ART 285: Art Since 1945

Introduction

Welcome to ART 285, Art Since 1945.

Art 285 introduces the history of contemporary artistic practice from 1945 to the present and reviews some major critical and historical accounts of modernism and postmodernism in the arts. A range of historical and methodological questions are addressed, including the evolving idea of artistic autonomy, the changing role of cultural institutions, the shifting relationship between high art and mass culture, and the impact of technology on cultural production. We will focus on some of the key concepts of modernism as they were developed after World War II, and consider challenges to modernism enacted by a variety of artistic movements such as pop art, fluxus, minimalism, happenings, and the European neo-avant-garde of the early 1960s.

Contemporary art is a vast arena of diverse styles, techniques, materials, forms, subjects, and aesthetic traditions; thus this course does not aim to be comprehensive.  Rather, the goal here is to provide a gateway into this art and the historical and conceptual framework in which it is situated.This course attempts to find a middle ground between a traditional survey that emphasizes chronological history and important artistic “movements,” and a thematic approach that emphasizes issues of spatial politics and modernism. 

The presiding context of this course is contemporary art in the West, and the majority of the art to be discussed was produced in either Europe or the United States. I have also included artists and readings that convey the more complex geopolitical situation and inform much contemporary art practice. Along with considering how the concept of modernism was formulated post-1945, we will focus our attention on the way that ideas about place and location inform this discourse.

We begin the semester with an introduction to our key concepts, “Modernism” and “Place,” and consider the way these concepts were developed in art following World War II. The second part of this course considers the work of artists responding to the moment of 1968, primarily through conceptualism, earth art, body art, and feminist critique. Finally, we will consider the increasing significance of site-specific instillations, performance art, and new media such as Internet art. Our course of study will conclude with an overview of the problems of artistic production as they relate to identity and location in contemporary art.

To follow you will find all of the necessary information you will need to participate in and complete this course. Please read each section carefully, as you will be expected to adhere to these guidelines throughout the semester.

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Required Textbooks

The following required texts can be obtained from Friday Center Books and Gifts either by ordering online or by printing and mailing the book order form.

• Hal Foster, Rosalind Krauss, Yve-Alain Bois, Benjamin Buchloh, Art Since 1900: Modernism, Antimodernism, Postmodernism, Volume 2, 1945 to the Present (Thames and Hudson, 2004).
  
• Charles Harrison and Paul Wood, eds. Art in Theory, 1900-2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas. New Edition. Blackwell Publishing, 2003).

In addition we will be reading a number of articles and short chapters from a range of sources. They will be available through e-reserves or JSTOR.

For each lesson, I have included links to useful online sources that you may want to refer to in order to deepen your understanding of a given time period, concept, artist, or art work. We are lucky that there is so much contemporary art available to us through the Internet, and I have organized the course to take advantage of these sources. This said, I realize that we are all working with different online capabilities, and you may not be able to access all of the material I have suggested. This is okay. You are not required to visit online sources. However, if you can make use of these sources, I hope that you do.  

You may find some of the reading material and art works for this course challenging. While some artists and writers may deal with subject matter in ways contrary to your own beliefs, I hope that you will keep an open mind. It is not required that you agree with what you read. However, I expect that you respect the opinions of not only authors and artists, but also of the instructor and other students. Your response papers and weekly discussion postings allow you to voice your own ideas and opinions about the material and I encourage you to do this. Also be sure to take the time to understand the material and the perspective of the writer or artist. Understanding is the key to effective criticism.

Some of the readings we will be doing are theoretical in nature. You may find this demanding and even frustrating. Please be diligent. Keep in mind that you will not be graded on your understanding of individual readings but rather on how you process and synthesize information. In grading, I will also be considering how you apply ideas to examples that you generate and your ability to craft an essay. 

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Internet Resources

Throughout this course, I have provided links to specific works and artist information important to engaging in our weekly themes. Here I provide a small selection of Web sites that contain useful background and research information. Many contain high quality images and sound files that can augment the required texts for this course.

