Course description:
 
The primary goal of this course is to clarify and enhance your role as a spectator in contemporary society, and thereby to introduce you to the world of visual arts and design.  In the process, you will examine the visual arts that you can find in our local environment--the Joseloff Gallery, the Wadsworth Atheneum, other galleries and permanently installed works of art in the Hartford area--and consider their relation to the issues that affect our cities and our world.  You will look at painting, sculpture, prints, photography, video, multi-media works, crafts, and perhaps more familiar aspects of your visual environment such as clothing and advertisements.
Visits to local galleries and museums will be required.  If this poses a problem for you, please think about it now.  To compensate for the time you spend on these assignments, your reading in the course will be relatively light.  The emphasis will be on looking, talking and writing, though reading will certainly enter in.

Ground rules:

Attendance is mandatory.  More than two unexcused absences will result in automatic failure of the course.   If you miss a class, or come in late and miss announcements, it is your responsibility to ask a classmate or call me to find out about any changes in readings, assignments, or schedules.  Participation in discussion will not only benefit your learning process, it will count as part of your grade.
You will be asked to write in several ways--short essays, worksheets, formal papers, and essays on your final exam.  All assignments are to be handed in on time.  Late assignments will be graded down one letter grade for each class meeting that they are late.  Papers will be graded on writing ability as well as content.  All assignments must be completed to pass the course. This includes students taking the course Pass/Fail.

Text and other readings:

 Henry M. Sayre, A World of Art, third edition, (Upper Saddle River, NJ:
              Prentice Hall, 2000)--on sale in University of Hartford Bookstore.
 Other readings may be put on reserve in Mortenson Library.
 

Assignments and grading:
 
 

Schedule of readings and assignments (tentative):

May 17         Introduction--Landscape: nature and culture

May 22         Production and perception of imagery
                     Reading: Sayre, pp. 3-16
                     Writing: Half a page on the art work you find most interesting in the
                             reading, explaining why you find it so.
 
May 24         Representation
                     MEET IN SCULPTURE BUILDING, HARTFORD ART SCHOOL
                     MOVE TO MORTENSON LIBRARY FOR LECTURE AND EXHIBITiON
                     Reading: Sayre, pp. 17-35

May 29         MEMORIAL DAY—NO CLASS
 
May 31         Representation (continued)
                     MEET IN CLASSROOM
                     Reading: Sayre, pp. 36-52
                     Organization of media report assignments
                     SHORT PAPER DUE ON CALDER
 
June 5           Art, Politics and Public Space
                     Reading: Sayre, pp. 53-69
                     QUIZ
                     Group work on media reports
 
June 7           Media Reports
 
June 12         MIDTERM
                     Summary discussion OR visit to Real Art Ways

June 14         Line
                     Reading: Sayre, pp. 71-89
 
June 19         Space
                     Reading: Sayre, pp. 90-108

June 21         Light and Color; Other Formal Elements
                     MEET IN TAUB GALLERY
                     Reading: Sayre, pp. 109-153
 
June 26        The Principles of Design
                     Reading: Sayre, pp. 154-182
                     QUIZ and review

June 28:        FINAL EXAM
                     PAPER DUE