An introduction to both the technical and conceptual aspects of drawing as a primary tool for visual expression and analysis. Art historical contexts as well as the dialogue between the arts and other disciplines will be considered. Emphasis is placed on learning to see, and to think visually.

Through investigation of major works produced in the Muslim world between the seventh and seventeenth centuries from Spain to India, this course explores the ways in which art and architecture were used to embody the faith, accommodate its particular needs, and express the power of its rulers. Topics include the calligraphy of the Qur'an, illustrated literature, the architecture of the mosque, and the aristocratic palace.

An exploration of major movements and personalities in architecture from the late nineteenth century to the present. Emphasizing the United States against the background of European developments, the course considers the search by architects, including Frank Lloyd Wright, Le Corbusier, and Frank Gehry, for a language of form and space that captures the contemporary spirit as it elevates society to a higher plane of existence. Discussion focuses on issues of technology and utopia, the skyscraper, and the collision of tradition, modernity, and postmodernism in architecture since 1945.

This survey course traces the rise and development of photography in the United States and, to a lesser extent, England, France, Germany, Mexico, and Russia. It charts the wide range of work with the camera, including commercial, vernacular, and fine art projects, and considers pictures from photography's very beginnings in the mid-nineteenth century to today's practices. Among the major figures to be discussed are Arbus, Brady, Cameron, Cartier-Bresson, Day, Evans, Frank, Johnston, Lange, Mapplethorpe, Modotti, Muybridge, Sander, Steichen, Stieglitz, and Weston.

This course surveys art in Europe from roughly the French Revolutionary era to the last quarter of the nineteenth century, that is, from the neo-classical painters (David and his atelier) at one end and the great painters of modern life in Paris (Manet and his followers) at the other.

This course focuses on architecture in Italy--including churches, palaces, villas, and fortifications, as well as city planning--from 1400 to 1700. In this period, architects took their cues from the classical tradition even as they carved out their own territory, developing new techniques and perfecting old ones to realize their designs. We will trace shifting architectural practice through key figures from Brunelleschi to Bernini, and through the lens of larger cultural forces.

An introduction to painting, sculpture, and architecture in Europe and America from the Renaissance to the present. Classes are organized around five focused topics: Renaissance Florence; the artist in the seventeenth century; art and revolution; nineteenth-century abstraction. Lectures will be complimented by class discussion and short films.

This studio course will be a design investigation of a particular theme in or approach to architecture and the built environment. Students will develop and apply traditional and contemporary architectural skills (sketches, plans, elevations, models, computer diagramming, and various modes of digital representation) to interdisciplinary and socially pertinent design problems. Creative and indexical study and analysis will be used to generate and foster a broad range of concepts and language to solve architectural issues involving site, construction, inhabitation, function, form, and space.

This seminar is a critical exploration of the various processes, accounts and theories of colonialism and decolonization in Africa and the Americas. The aim is to chart alternative paths to rethinking the meaning and impact of these terms. Focusing on the various colonial/imperial tools employed to subjugate, exploit and dominate colonized subjects, we will examine how liberal discourses/structures that are assumed to embody the terms of freedom and sovereignty have now become extensions of the colonial they were initially employed to overcome.

This course will examine the cultural, social, political, and economic history of African Americans through the Civil War. Topics covered include the African background to the African American experience, the Atlantic slave trade, introduction and development of slavery, master-slave relationships, the establishment of black communities, slave revolts, the political economy of slavery, women in slavery, the experiences of free blacks, the crisis of the nineteenth century, and the effect of the Civil War.