Program Planning 2020-2021

SPRING 2021
ART HISTORY PROGRAM PLANNING

Although the past few months have been challenging for everyone, we in the Art History department hope that you are all safe and well. We have worked hard to make the course offerings and department-sponsored events for the spring exciting.

If you have any questions as this unprecedented new round of program planning approaches, please feel free to contact Jonathan Reynolds (Art History Concentration), Joan Snitzer (Visual Arts Concentration), or any of our faculty. 

Jonathan Reynolds                 Joan Snitzer
Co-Chair, Art History              Co-Chair, Visual Arts

QUICK LINKS
Art History Major Requirements
Art History Written Senior Thesis
Visual Arts Requirements
Senior Project for Visual Arts
Art History Minor Requirements

SPRING 2021 ART HISTORY COURSES 
·       Spring semester courses will be held from Monday, January 11, 2021 – Monday, April 26, 2021.
·       Spring A courses will be held from Monday, January 11, 2021 – Friday, February 26, 2021.
·       Spring B courses will be held from Monday, March 8, 2021 – Monday, April 26, 2021.
·       Student Advising Begins Monday, November 3rd.
·       Registration period - November 16 – November 20th.  THE COLLEGE CHANGED THE REGISTRATION PERIOD TO START DECEMBER 1st. REGISTRATION CLOSES DECEMBER 11th. 
·       Barnard Art History limited enrollment seminar applications (unless otherwise noted) due Friday, November, 6th at 5pm. THE DEADLINE HAS BEEN EXTENDED TO THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 19TH. 
Email your application to arthistory@barnard.edu. 

 DOWNLOAD A BARNARD ART HISTORY SEMINAR APPLICATION 

SPRING 2021 BARNARD ART HISTORY COURSES
_{Please confirm all course information by visiting the Columbia University Online Directory of Spring 2021 Art History Classes.}

BARNARD ART HISTORY UNDERGRADUATE LECTURES

AHIS-BC1002 INTRODUCTION TO ART HISTORY II (full semester course)
The second part of the Introduction to Art History goes from about 1400 to 2021, circles the world and includes all media. Every class meeting is organized around one historical theme, which is launched at the start of class by a work of contemporary art.  How, over time, has humanity expressed its dreams, fears, and identities in visual form?  How does beauty deal with experience?  Note: In-class breakout sessions and weekly forums are required.
Anne Higonnet 4pts Monday and Wednesday 2:40pm-3:55pm

AHIS-BC2355 APOCALYPSE (full semester course)
This lecture course explores how art and architecture responded to changing attitudes toward death, the afterlife, and the end of the world over the course of the European Middle Ages, from early Christian Rome to the dawn of the Protestant Reformation in Germany. Medieval illustrations of the Book of Revelation in New York collections will play a central role in discussions of plague, rapture, and “eschatology”—or concerns over the fate of the soul at the end of time. We will analyze the visual culture associated with ordinary people preparing for their own death and the deaths of loved ones, saints and Biblical figures whose triumph in death served as exemplars for the living, and institutional and individual anxieties over humankind’s destiny on Judgment Day. Artworks under consideration will encompass various media and contexts, including monumental architecture and architectural relief sculpture, tomb sculpture, wall painting, manuscript painting, reliquaries, and altarpieces. The course satisfies the major requirement's historical period of 400-1400.
Note: Required 1 hour weekly discussion sections to be arranged.
Enrollment Note: Limited to 60 Students
Greg Bryda 4pts M/W 10:10-11:25pm

AHIS-UN2405 TWENTIETH-CENTURY ART (full semester course)
The course will examine a variety of figures, movements, and practices within the entire range of 20th-century art—from Expressionism to Abstract Expressionism, Constructivism to Pop Art, Surrealism to Minimalism, and beyond–situating them within the social, political, economic, and historical contexts in which they arose. The history of these artistic developments will be traced through the development and mutual interaction of two predominant strains of artistic culture: the modernist and the avant-garde, examining in particular their confrontation with and development of the particular vicissitudes of the century’s ongoing modernization. Discussion section complement class lectures. Course is a prerequisite for certain upper-level art history courses.
Note: Required 1-hour weekly discussion sections to be arranged.
Alexander Alberro 4pts T/TH 4:40-5:25pm

