Art History 291 - COLQ: ICONOCLASM

Students may take up to two semesters of ARH 291, “Topics in Art History,” as long as the topics are different: Why have individuals and groups been moved to destroy art? How has art been construed as both essential, bewitching and dangerous? We consider representational imagery in ancient Greece and Rome, and in Judaic and Islamic traditions; the Byzantine iconoclastic controversy; 16th-century Northern European iconoclasm and the coincident wholesale destruction of indigenous American art; the Counter-Reformation validation of religious imagery; the French Revolution; and attacks on works of art in the modern world. We also consider censorship and philistinism generally, and when (or whether) campaigns of renovation and restoration can legitimately be called iconoclasm. Group A