Courses Taught

1 

ART 1104  Language of Visual Arts

​

Introduces key formal structures across the broad variety of disciplines in the visual arts and built environment, including: architecture, painting, sculpture, photography, and film. Considers global objects and sites from an intercultural perspective, examining how various formal elements impact our experience and function to construct meaning for audiences. Writing informed arts criticism grounded in local and regional cultural resources.

2

ART 1104  Language of Visual Arts (Online)

​

Online asynchronous module based course. Introduces key formal structures across the broad variety of disciplines in the visual arts and built environment, including: architecture, painting, sculpture, photography, and film. Considers global objects and sites from an intercultural perspective, examining how various formal elements impact our experience and function to construct meaning for audiences. Writing informed arts criticism grounded in local and regional cultural resources.

3

RLCL/HUM 1214  Introduction to Humanities: The Medieval World

​

This course examines the historical and cultural developments during the period from 400-1400 commonly known as the Middle Ages. Rather than trying to cover 1,000 years in one semester, we will focus on a particular theme: The Culture of Devotion. Using this topic as a point of departure, we will examine many dynamic milestones in religious, political, and personal devotion of the medieval world. The central questions we will seek to answer are: How do individuals and institutions (i.e. the Church, State) express devotion? How do dominant social and cultural values shape devotional practices, art, popular literature, and sacred places? What is so different about medieval concepts of devotion from our own experience?

4

ART 1984  Intersections of the Arts

​

Introduces fundamental concepts and formal structures from fields in the visual, fine, and performing arts, including painting, sculpture, photography, architecture, music, theater, creative writing, and film. Examines relationships between form and content in global works from interdisciplinary, intercultural perspectives. Considers how various modes of artistic expression shape audiences’ reception. Compares methodologies and interpretive strategies used across the arts. Producing multimedia projects synthesizing skills and methodologies from above disciplines.

5

ART 3284  Medieval Art & Architecture

​

This course surveys major monuments produced in Europe, Byzantium, and the Middle East during the medieval period, roughly 300-1400. Students will become acquainted with diverse religious and artistic practices of the epoch commonly referred to as the Middle Ages in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic traditions. Our focus will be on discovering and analyzing how the culture, politics, and religion interact with the work of artists and and major monuments in the built environment. To accomplish this, we examine the rich cross-pollination and cultural exchanges that occurred between major European, Byzantine, and Muslim empires, and the resulting rich cross-pollination that influenced artistic production and architecture. The result will be a comprehensive overview of medieval art and its role in shaping social life and cultural customs of this time.

6

ART 3484  Baroque Art & Architecture

​

This course introduces major artworks, buildings, and monuments produced during the Baroque era in art history--what is now more commonly referred to as the early modern period--from about 1575 to 1700. It focuses primarily on key developments by European artists and architects--both men and women--in Italy, France, Spain, Flanders, the Dutch Republic, and England whose contributions indelibly reshaped the trajectory of artistic production in the Western hemisphere. However, we will often also consider in many instances the impact of cross-cultural exchanges from other global global societies.

The Baroque period constituted an unprecedented upheaval in religious thought, political power, scientific inquiry, economic revolution, and artistic flourishing that dramatically recast the nature and role of art in society. 

7

ART 4104  Interpretation of Visual Arts

​

This course serves as the capstone seminar for the Pathways Minor in Visual Arts & Society. It introduces methodologies, theories, and interpretive strategies commonly used to analyze the visual arts and built environment. Approaches we will study derive from a variety of disciplines. These include: art history, philosophy, anthropology, cultural studies, and sociology—to name a few. We will focus on numerous critical case studies of global objects and sites, ranging from the prehistoric to contemporary periods in the fields of: painting, sculpture, architecture, photography, and film. You will develop effective discursive skills employed in written and oral presentations. We will consider ethical and political issues surrounding the interpretation of art. Our goal is to understand how art—and cultural production more broadly—lends itself to a wealth of legitimate readings, while questioning the notion that the single "truth" so many believe they are missing in an artwork does not in fact exist.