General Information and Research Portals

• Smithsonian National Museum of American History: a large source of primary documentation on the visual arts
• UbuWeb: host to all things avant-garde: sound art, music, poetry, and film—you can find it all here
• Artcyclopedia: links to Web sites by artist and by movement
• Art History Resources on the Web: links to art works, essays, artists' biographies, Web sites, and museums
• Art-Online: links to contemporary art galleries, libraries, and image banks
• ARTinFlux: links to Web sites devoted to theory, theorists, methodology, artists, artist groups, and museums

Image Banks

• ArtSTOR: an image database that UNC Libraries subscribes to. You will find many of  the still images that we encounter in this course here, generally of much higher quality than those found through Google.
• Guggenheim Collection: a visual archive of the Guggenheim holdings

North Carolina Museums and Institutions

• Ackland Art Museum: UNC-Chapel Hill’s museum. Usually has part of their wonderful contemporary print and photography collection on display. Also mounts a show of work from graduating MFA candidates from UNC-Chapel Hill each spring (free).
• The Nasher Museum at Duke:  a strong and growing collection of contemporary artists of internationational renown (discount prices for UNC  students).
• The North Carolina Museum of Art:  a great permanent collection, often hosts exhibits featuring contemporary artists (free to visit the permanent collection).
• The Weatherspoon Museum at UNC-Greensboro: focuses on modern and contemporary art (free and worth the trip).

Online Dictionaries and Glossaries

• Grove Art Online: an extensive dictionary of art and artists. Grove has over 45,000 articles, many more images, and links to museums and galleries around the world.

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Course Requirements

Expect to spend a minimum of nine hours per week on this course. There are four major components of this course:

• a weekly writing assignment in which you will be responding to a question based on the week's reading assignment
• weekly contributions to the discussion forum
• attendance at two events related to contemporary art and a written response to each
• a final paper in which you conduct an in-depth exploration of an aspect of a work of art or topic of your choosing. 

Assignments and Values

Discussion Forums

Our discussion forums are on Blackboard. See Course Mechanics for details on how to access Blackboard.

Why participate in the forums? Learning from your classmates is one of the most important and rewarding experiences of higher education. Our online discussion forum duplicates in-class exchange. It is crucial that you participate at least once a week, hopefully more, and always in a manner that enriches class discussions. The discussion forum is your arena for exploring issues and ideas presented in the readings that you found interesting and challenging.

Each week I will assign one member of the class to act as our discussion leader. This student will pose a question based on the readings for the rest of us to respond to, and start our conversation by presenting his/her own response to the question. When you are the discussion leader, your post will be due by Tuesday at 5 pm so that other students will have time to respond. I have posted a guide under “Course Documents” on Blackboard that will help you to think critically and generate a response to the readings. This document is a great place to go when you need help generating a question for the class to consider. In addition, you are always welcome to use the questions that I pose in the Lesson Notes section for each week.

Whether you are the discussion leader or are just responding to other student posts you may raise new issues and questions, clarify reading assignments, and inquire about others' thoughts and opinions. Is there something you could elaborate on or question in a fellow classmate's posting? Remember that debating is very different from fighting, and debating is far more productive! Your posting should always be courteous and thoughtful; never get personal. And please proofread before you hit the submit button! Your discussion grade will reflect these requirements.

All participation in the discussion forum is due by 5 pm Friday unless otherwise noted in the lesson. Of course, it is beneficial to the class to post early in the week so that others may respond to your ideas. Be sure to check the discussion forum frequently, read all the postings from your classmates, and engage in discussion.

I will determine the schedule for discussion leaders during the first week of class. If there is a week that you would particularly like or dislike, please let me know as soon as possible and I will do my best to accommodate your wishes.

Weekly Response Papers

Each week's lesson includes a written assignment. All written assignments are due by 5 pm on the Sunday of each lesson week. (Earlier submissions are always welcome and encouraged.) Each assignment asks you to use the reading assignments and other materials, such as online sources, to respond to questions I pose. Your response should always be in the form of an essay, unless otherwise noted. I expect these essays to be thoughtfully written and well organized, with attention to grammar, thesis statements, transitions, and topic sentences. Use evidence to support your arguments, and when engaging visual examples (which you will do frequently, as this course focuses on contemporary art), always point to details in those images. In other words, visually analyze or interpret selected images. Improvement in your writing throughout the course is expected and rewarded, but this is hard work and requires effort and commitment.

Format: All assignments should be double spaced, use a standard twelve-point typeface (such as Times New Roman), and have one-inch margins. The length of writing assignments will vary, but a general rule is two to three pages per question. Write an essay, with thesis, argument, and conclusion, unless otherwise noted. Use spell-check and proofreading tools.

Citation: All work in this course, including participation in the discussion forum, falls under UNC's Honor Code. Please contact me if you have any questions about the use of sources. Always cite the source when you are presenting others' ideas. In this class, I prefer that you use footnotes in your written assignments. Microsoft Word allows you to make notes under the “insert” toolbar by inserting a small number into the text and a corresponding number at the end of the page or bottom of the document, where you enter a citation. The content of a note is a citation of the article to which you are referring, including the page number when appropriate (for reference to a specific idea, a specific phrase, or a direct quote). Please use the Chicago Manual of Style standard bibliographic format. 

