Nov 10, 2024
Ohio University Graduate Catalog 2013-2015
AH 5621 - Art and Theory Since 1945
Looks at the three decades of artistic production in America and Europe after World War II and the Holocaust. It focuses Develop language to discuss, describe, and generate formal analyses of art works.on four main questions: first, how did artists attempt to come to terms with the violent rupture in European civilization caused by the dehumanizing forces of war and genocide? Second, how did artistic production assist in the reconstruction of culture and community? How did they forge a connection to the prewar avant-garde? Third, how did artists attempt to engage the increasing presence of media and advertisement production, what Theodore Adorno referred to as “The Culture Industry,” and George Bataille has discussed under the rubric of “The Marshall Plan,” roughly understood as the “Americanization” of Europe. Last, how does our focused examination of postwar European Art in relationship to post-war American art de-center the art historical narrative that focuses primarily on American art centering on New York? How might our queries suggest a different narrative? Presents a historical approach to the development of art in America, Italy, France, Germany and the Netherlands from the first attempts to represent the atrocities of war to the critique of institutions of power in the ‘60s through to the return of painting as a form of historical reflection in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s. Does not claim to provide an exhaustive catalogue of every important artistic activity after the war. Rather, specific figures will be examined as case studies of the interrelationship between aesthetic, historical and ideological issues from 1945 on. Finally, introduces the history of contemporary artistic practices from the 1960s to the present, and the major critical and historical accounts of modernism and postmodernism in the arts. Focusing on the interrelationships between modernist culture and the emerging concepts of postmodernism and contemporary art, addresses a wide range of historical and methodological questions. These include the evolving idea of artistic autonomy, the changing role of cultural institutions, the shifting relationship of high art and mass culture, the impact of new technologies on cultural production, and the emergence of new audiences for art.
Requisites
Credit Hours: 3.0
Repeat/Retake Information: May not be retaken.
Lecture/Lab Hours: 3.0 lecture
Eligible grades: A-F,PR,WP,WF,FN,FS,AU,I
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