| Fall 2008 Visual Studies Courses |
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VIS STD 180A (4) Thirty hours lecture and 90 hours studio per semester. Prerequisites: Env Des 11A and 11B or consent of instructor. Projects in graphic form, color, and word-image relationships. Principles of Three-Dimensional Design Principles of Three-Dimensional Design is an elective Visual Studies course that focuses on the reverie of three-dimensional construction. This course offers the opportunity to create – build actual objects and sculptures that are fully realized and complete within themselves. This process allows us to tap into the inner journey that reveals previously unseen structures through empirical and improvisational means. This is a course in the fundamentals of visual design; both its theory and practice. These issues will be systematically explored in a combination of lectures, studio assignments, and weekly projects. Emphasis will be placed on the connection between meaning and form. Dialogues will be explored involving three dimensional forms, two dimensional drawings, and digitally manipulated images. Topics will include issues of design and composition, relationships between color and form, and the role of order, scale, structure and proportion in visual design. A variety of techniques, materials and media will be used to illustrate these topics. There will be two weekly assignments, one smaller which emphasizes both content and formal composition, and one larger which explores a number of design principles within a broader context. Students should anticipate intensive in-class work and outside assignments. Projects will be reviewed and graded as they are completed. A digitally designed portfolio comprised of the courses projects will be submitted at the end of the semester. VIS STD 181 (4) Thirty hours lecture and 75 hours studio per semester. Learn the classic methods of photography using film, paper, and the darkroom. The course will cover 35mm camera operation, black and white film, and print processing along with essential aesthetic considerations. There will be hands-on demonstrations, laboratory sessions, slide shows, and in-class critiques, all designed to facilitate progress of assigned projects. There will be an introduction to digital technology. Historical and contemporary issues in photography will be discussed. Each student will finish class with a portfolio of photographs. Extended Course Description This course is an intensive investigation of photographic technique and practice. Specific assignments will introduce students to the mechanics of the medium using 35mm cameras, black and white film and a wet darkroom. The final project will address concepts of representation, narrative and abstraction. The course format will include technical demonstrations such as studio lighting, lectures on historical and contemporary photographic work and class critiques. Each student will finish the course with a portfolio of photographs on one theme. VIS STD 185X (3–4)
The premise here is straightforward: to read an artist's biography, and to test our understanding of the life by making a set of paintings in response. To test through the doing, as it were. The paintings may be straightforward copies of the work of the painter in question, developed over time, in parallel to the life. Or they may be extrapolations--based on our own (one's own) understanding of the life. The relationship between these two terms will be the focus of the class. How does a work of art reflect biography? How does a life become manifest in visual terms? How does life become art? *Topics and Projects* (for example): We will read perhaps three biographies in common, over the course of the semester, with each person in the class choosing an additional painter or two whose work they particularly wish to explore on their own, sharing this exploration with the class as a whole. Students will also take on the responsibility of presenting the lives orally (with necessary visual parallels)--that is, through notes and stories derived from the reading. (This, by the way, is what painters do, sharing such stories as a kind of fundament, or lore, each life becoming in its own way a myth. A story from Alberto Giacommetti, for example--that he lived as a child in a mountain valley in Switzerland where, during winter months the sun never reached the valley floor...) *The format will be a weekly seminar, with work posted each class session as focus of discussion--and point of departure.* **Note that the emphasis here will be on painting, painterly painting in particular (as opposed to other current modes of art practice). An old art. The prejudice--and the passion--of your instructor. We'll start with Titian--or maybe Lorenzo Lotto. Then Watteau. Delacroix's Diaries... Pissarro or Renoir (Renoir, My Father by Jean Renoir). Jack Lindsay's Cezanne, together with Cezanne's letters. Vollard on Degas? Gauguin (with Gauguin's Noa Noa)? Hilary Sperling's Matisse??? Walter Sickert. Of the Americans: Eakins. or Hopper. Maybe Philp Evergood (Kendall Taylor: Never Separate from the Heart). James Lord: Giacometti. Guston, of course. Dore Ashton's book (Yes, But...) **There's a logic to these choices--the painter au rebours--against the current. What Cezanne (a perfect example) referred to as "temperament." His turgid early work--heavy, dark complete--and then the late, unfinished watercolors--the ones Cezanne left scattered over the fields near Aix--open, touches of color, all suggestion... **There are TOO MANY great possibilities, so what we touch on will just be a start. Looks like some of the reading could/should be done over the summer, in preparation. Maybe we want that kind of commitment from the students involved? *Enrollment/Prerequisites*: Upper Division or Graduate standing. Students should have ENV DES 11A and/or equivalent background in visual arts. Majors from outside the CED with at least some studio art experience are welcome. *Enrollment Procedures*: Limited enrollment of 10, based on each student's studio background, example of work (small sized, yet legible, JPEG file(s)), and a written statement (concise, please!) sent to Professor Anthony Dubovsky by e-mail at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it Please include name, major, class, and contact information. VIS STD 186B (1–4) Formerly 186C. Set up Photography: Towards a New Social Surrealism FIRST DAY OF CLASS: MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 7-10 PM, 104 WURSTER HALL If we see our passage on earth as a theatrical play, what snapshots of our experiences would we wish to share with our contemporaries? At the core of this class is the desire to go deep within ourselves and explore how we can artistically and critically materialize the intimate relationship between our body/mind, our environment and the arts. Some of the situated questions we will raise are, for example: What aesthetic principles underlie and inform