BARNARD SEMINAR COURSES

SEMINAR ENROLLMENT NOTES: Most Barnard Art History seminars are limited to 15 students and require an application for admission. Spring 2021 seminar applications are due no later than Friday, November 6th at 5pm. NOTE WE HAVE EXTENDED THE DEADLINE TO THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 19th. Submit your typed application by email directly to the Barnard Art History Department office arthistory@barnard.edu. The department will notify students of the course rosters via email by the week of November 23rd. DOWNLOAD A BARNARD ART HISTORY SEMINAR APPLICATION

AHIS-BC3668 MAKING VISUAL: A TALE OF TWO CITIES (full semester course)
This seminar considers recent developments necessitated by classroom restrictions during the COVID-19 crisis. The experience of virtual communication is developing as one reads this course description. This course intends to develop visual skills that are both flexible and productive for communication in a global environment. Collaborating with creative educators from the digital and design fields living in Berlin, Germany, will enhance class participants' engagement and attention to online learning. The seminar's individual and collaborative projects and innovations can and will be useful well into the future with and without geographical and environmental restrictions. 
Integrated into skills learned in a traditional studio course is a series of four workshops introducing class participants to relevant approaches for extending the reach of their artistic work through innovative methods and technologies. The workshops' core focus is on learning essential conceptual and practical art studio skills hand-in-hand with the knowledge of technology and software platforms (Miro, StopMotion, Adobe Premiere After Effects, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Lightroom, InDesign, Google Sheets, Google Slides, and Zoom). In addition, student participants volunteer tutorials in a variety of selected digital programs and interactive platforms. By gaining facility both with the software platforms and collaborations without geographic restrictions, students have the opportunity to develop a broad range of communication strategies in cooperative, digital and visual image production. Students will execute a series of individual and collaborative projects developed to enhance an understanding of visual subjects.
Note: Small required group meetings Wednesday, 2:30-3:30pm
Enrollment Note: Class is limited to 15 students with instructor’s permission. Seminar application required - due on November 19th, 2020 Download application here)
Joan Snitzer 4pts Art History Seminar Wednesdays 12:10–2:00pm + Small-Group Meetings Wednesdays 2:30-3:30pm

AHIS-BC3844 REVOLUTION AND ART (full semester course)
In 1789, a French revolution shook the government foundation of Europe, and with it, all the arts. The principles of monarchy were rejected, women gained unprecedented freedoms, and French slavery was abolished.  How did the arts express those upheavals?  A reaction against the Revolution began by 1805. An emperor crowned himself, slavery was reinstated, and women’s rights were revoked.  How did the arts deal with this backlash?
Enrollment Note: Class is limited to 15 students with instructor’s permission. Seminar application required - due on November 19th, 2020 Download application here)
Anne Higonnet 4pts Wednesday 10:10-12pm

 AHIS-BC3910 CONTEMPORARY PHOTOGRAPHY AND RELATED MEDIA (full semester course)
An introductory survey of contemporary photography and related media through the framework of current exhibitions in New York City. Exhibitions of photography and video play a particular role in mirroring the present moment, which finds political themes front and center. Prevalent are exhibitions that redress (art) historical erasure, present counter histories, or take direct aim at specific governmental policies of systems.  Through virtual visits to NYC galleries and museums (approximately 8 trips), we will take stock of which artists are showing, in what contexts, and unpack both artistic and curatorial strategies. In addition to class discussion of what we’ve seen, during our time in the classroom, we will look back at select landmark photography exhibition to chart evolutions in the medium, and their interrelation with politics.
Enrollment Note: Class is limited to 15 students with instructor’s permission. Seminar application required - due on November 19th, 2020 Download application here)
Joanna Lehan 4pts Art History Seminar Thursday 12:10-2pm

AHIS-BC3928 DUTCH SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY ART (full semester course)
This course is devoted to a close examination of Dutch art of the seventeenth century, one of the most celebrated chapters in the history of art. Students will be exposed to seminal art historical texts on the period, with a focus on such topics as the rise of the modern art market, the imagery of everyday life, and intersections between art and gender.
Enrollment Note: Class is limited to 15 students with instructor’s permission. Seminar application required - due on November 19th, 2020 Download application here)
Adam Eaker 4pts Day/Time Monday 10:10-12pm