8

ART 4104  Interpretation of Visual Arts (Online)

​

Online asynchronous module based course. Introduces methodologies, theories, and interpretive strategies commonly used to analyze the visual arts and built environment. Approaches derive from a variety of disciplines: art history, philosophy, anthropology, cultural studies, and sociology—to name a few. Focus on numerous critical case studies of global objects and sites, ranging from the prehistoric to contemporary periods in the fields of: painting, sculpture, architecture, photography, and film. Development of effective discursive skills employed in written and oral presentations. Emphasis on ethical and political issues surrounding the interpretation of art. Understanding how art—and cultural production more broadly—lends itself to a wealth of legitimate readings, while questioning the notion that the single "truth" so many believe they are missing in an

9

ART 4384  Renaissance Landscape Painting

​

This course examines landscape painting and its development in European art from roughly 1300-1650. During the Renaissance, artists increasingly devoted more attention and greater space in their works to realistic depictions of the natural world and environment. This culminated in the emergence of landscape as an independent genre of art by the mid-seventeenth century in France, Italy, and the Netherlands. The innovations of well-known northern and Italian pioneers such as Albrecht Dürer, Joachim Patinir, Pieter Bruegel, Leonardo da Vinci, Giovanni Bellini, and Titian will be assessed, alongside more minor specialists working in this field. We will explore landscape as a dynamic instrument of identity and power, rather than as an innocent mirror of nature or empty subject-matter. We will investigate how landscape painting connects to major religious, social, and political changes in Europe; evolving art collecting and display customs; Renaissance art theory; and the production of other graphic media such as maps, prints, and drawings.

10

ART 4384  History of Collecting, 1400-1800

​

This advanced seminar explores the evolution of European collecting, collections, and display practices from the Renaissance through early modern period, roughly 1400-1800. It examines dynamic ways art and material culture were acquired, circulated, presented, exchanged, and recorded by private individuals and public groups during this period. The objects in question range from botanical specimens, animals, precious gems, and books—to antiquities, paintings, sculptures, and maps. To discover their rich histories, we will become familiar with primary documents such as wills, inventories, and artists contracts. We will pay particular attention to the social dimensions of collections to discover what meanings they held for early modern audiences. More specifically, we will consider how collections were used as agents of knowledge, wonder, authority, and identity. 

11

ART 4384  Titian & His Legacy

​

The Venetian artist Titian (1488/90-1576) stands as one of the most successful and famous painters working in Renaissance Italy. His innovative approaches to painting, printmaking, and drawing revolutionized the visual arts in 16th-century Europe. This class explores Titian’s dynamic art as a lens through which to think about broader issues of art theory, studio practices, art collecting, gender and identity, eco-criticism, and the role and status of artists in society. Significant attention will be paid to Titian’s rivalry with his peers, like Michelangelo and Raphael, as well as his fundamental influence on later artists, such as Rubens, Velázquez, Rembrandt, but also contemporary painters.

12

ART  4484 Topics in Criticism & Methodology

​

This advanced seminar introduces art history majors--and those in related fields--to various theories and methodologies used to interpret, critically assess, and research art and visual culture in the field of art history. Additionally, we will examine the major historiographic trends in the discipline involving its origins from the Renaissance through to the present day. Particular focus will be paid to major intellectual frameworks and strategies that have emerged to understand artistic production. These range from connoisseurship and material analysis to digital art history, decolonization, and eco-criticism. 

13

ART 5584  History of Collecting, 1400-1800 (Graduate)

​

This advanced graduate seminar explores the evolution of European collecting, collections, and display practices from the Renaissance through early modern period, roughly 1400-1800. It examines dynamic ways art and material culture were acquired, circulated, presented, exchanged, and recorded by private individuals and public groups during this period. The objects in question range from botanical specimens, animals, precious gems, and books—to antiquities, paintings, sculptures, and maps. To discover their rich histories, we will become familiar with primary documents such as wills, inventories, and artists contracts. We will pay particular attention to the social dimensions of collections to discover what meanings they held for early modern audiences. More specifically, we will consider how collections were used as agents of knowledge, wonder, authority, and identity.