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Studies in 17th & 18th-Century Art (440-0-1)

Topic

Materiality

Instructors

Alicia Caticha

Meeting Info

Kresge 4354 Art Hist. Sem. Rm.: Tues 2:00PM - 4:50PM

Overview of class

The materiality of art is central to how art is made, how it looks, what it means, and how it is preserved. Art history's recent material turn has challenged art historians to look beyond the fine arts to material culture while also expanding the field's geographic and temporal focus. However, this trend in scholarship obscures art history's long tradition of object-oriented study. This seminar examines this historiographic tradition while also looking towards current theoretical approaches to materiality, including, but not limited to, theories of agency (the means through which objects shape human behavior), making (the processes of creation, the transmission of artistic knowledge, and the global movement of makers), exchange (the movement of objects through space as they are gifted, purchased, sold, or simply used), and matter (the physical substances that comprise all objects).