AHIS-BC3933 BUOYANCY (Block B Course)
“Be like a duck. Calm on the surface, but always paddling like the dickens underneath.” - Michael Caine. We do not live our own desires. Pressing ourselves into heavy molds not made for our bodies compresses us, tears our skin, and bruises our features. It is hard to breathe. We sink. Weight harbors the downward pull. It attaches itself in many ways but there are countless ways to set it down, to be free. This takes practice and skill. The common task of this visual arts seminar is to distinguish ourselves from the weight we carry. Through a variety or reading, writing, and making activities we shall seek out and contact levity: that gravity that changes our bodies, make us light of touch, aerates and propels us toward the state of buoyancy. Not for the faint of heart.
Enrollment Note: Class is limited to 18 students. Instructor’s permission to enroll is required. Attend first day of class for enrollment selection.
Irena Haiduk 4pts Art History/Visual Arts Seminar Monday and Wednesday 1:10-3:55pm

AHIS-BC3960 SENIOR RESEARCH SEMINAR (full semester course)
(REQUIRED COURSE FOR SENIOR VISUAL ARTS MAJORS – no application required)
Course open to Barnard Art History majors only. Independent research for the senior thesis. Students develop and write their senior thesis in consultation with an individual faculty adviser in Art History and participate in group meetings scheduled throughout the senior year.
Rosalyn Deutsche 4pt Art History Majors Seminar Tuesday 6:10pm-8:00pm

AHIS-BC3976 JAPANESE PHOTOGRAPHY (full semester course)
This course will examine the history of Japanese photography from the middle of the 19th century to the present. The class will be organized both chronologically and thematically. Throughout its history, photography has been an especially powerful medium for addressing the most challenging issues facing Japanese society. Among the topics under discussion will be: tourist photography and the representation of women within that genre in the late 19th century, the politics of propaganda photography, the construction of Japanese cultural identity through the representation of “tradition” in photography, and the interest in marginalized urban subcultures in the photography of the 1960s and 1970s. Although the course will be focused on Japan, the class will read from the literature on photography elsewhere in order to situate Japanese work within a broader context.
Enrollment Note: Class is limited to 15 students with instructor’s permission. Seminar application required - due on November 19^th, 2020 Download application here)
Jonathan Reynolds 4pts Art History Seminar Thursday 10:10-12pm 

AHIS-BC3984 CURATORIAL POSITIONS, 1969-PRESENT (full semester course)
Contemporary exhibitions studied through a selection of great shows from roughly 1969 to the present that defined a generation. This course will not offer practical training in curating; rather it will concentrate on the historical context of exhibitions, the theoretical basis for their argument, the criteria for the choice in artists and their work, and exhibitions internal/external reception.
Enrollment Note: Class is limited to 15 students with instructor’s permission. Seminar application required - due on November 19th, 2020 Download application here)
Valerie Smith 4pts Art History Seminar Tuesday 10:10-12pm

AHIS-BC4846 DESIGNING DESIGN II: SPACE IS THE PLACE (Block B Course)
The way an environment is made remains deeply embedded within it. Our environments shape us like our families, they nourish and educate us, they prejudice us. What if they were not a given? If our relationship to them was something we choose and shape, less of a blood relation, more of a lifelong friendship? A friend is an equal with their own agency and will, a partner in play and life. Friendship is a place where we interact, welcome each other and make the world together. The common task of this class is to devise a studio for making living environments to study how we could make, exhibit and live with art. Through a variety of individual and group readings and assignments, in class case-studies and interviews we will test our preconceptions of space and time so that we may experience and inspire the state of being present. We will study and practice presence to form intimate bonds with interior, exterior, bodily and narrative environments already in existence and of our own making.
Enrollment Note: Class is limited to 18 students. Instructor’s permission to enroll is required. Attend first day of class for enrollment selection.
Irena Haiduk 4pts Art History/Visual Arts Seminar
Block B Monday and Wednesday 9:10-11:55am

