(Offered as ARHA 317 and EUST 318) Ghosts, angels, monsters, fairies, the presence of imaginary beings has a central role in human thought and art. In this course, through a series of hands-on projects, we will explore ways to make the invisible and imaginary visually present as art. We will examine the world of imaginary beings, their taxonomy, representation and attributes, and survey their history in art from the paleolithic to the present.

(Offered as ARHA 316, ARCH 316, and EUST 316) This seminar is based on a close, comparative reading of the critical theorist Walter Benjamin, the artist Paul Klee, the photographer August Sander, and the filmmaker Wim Wenders. Their treatments of cities, arcades, towers and streets will be used to explore both the sensations of place and the operations of memory, in images, texts, artifacts, and in architecture.

This course explores sound as a medium of art-making with a rich history and radical potential within contemporary culture. Techniques covered will include non-musical scores, field recording, basic computer-based audio manipulation, and building lo-fi electronics for experimental sound synthesis. Accompanying readings draw from acoustic ecology, critical sound studies, afro-futurism, and media theory to contextualize collective exploration. Students will be expected to create studio-based art for critique. No musical experience is required.

Spring 2024. Professor House.

This studio course is designed as an interactive laboratory for students interested in imaginative experimentation to discover and access multiple ways to generate material in different media (dance, theater, visual /digital art, text and/or sound). The course emphasizes a practice of rigorous play and a dedicated interest in process and invention. Also, the course will be informed by a view that anything and everything is possible material for creative and spontaneous response and production.

(Offered as ARHA 258, ARCH 258 and EUST 258) The purpose of this course is to introduce students to research on lived environments from the Renaissance to the Enlightenment, the architecture that shaped them, and the art and objects that they contained. The goal of each class, through reading and discussion, is to investigate what a researchable question is in the fields of history, art history, architecture, and material culture in Europe, England, and the Americas.

(Offered as ARHA 230 and ASLC 230) This class will focus on the transformations in artistic practice and expression in Japan from the mid-nineteenth century to the present. It will examine how artists and architects responded to Westernization in the nineteenth century, modernization in the first half of the twentieth century, Americanization in the post-war era, high-growth in the 1970s and 1980s, and globalization in the twenty-first century.

The combination of language with visual information offers a rich range of possibilities. In this course we will investigate strategies of interweaving image and text to create works that draw upon the qualities of each to produce hybrid forms. The class will look at a variety of sources and respond to them in a series of hands-on studio projects. These sources include maps, diagrams, calligraphy, illustrations and manuscripts, as well as work from the history of art and literature.

“Eco” is derived from the Latin oeco, “house.” That means that the word “ecology” was coined to discuss the study of our home and community. What does art, which is also about making place and participating in community, contribute to this field of knowledge? How can art challenge what we already ‘know’ about our surroundings and the relationships that take place within them? What else can we perceive and communicate through artistic research and practice? How can we notice and creatively denounce neglect of our environment?

(Offered as ARHA 223 and ARCH 223) This intermediate level course is a global survey of historic preservation, or the restoration of buildings, spaces, and landscapes in the modern era. We will ask: Why do people feel compelled to preserve the architecture of the past? From the halls of UNESCO (the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) to the scholarship on Mayan archaeology that sparked the emergence of a Mexican tourism industry, this question has brought academics, diplomats, business people, and consumers into dialogue worldwide.

(Offered as ARHA 221 and FAMS 221) This introductory course is designed for students with no prior experience in video production. The aim is both technical and creative. We will begin with the literal foundation of the moving image—the frame—before moving through shot and scene construction, lighting, sound-image concepts, and final edit. In addition to instruction in production equipment and facilities, the course will also explore cinematic form and structure through weekly readings, screenings and discussion.