Visual & Studio Arts

First-Year Studies—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 1060

Note: Also offered as ARTS 3060.

Technical exploration, perception, development of ideas, intuition, invention, representation and communication are at the core of this class. We will begin this course in an observational mode, introducing practical information about the fundamentals of painting: color, shape, tone, edge, composition, perspective, and surface. We will paint still lifes and transcribe a masterwork. We will look at the work of both old masters as well as contemporary painters. We will also take a trip to a museum/galleries to look at paintings in the flesh. The course will include demonstrations of materials and techniques, slide presentations, films and videos, reading materials, homework assignments, and group and individual critiques. In the second half of the course, we will complete a series of projects exploring design principles as applied to nonobjective (abstract) artworks. Using paint, with preparatory collages and drawings, we will engage with strategies for utilizing nonobjective imagery towards self-directed content. Each week will bring a new problem, with lessons culminating in independent paintings. Projects will emphasize brainstorming multiple answers to visual problems over selecting the first solution that comes to mind. The last part of the class will be devoted to a personal project. Students will establish their theme of interest, which they will present during conference meetings; then, they will carry out research and preparatory work to develop a series of paintings. Drawings will often be produced in tandem with paintings in order to solve painting problems and illuminate visual ideas. Revisions are a natural and mandatory part of this course. The majority of class time will be spent in a studio/work mode. The studio is a lab where ideas are being worked out and meaning is made.  It is important that students are curious and travel to unexpected places rather than merely relying on existing skills and experiences, instead challenging themselves to openness and progress. The process will be part critical thinking, part intuition, and in large part physical labor. Working rigorously inside and outside of class is required. The goal is to establish the roots of a healthy and generative personal studio practice. Students will also strengthen their knowledge of art history and take into consideration the wider cultural, historical, and social contexts within which art is being made today. Students will meet weekly with the instructor for individual conferences, as part of regular class time, alongside corequisite First-Year Studies Project (ARTS 1000), which will meet weekly as a group.

Faculty

• Yevgeniya Baras

First-Year Studies—Fall

ARTS 1000

In this course, students will experience different methods of doing artistic visual research, developing ideas, and seeking out information to express ideas more precisely. Students will learn about different artists working today so that they can see themselves as part of the lineage and become acquainted with looking at and learning from the practices of others. Working communally is a very important part of being an artist. Students will collaborate artistically with others. Finding critical language for your own work and developing the ability to speak about the work of others are crucial skills. We will study the process of productive critique and practice it so that students will have the tools to participate in studio classes. The course's intention is to help students learn the fundamentals of visual arts, and acquire the tools they will need regardless of which discipline they may end up focusing on. Enrolled students will meet weekly, connect to peers, think about art across disciplines (drawing, sculpture, painting, photography, printmaking, performance, video, and more), receive academic advice, and enrich the beginning of your college life. Students will have the opportunity to ask lots of questions. The course will culminate in a group gallery show connecting first-year artists with the wider college community. In fall and spring, students will meet weekly as a group, alongside corequisite First-Year Studies ARTS course.

Faculty

• Yevgeniya Baras

First-Year Studies—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 1305

Note: Also offered as ARTS 3305.

This introductory course will explore the fundamentals of sculpture, with an emphasis on how objects function in space and the connections between two-dimensional and three-dimensional forms. This course will focus on the process of building and constructing and working with varied materials and tools. Students will explore various modes of making, binding, building, fastening, and molding, using wood, cardboard, plaster, and found materials. Using Richard Serra’s Verb List as inspiration, students will use verbs as a guide for building. Technical instruction will be given in the fundamentals of working with hand tools, as well as other elemental forms of building. This course will include an introduction to the critique process, as well as thematic readings with each assignment. Alongside studio work, the course will look at historical and contemporary artists, such as Jessica Stockholder, Martin Puryear, Judith Scott, Rachel Whiteread, Simone Leigh, Louise Nevelson, Alexander Calder, Donald Judd, Robert Morris, Eva Hesse, and Louise Bourgeois, among others. Students will meet weekly with the instructor for individual conferences, as part of regular class time, alongside corequisite First-Year Studies Project (ARTS 1000), which will meet weekly as a group.

Faculty

• Katie Bell

First-Year Studies—Spring

ARTS 1000

Through readings, discussion, studio prompts, and collaborative workshops, students will investigate the space in between mediums. This course will engage each student’s varied interests in painting, sculpture, printmaking, performance, drawing, new genres, photography, and more. We will consider the work that can happen across mediums, combining various ways of thinking about material and form. This course will emphasize the interdisciplinary nature of a Sarah Lawrence education and give students the tools to think across disciplines, connecting the visual arts to the wider curriculum. The course will culminate in a collaborative group exhibition that will allow students to see their work as part of a larger whole. In fall and spring, students will meet weekly as a group, alongside corequisite First-Year Studies ARTS course.