our practices? How do we see the boundaries between Design, Art, and Photography? What is our relation to light, darkness, and color? How do we acknowledge our construction of reality through our senses and lenses? Through diverse subjects centered around Body / Mind (the constructed self, love, the naked body, hate, peace); the environment (earth, social inequities, water, decay); the creative gesture (artists, dance, performance) , this class will focus on restructuring our experience across the fields of visual and performing arts – including painting, sculpture, design, installation and performance. We will be committed to explore photography as Conceptual Art and NOT as a documentary practice. You will be encouraged to think of each exercise as being a (sometimes highly designed) visual poem condensing your critical position, humour, thoughts and feelings on the subjects mentioned above. Our photographic production will lean towards a “new Social Surrealism” which I could best describe as: set up or staged “portraits of our time,” photographs as paintings, advertising or (slightly) burlesque compositions, theatrical narratives or artistical essays. In short, you will be required to show, through your photographs, your critical distance vis-a-vis your sensual and intellectual understanding of each theme. Since the class is not solely about photography and not about photographic techniques, there is no restriction as to what tools you could use: analog or digital cameras, scanning devices, stylus drawing tools and photoshop can all be put to use to enrich your aesthetic vision. Regarding your previous experience with photography, you may be in a much better position if you have already taken a photography class. For each weekly assignment everyone is expected to produce a large-format photograph (a maximum of 18" wide) in B & W or in color. Everyone is also expected to present their work-in-progress on a board, showing the various stages of the creative process, including, for example, small tests, sketches, copies of drawings, notes, etc. Each weekly meeting will be centered around a pin-up of the work and a class critique in which you’ll learn to become a teacher and relate your observations to design, photography, the arts, your own field of interest, and your life in general. The group critique will be the major tool to develop our growth and understanding; please take this class only if you are planning to give your full participation during these class pin-ups. Final grade will based on the average evaluation of all 12 projects and on a final show presented in the Wurster lobby. This is a class that requires work and time commitment. It is not advised to take an architectural design studio at the same time. Final class selection will be available on Wednesday September 10, after our first class meeting on September 8, based on a short questionnaire collected the first day, and a short interview that will probably take place on Tuesday 9 from 5 to 7 PM in my office, #349 in Wurster, during which I would love to see any of your work in the visual arts. In other words, since being registered in the class is by consent of the instructor, the waiting list serves only as a temporary reference and does not imply that you’ll be included in the class, just as not being on the waiting list does not mean that you cannot get in. JUST SHOW UP THE FIRST DAY OF CLASS. If you want to check my own work, see the book of photography Bodyscapes and website at: www.jeanpaulbourdier.com. VIS STD 187A Freehand Drawing (4) Freehand Drawing is an elective Visual Studies course that goes beyond the constraints of an Introductory Drawing class. Here we continue the experiential process of learning to see – observe, and dive into the root of of the creative process and inspiration. Drawing by hand is the most direct, immediate, and universal means of visual expression. In this course we will develop what it is we have to express while we give visual form to our thoughts. We will also use color for its vital emotive power. Experimentation, improvisation, and play are key in this course as a means of learning and connecting to our own creativity. The emphasis in this course is on developing greater facility, awareness, and self-expression in freehand drawing. Aspects of composition will be stressed throughout the course. We will work from a variety of subjects, including architecture still life, landscape, and the model. A variety of drawing media will be employed such as pencil, pen and ink, charcoal, pastels, grease media, felt tip, etc. The work of a variety of artists and practitioners throughout history, who have used drawing as a primary means of expression, will be shown in books and in slide presentations. There will be weekly out of class assignments. Class critiques of work done both in class and as home work will be part of each session. A portfolio consisting of in and out-of-class assignments will be submitted for review at mid-term and at the end of the semester. VIS STD 198 (1–4) No more than 4 units allowed each semester. Course may be repeated for credit. Must be taken on a passed/not passed basis. Studies developed to meet needs. See General Catalog regarding unit limitation toward the degree. VIS STD 280 (1–3) Fifteen hours of lecture/seminar per unit per semester. Prerequisites: 181, 186. Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies. Advanced work in visual studies and photography. Graduate Seminar / Word and Image This is a class about imagination and ideas. A road trip, perhaps — or a voyage. We begin each week with a theme — often a single word — as point of departure. Each person in the group does a project in response — a drawing, a painting, a collage — the medium is open. In the following class we look at the work, and a conversation ensues. And then, a new word. The hand is important throughout: how the sense of touch can become a guide. The endeavor here involves a kind of opening — not just in terms of skill (although skill can play a part), but more in finding the right (visual) language to give form to one’s feelings about and understanding of the surrounding world. A challenge that carries over into any of the design fields — and beyond…. Students from all departments welcome. A good place to explore your initial ideas about the Master’s Thesis. Also, for graduate students interested in teaching drawing (as GSIs in ED 11A) this course is a strongly encouraged. VIS STD 298 (1–5) No more than 5 units allowed each semester. Course may be repeated for credit. Special group studies on topics to be introduced by instructor or students. VIS STD 299 (1–5) One unit will be assigned for each 4 hours of student effort per week. Course may be repeated for credit. Individual studies in cluding reading and individual research under the supervision of a faculty adviser and designed to reinforce the student's background in areas related to the proposed topic. |
Painters' Lives