ARTS 1431: Early Nineteenth-Century Art

Abstract

Course Description: This course examines the history of French painting from 1800 to 1850, introducing the period’s major artists, theories, and styles -- David’s Neoclassicism, Delacroix’s Romanticism, Courbet’s Realism. In this period, the artworld centered on Paris, the predominant location for both art production and display. The shifts and changes happening there rippled around the world well into the next century. Although it will focus on art in Paris, this course will nonetheless resist seeing the history of French painting in terms of national accomplishment. Indeed, the rise of nationalism in the nineteenth century finds a counterpoint in the cosmopolitanism of the French capital. Artists from around the world came to Paris and exhibited their works there. Artistic production by French artists in places like Rome and Tangier likewise provided an international context and iconography; it also served to redefine the Frenchness of French painting. An ongoing dialogue with non-French art – ancient Greek sculpture, German aesthetics, English landscape painting – played a similarly important role. Consequently, the history of French painting in this course will necessarily be a global history.¶ Objectives: By participating fully in the course, you will have acquired, by the end of the semester, the following knowledge and skills: • the ability to produce written descriptions of works of art. • the ability to use historical and theoretical research in the analysis of works of art. • an understanding of how art relates to its historical and cultural circumstances. • an understanding of different art historical approaches and methodologies.