Faculty

• Katie Bell

First-Year Studies—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 1358

Note: Also offered as ARTS 3358.

This course will examine the video image as an artistic medium through the study of contemporary video art. The course will focus on identity and self-exploration. Students will make one work in two phases: first, a video investigation of the self and second, a screen-based installation of that work using projectors, monitors, and found technology. Students will be expected to develop fluency in video as a critical and aesthetic practice, to conduct independent research into the current state of the medium, and to situate their own work within the contemporary field. Projects will be developed through skills-based demonstrations and iterative critique. While there is no access to custom fabrication in this course, students are encouraged to experiment with available equipment and innovative surfaces. Students will meet weekly with the instructor for individual conferences, as part of regular class time, alongside corequisite First-Year Studies Project (ARTS 1000), which will meet weekly as a group.

Faculty

• Angela Ferraiolo

First-Year Studies—Fall

ARTS 1000

Designed specifically for our first-year cohort, this seminar will introduce students to a diverse range of visual arts disciplines, guiding both beginners and those with prior studio experience through drawing, painting, sculpture, collage, sound, and digital media. These fluid, intersecting practices will encourage students to recognize how a discovery in one medium can radically transform their approach to another. Projects create a generative cycle where an initial thought informs a physical artwork, and the act of making sparks new thoughts as ideas evolve through a constant dialogue between mind and matter. Through studio work, artist presentations, and critiques, coupled with first-year introductions to areas of the college such as library research and career services, students will explore how art reflects their personal inquiry and intersects with other new fields of study. Highly encouraging curiosity and play, this course will conclude with an exhibition highlighting their individual evolution as a culmination of their first year. In fall and spring, students will meet weekly as a group, alongside corequisite First-Year Studies ARTS course.

Faculty

• John O’Connor

First-Year Studies—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 1162

Note: Also offered as ARTS 2162, FLMH 2162, and PSYC 2162.

Why is the topic of laughter so often siloed or scorned in discussions of high art, literature, and the sciences? Why don’t we take laughter seriously as a society? How many professors does it take to teach a course on laughter? (Two more than usual...) In this lecture with weekly seminars, students will develop a highly interdisciplinary understanding of laughter as a human behavior, cultural practice, and tool for creative expression. Based on the expertise of the three professors, lectures will primarily investigate laughter through the lens of psychology, film history, and visual arts. The goal of placing laughter at the center of our discourse is to think and play across disciplines to explore the many contradictory ideas and experiences signified by laughter, from humor and collective joy to unease and social rupture. For weekly class assignments, students will be asked to conduct observational studies of themselves and others’ laughter patterns, make artworks inspired by stand-up, sitcoms, and slapstick comedy, or write close analyses of classic cinematic gags. Over the course of the semester, we will examine the building blocks of laughter; classic devices of modern comedy; and laughter as a force of resilience, resistance, and regeneration. Topics to be discussed will include the evolutionary roots of laughter as a behavior; the psychological and physiological substrates of laughter as a mode of emotional and self-regulation; humor in Dada, surrealism, performance art, and stand-up comedy; jokes and the unconscious; comic entanglements of modern bodies and machines; hysterical audiences of early cinema; and how to read funny faces, word play, spit takes, toilet humor, and sound gags. Experiential, hands-on opportunities for engaging with the course will involve expert panels, improv/comedy workshops, scientific laughter labs, and an art exhibit organized around laughter. Students will meet weekly with the instructor for individual conferences, as part of regular class time, alongside corequisite First-Year Studies Project (ARTS 1000), which will meet weekly as a group.

Faculty

• John O’Connor

First-Year Studies—Spring

ARTS 1000

Over the years, photographers who studied photography at Sarah Lawrence have gone on to strong professional practices in the fine arts. In the spring, several of them will participate in a group show opening in the Barbara Walters Gallery at the Heimbold Visual Arts Center.

In this project course, these artists will briefly present their work virtually and respond to student questions about both their work and their post-Sarah Lawrence experiences. Discussions amongst class participants will follow.

Invited artists include Alec Soth, John Pilson, Miranda Lichtenstein, Chris Wiley, Max Warsh, Alyssa Gorelick, Lily Dabe, Mary Kim, Jane Lowe, Manal Abu-Shaheen, Taj Forer, Mike Itkoff, elin o'Hara slavick, and Susan Meiselas, amongst others.

Other guests may include Nancy Spector, art historian and former Chief Curator at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, and Zein Khalifa, Founder and Director of Tintoretto Gallery, Cairo, Egypt.

In fall and spring, students will meet weekly as a group, alongside corequisite First-Year Studies ARTS course.

