures embedded within or attached to the object - the thing that is often most out of reach. In this seminar, we cast a wide net, historically and geographically, to ask: What and who defines an Icon? How has the destruction or defacement of Icons - Iconoclasm - come to be understood as something much more than a simple act of vandalism? What are the principles and politics of Iconoclasm? How is Iconoclasm very much in play today as a catalyst for social justice, political action and collective agency?

Open to Sophomore, Junior, Senior or Graduate Students.

Elective

As a stimulus to the imagination, method of investigation, or as a basic means of communication, drawing is a fundamental process of human thought. This class will examine various kinds of drawings from the history of art and visual culture moving chronologically from the medieval to the post-modern. Our studies will have a hands-on approach, meeting behind the scenes in the collections of the RISD Museum. Working from objects directly will be supplemented by readings and writing assignments as well as active classroom discussion. This seminar is recommended for THAD concentrators and students especially interested in drawing.

Open to Sophomore, Junior, Senior or Graduate Students.

Elective

As a stimulus to the imagination, method of investigation, or as a basic means of communication, drawing is a fundamental process of human thought. This class will examine various kinds of drawings from the history of art and visual culture moving chronologically from the medieval to the post-modern. Our studies will have a hands-on approach, meeting behind the scenes in the collections of the RISD Museum. Working from objects directly will be supplemented by readings and writing assignments as well as active classroom discussion. This seminar is recommended for THAD concentrators and students especially interested in drawing.

Open to Sophomore, Junior, Senior or Graduate Students.

Elective