COLUMBIA ART HISTORY BRIDGE SEMINAR OPEN TO BARNARD UNDERGRADUATES

AHIS-GU4521 SIN AND SODOMY (full semester course)
For the unrepentant sins of their inhabitants God had Sodom and Gomorrah, the ignominious twin cities from Genesis, shattered to smithereens. Throughout the Middle Ages, the tale was invoked to justify harsh judgment of mortal sins of the flesh and “unnatural” sex acts, in particular those occurring between members of the same sex. This bridge seminar focuses on the church’s desire to control the potential of human sexuality to subvert its order of “natural” law. Through historical texts and artworks from the period, we will analyze the wide diversity of medieval attitudes toward non-normative sex and eroticism in a variety of contexts, from the construction of the phenomenon of sodomy in early and high medieval exegesis, the eradication of pre-Christian fertility rituals in northern and eastern Europe, the playful undermining of gender roles in secular medieval romances, to illicit accounts of public sex in pleasure gardens and bath houses, and monumental hellscapes rendered with graphic visualizations of sexual violence. Moving chronologically through the Middle Ages, we will end by addressing modern questions surrounding the sexuality of Jean the Duke of Berry and Albrecht Dürer, and Hieronymus Bosch’s fixation with butt play. Discussion will be informed by critical readings in queer theory, feminism, and gender studies by Jack Halberstam, David Halperin, Susan Stryker, to name a few, and by medievalists employing these methods, such as Roland Betancourt, Caroline Walker Bynum, Michael Camille, Dyan Elliott, and Robert Mills.
Enrollment Note: This is a Columbia Art History bridge seminar limited to 15 students with instructor’s permission. Columbia seminar application required - Appy by January 4, 2021 LINK TO APPLICATION
Greg Bryda 3pts Wednesday TBD.

VISUAL ARTS COURSES

ENROLLMENT NOTE FOR VISUAL ARTS COURSES: Students must attend first class for instructor’s permission to register.

AHIS BC3531 ADVANCED SENIOR STUDIO II (Full semester course)
(REQUIRED COURSE FOR SENIOR AH VA MAJORS)
Advanced Senior Studio II is a critique class that serves as a forum for senior Visual Arts majors to develop and complete one-semester studio theses. The priorities are producing a coherent body of studio work and understanding this work in terms of critical discourse. The class will comprise group critiques and small group meetings with the instructor. Virtual field trips and visiting artist lectures will augment our critiques. Please visit: https://arthistory.barnard.edu/senior-thesis-project-art-history-and-visual-arts-majors  
Enrollment Notes: Limited to Barnard Senior AH VA Majors
Note: 1 hour weekly required meetings to be arranged.
John Miller 3pts Monday 5:00-7:00pm

AHIS-BC3003 SUPERVISED PHOTOGRAPHY PROJECTS (full semester course)
Designed for students to conduct independent projects in photography. Priority for enrollment to the class will be Barnard College students who are enrolling in classes at ICP (International Center of Photography).  The cost of ICP will be covered by Barnard College. All of the other students enrolling in the course (CC, GS SOA) will be responsible for their own ICP course expenses.
Enrollment Note: Course limited to 18, with priority to Barnard Art History majors.
John Miller 3pts Monday11:00am-12:50pm 

AHIS-BC3031 IMAGERY AND FORM IN THE VISUAL ARTS (full semester course)
(MAJOR REQUIREMENT FOR AH VA MAJORS, JR's and Sr's Only)
This seminar examines the usage of art-historical material and cultural theory within artistic practice.
Students explore the nature of communication, dialogue, history, and practice common in contemporary visual art.  Students develop constructive and critical discourses relevant to today’s visual culture and cultivate criteria for viewing, understanding, and creating artworks within a contemporary art community. Enrollment Note: class is limited to 16 with the instructor’s permission.
Enrollment Note: Course limited to 15, with priority given to Jr and Sr AH VA majors. 
Joan Snitzer 4pts Monday 2:10pm-4:00pm

TENTATIVE SUMMER 2021 ART HISTORY COURSES

Please confirm all course information by visiting the Columbia University Online Directory of Summer Art History Classes.  

^{·       Summer A courses will be held from Monday, May 3, 2021 – Friday, June 18, 2021.
·       Summer B courses will be held from Monday, June 28, 2021 – Monday, August 16, 2021.
·       Course descriptions, sections and times, will be available in advance of Summer registration in April 2021.}