Your assignments are short essays, so lengthy quotes are never appropriate. Quotes should be used conservatively, and only when you need to include exact words. Always explain how and why you are including these words: How are you interpreting them?

Late Response Papers: Avoid turning assignments in late—it hinders class discussion and puts you behind. Let me know if you have extenuating circumstances as soon as possible. I will either approve and excuse your lateness or warn you of the reduction of your grade. I will be strict—leniency in this matter often fuels more instances of lateness.

Submitting Your Essays: For both your weekly response papers and your final paper you will be submitting your work electronically through the digital dropbox function on our Blackboard site. All short writing assignments should be titled as follows: Lastname_Lesson_1.doc. Please make sure your name is also on the first page of the document itself as well. See Course Mechanics for specific instructions on assignment submission.

Outside Events

Please choose two events (visiting artist lectures, museum exhibitions, visit to a gallery featuring contemporary artists) and turn in a one-page response to the event for credit.  I will post a list of events in the Chapel Hill area that can be used for this requirement, but you may complete this requirement from virtually anywhere. If you have any travel plans this semester, I encourage you to attend an event or exhibit while away. If you have restrictions that prevent you from completing this assignment, please contact me with an explanation of your situation and I will work with you to develop an alternate assignment.

Final Project

You will be required to write a ten- to twelve-page research paper on the topic of your choosing. This assignment allows you to explore in greater depth an intriguing art work or issue related to this course. Before beginning your paper, you must have your topic approved by me.

You will need to use at least five scholarly sources for this project. Scholarly sources are those that you either find in an academic library or articles found online in databases such as JSTOR or ArtFullText. Cite your sources when writing, using footnotes as you did with your short essays.

You will also need to include images of any work that you choose to write about. Because image files can be difficult to send electronically, please be sure to limit the size of your file—an image should take up no more than one quarter of the page. It would also be helpful for you to "compress pictures" before sending your final document. To do this using Microsoft Word, select "Save As" under "File." From this window, go to "tools" and then choose "compress pictures." This reduces the quality of the image somewhat, but this is okay for our purposes.

A "Works Cited" page should also be included. This page should list only the sources you consulted in writing your paper. Please use Chicago Manual of Style format.

As with the shorter, weekly writing assignments, your paper should have a clear thesis and be well organized, clearly written, and free of grammatical errors. The UNC Writing Center provides a number of services that can help you improve the way that you approach the writing of research papers. I encourage you to take advantage of their expertise. Besides offering handouts on writing topics online, they also offer consultation via e-mail.

Late papers will not be accepted for this assignment.

Extra Credit

While there is no substitute for doing your best on the major assignments outlined above, I understand that sometimes students want opportunities to improve grades and take on new challenges. Thus, I have built extra-credit assignments into this syllabus. Follow the instructions given for each extra credit assignment, and if you do a good job on the assignment, I will add an extra point onto your final grade for each extra credit option completed.  You can earn a total of three points on your final grade by doing three extra-credit assignments.

You may complete these assignments at your own pace, and all extra-credit work must be submitted via Blackboard's digital dropbox.

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Grading Guidelines

There are no exams in this course. Each assignment and your overall participation will receive a letter grade, and these grades reflect the following distribution:

A=Excellent
B=Good
C=Average
D=Poor
F=Failing

I will always give you comments regarding what was expected of the assignments and what you might have done differently or might have included in your work. Take these comments as a means to approach future assignments. Don't despair if your grades are not what you expect at first. Keep working diligently and follow all directions, and you (and your grades) will improve.

Strategies for Success

Reading: Look at my notes for each lesson. What themes do I highlight from the readings? As you read, what concepts are the reading assignments raising that you might compare to previous readings? What is the subject of the essay? The audience? The author's agenda? What is the author arguing? What is he or she using as evidence? What examples are used and how? Do you agree with the arguments and the method of analysis?

Writing: Decide what information in the readings is targeted towards my questions and comments; in other words, what aspects or themes should you focus on when answering questions, and what new ideas and examples is the assignment asking you to generate? How can you apply comments and suggestions I have given you on previous essays to this assignment? What kinds of things do I ask you to do differently or to expand upon? Are you clear about what you are arguing? Be clear, be creative, and support your arguments.

Explore the links provided and get a feel for the way that information is presented. Study the images that are reproduced in your readings and in the lessons, and use them in your written responses. Include questions you have from the lesson that you feel have not yet been addressed. Do recent conversations evolve or diverge from earlier ones?