Faculty

• Joel Sternfeld

Open, Studio—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 3371

This design studio will investigate foundational design principles through the concept of transition, focusing on the exchange between built and natural environments. It will address this relationship in both physical and social dimensions, through a lens of ecology that involves individual and collective appropriation. The course will be structured into two modules that progress from the fundamental to the complex. In the first half of the semester, students will engage with typical elements of transition in architecture, such as windows, doors, and corridors to develop an architectural analysis that is at once documental (working with projective standards, scale, line weights, and precision) and experimental (explores the abstract potential of form to derive alternative interpretations of elemental types). The second half of the course will investigate transitions at an urban scale, focusing on types such as the street and the square. The studio’s pedagogical approach relies on conceptual inquiry and iterative design experimentation. Students will work both individually and in groups, integrating analog methods with advanced digital tools.

Faculty

• Marina Correia

Open, Concept—Spring | 2 credits

ARTS 3365

This course will offer an introduction to fundamental discourses on the relationship between city and nature from the 20th and 21st centuries, bridging design, history, and theory. We will examine interpretations of “green” and other topics such as infrastructure, geography, and inhabitation. Case studies at both architectural and urban scales—including the cities of Los Angeles, Paris, New York, and Rio de Janeiro—will be integrated throughout the course. The objective is to situate students in the contemporary city and its recent history by engaging with its fields of opportunities (innovative, unique contemporary potentials) as well as its gaps, latent absences, and concealed inequalities. The course methodology will emphasize active participation through weekly readings and discussions. Coursework will interweave theory and design through the production of essays and drawings, supported by digital drawing workshops and presentations.

Faculty

• Marina Correia

Open, Studio—Spring | 5 credits

ARTS 3385

This design studio will examine current environmental pressures in the margins of the Bronx River in relation to inhabitation, including homelessness, transient living, appropriation, and commonality. Layers of mobility infrastructure and industrial uses parallel to rivers in urban environments often exacerbate their isolation from residential neighborhoods. Recreational programs are frequently paired with existing or new educational facilities; however, housing for the most vulnerable population is not integrated into these visions. Working on a site adjacent to the Bronx River, students will explore convergences that challenge conventional definitions of inhabitation, amplifying intersections between natural landscapes and shelter. This architectural design studio will develop foundational design skills through conceptual inquiry and iterative design experimentation. Students will work both individually and in groups, integrating analog methods with advanced digital tools.

Faculty

• Marina Correia

Open, Studio—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 3032

This course will be rooted in observational drawing. Students will either build or expand a working knowledge of drawing techniques using traditional drawing materials and working on paper as a substrate. Assignments will take students out into the field, in addition to studying inventive still lifes in the classroom. Students will be introduced to contemporary artists who use drawing at the center of their practice. In addition to classroom drawing exercises, students will think critically about animal (including human), vegetable, and mineral with three conceptual prompts provided and will result in a longer drawing. Each prompt will be rooted in a short reading from one of the following texts, inviting us to think more metaphorically in a larger drawing. Excerpts from the following texts will be provided: Robin Kimmerer’s Gathering Moss, Rob Nixon’s Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor, and F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. Examples of a drawing prompt within each strand of the course could include: the gaming preserve, the zombie, the leper (animal); megafauna, herbaria, moss, compost (vegetable); and luxury, magic, pills (mineral). As much as possible, students will cull images from life, or their own photoshoots or archive; using images from Pinterest or the internet will be discouraged. From the classroom and homework, the students’ greatest strengths and interests will develop and a conference project will emerge—resulting in either ten small-sized, three medium-sized, or one large painting on a topic of their own choosing. Homework assignments, individual and class critiques, and building a language to talk about drawing and ideas will be an important and required part of class.

Faculty

• Marion Wilson

Open, Studio—Spring | 5 credits

ARTS 3056

Considering multiple routes of arrival, we will revisit some places that have been meaningful to you that you carry along wherever you go. From direct observations to conjuring places from childhood memories, we will devise methods of mapping. We will maintain a mode of collective and independent study with various prompts, readings for discussions, and examples shared. We will explore different methods of drawing including contour, blind contour, note-taking, repetition, erasure, building, collage, and more with studio materials as well as expanded materials such as receipts, conversations, dirt, and engravings, developed by students individually. Each student will maintain a sketchbook throughout the course with recordings of places to develop a practice of observing, recordkeeping, and articulating through drawing. We will be moving between varying scales: of a place embedded in your memory on a micro level, such as from hiding under the table while playing hide and seek, to a more macro study of a geographical location and its infrastructure. In the way that certain smells have a transportable power—plugging that association in your mind to a particular place, to certain people, to specific times—we will explore what are some ways we can carry a sense of a place with us. We will unpack these places by examining its location, history, memory, im/materiality, volume, capacity, temperature, traceability, portability, in/stability, dis/comfort, and more expanding our understanding of materials—that reveal a variety of logics that hold a place together.