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Honor Code

Remember that as a student of UNC-Chapel Hill, you are bound by the University's Honor Code: "It shall be the responsibility of every student at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to obey and support the enforcement of the Honor Code, which prohibits lying, cheating, or stealing when these actions involve academic processes or University students or academic personnel acting in an official capacity." An especially serious Honor Code violation is plagiarism. See the UNC-Chapel Hill Writing Center's page on plagiarism—what it is and how to avoid it.

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Course Mechanics

Blackboard

Some of your class components (discussion forums, exams, and announcements) are accessed through a software package called Blackboard, and you will need to log in to Blackboard using a unique identifier known as your UNC Onyen (Only Name You'll Ever Need) and Onyen password.

There is a link to the Blackboard site in the gray navigation bar at the top of every page in this course. Click on that link, and then use your Onyen to log in to Blackboard. Click on the "ART 285" link, and you will see navigation buttons on the left side of the screen labeled Announcements, Discussion Forum, and so on.

If you experience problems accessing Blackboard, this is what you should do:  

If you do not already have a UNC Onyen, go to the Onyen Web site and follow the instructions for creating an Onyen.

If you have an Onyen but have forgotten it (or the password), go to the Onyen Web site.

If you have your Onyen but can't log in to Blackboard, contact Janice Durham at the Friday Center.

If you can log in to Blackboard but can't find this course listed, contact Janice Durham at the Friday Center.

If you can't locate an exam or discussion forum in Blackboard, contact the Instructional Designer.

If you have other technical problems while using Blackboard, contact Blackboard Help (use the Help button in Blackboard, or call 919-962-HELP).

Library Services and E-reserves

Students enrolled in Carolina Courses Online have access to the UNC Library System. Visit Distance Education Library Services to access a wide array of online services and resources including e-reserves, online databases, online journals, online books, and live help with research and library access.

Most online resources require you to log in with your Onyen and password. If you have any trouble finding the resource that you need or logging in to a resource, you can contact the library through the contact information at Distance Education Library Services. You can chat live about your problem, or send an e-mail to request assistance.

Using E-mail

All communication from me will go to your UNC Onyen e-mail address (the one that appears when you post to the discussion forum). Off-campus users can access their UNC e-mail account using Webmail. You can have your Onyen e-mail forwarded to a different e-mail address by clicking “Forward email” on the Onyen Web site.

We strongly recommend that you use your UNC e-mail account for all e-mails regarding your course. Hotmail users should be aware that Hotmail will block messages sent from within Blackboard because Blackboard uses “blind carbon copy” to protect privacy. If you forward your mail to a commercial e-mail service provider (yahoo.com or msn.com, for example), messages from your instructor, Friday Center staff, or other students may be delayed because these service providers sometimes place temporary blocks on messages originating from universities.

You must include "ART 285 CCO" in the subject line of all of your e-mail communications. 

Submitting Assignments

Submit assignments using the “Digital Dropbox” in Blackboard. Make sure to hit “Send File,” not just “Add File” so that Blackboard makes it available to me. “Adding” the file just saves it to your page and you will be the only one who can access it.

In the event that Blackboard is unavailable, e-mail your essays to me by attaching them as Microsoft Word documents. If you do not have Word, save your files as rich-text format (.rtf). I will send you a brief notification that I received your assignment, usually along the lines of: “Got it, thanks!” If you do not receive this confirmation within a day, please contact me.

The subject line of your e-mail should always include your last name, course number, assignment number, or some reference to the content of the e-mail (the material or subject about which you are inquiring). Assignments should have a subject line similar to “lesson1 art285 jones.”

It is extremely important for you to save copies of your assignments.

Please check your e-mail software to see how it manages sent and saved messages. Some software automatically deletes messages one month after they have been sent; others only save messages if they are filed in folders; others save messages received but not those sent. You may need to send yourself a copy of your e-mailed assignment at the same time you send it to me, or you may need to print a copy of the e-mail message and any attachments to keep in your paper files. No matter how your system works, make sure you know how to save a copy of all work that you submit and that you save the copy for several months beyond the end of the course.

Other Questions

If you have questions regarding

the content of the course and your progress, contact me. There is a link to my e-mail address at the top of every lesson page. Please include "ART 285 CCO" and your name in the subject line of your e-mail.

problems with this Web site, including bad links, contact the Instructional Designer at the Friday Center

enrollment, Onyen, credits, withdrawal, and so on, contact the Student Services staff at the Friday Center for Continuing Education (phone 919-962-1134 or 800-862-5669)

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Course Schedule

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Lesson 1

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Last modified: January 22, 2009
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