Faculty

• Ayesha Khan

Intermediate/Advanced, Studio—Spring | 5 credits

ARTS 3045

Prerequisite: a prior drawing or painting course

This course will assume versatility in drawing methods, the ability to sustain an independent art practice, and an interest in ecological systems. The course will be divided into three sections and all will be connected to the natural world. We will spend as much time as possible thinking outside of the classroom. The first third of the course will focus on observing, studying botany, collecting, and pencil and watercolor drawing. The second third of the course will use elements of the natural world to create artwork—including but not limited to: using plants to create paper, making botanical dyes and inks, engaging wind, light, rain, and other natural elements in collaboration or instead of traditional art practices. The third part of the course will discuss artists as cottage industries and ways that artists have thought about markets and labor. These sections will not happen sequentially but rather there will be a mix of assignments and topics throughout the semester. Prompts will include: create a botanical herbarium, paint with all natural inks and dyes; cook an egg with only publicly sourced electricity, build an art collection; create new substrates, design a “garden.” We will take field trips, visit an art fair, respond to creative texts, and lead with dialogue.

Faculty

• Marion Wilson

Open, Lecture—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 2162

Note: This is a complex, composite course; interviews are strongly encouraged. Same as FLMH 2162 and PSYC 2162. Also offered as First-Year Studies ARTS 1162.

Why is the topic of laughter so often siloed or scorned in discussions of high art, literature, and the sciences? Why don’t we take laughter seriously as a society? How many professors does it take to teach a course on laughter? (Two more than usual...) In this lecture with weekly seminars, students will develop a highly interdisciplinary understanding of laughter as a human behavior, cultural practice, and tool for creative expression. Based on the expertise of the three professors, lectures will primarily investigate laughter through the lens of psychology, film history, and visual arts. The goal of placing laughter at the center of our discourse is to think and play across disciplines to explore the many contradictory ideas and experiences signified by laughter, from humor and collective joy to unease and social rupture. For weekly class assignments, students will be asked to conduct observational studies of themselves and others’ laughter patterns, make artworks inspired by stand-up, sitcoms, and slapstick comedy, or write close analyses of classic cinematic gags. Over the course of the semester, we will examine the building blocks of laughter; classic devices of modern comedy; and laughter as a force of resilience, resistance, and regeneration. Topics to be discussed will include the evolutionary roots of laughter as a behavior; the psychological and physiological substrates of laughter as a mode of emotional and self-regulation; humor in Dada, surrealism, performance art, and stand-up comedy; jokes and the unconscious; comic entanglements of modern bodies and machines; hysterical audiences of early cinema; and how to read funny faces, word play, spit takes, toilet humor, and sound gags. Experiential, hands-on opportunities for engaging with the course will involve expert panels, improv/comedy workshops, scientific laughter labs, and an art exhibit organized around laughter.

Faculty

• John O’Connor
• Maia Pujara
• Leana Hirschfeld-Kroen

Advanced, Studio—Year | 10 credits

ARTS 4112

Prerequisite: restricted to seniors; at least 20 visual arts credits; additional creative arts credits considered

This course is designed for seniors committed to deepening their art-making practice over an extended period. Students will maintain individual studio spaces and are expected to work independently, creatively, and critically—challenging both themselves and their peers to explore new ways of thinking and making. The course will include prompts that encourage interdisciplinary approaches to art and culminates in a solo gallery exhibition during the spring, accompanied by a printed book documenting the show. Students will engage in regular critiques with visiting artists and faculty; discuss readings and a range of artists; visit galleries and studios; and participate in the Visual Arts Lecture Series, a program of lectures given by prominent contemporary artists and held at Sarah Lawrence College. Beyond studio work, students will develop skills in presenting their work—including writing artist statements and exhibition proposals, interviewing artists, and documenting their art. A series of professional-practice workshops will further prepare students for life beyond college.

Faculty

• John O’Connor

Open, Concept—Spring | 1 credit

ARTS 3419

This course will center the practical labor that sustains an arts and exhibition program through structured, hands-on work across galleries, studios, and program infrastructure. Students will meet weekly during scheduled class time and complete required supervised hours outside of class supporting exhibition installation and deinstallation, maintenance of shared spaces, documentation and archiving, and assistance with publications and communications, including websites and social media. As part of the course, students will collaboratively curate a student exhibition and contribute to the development of an arts publication or series of small catalogs. Students are responsible for weekly monitoring of the Heimbold Galleries and are expected to assist with and attend artist lectures, workshops, and exhibition openings. The course will emphasize collaboration, care, and professional responsibility, and will provide practical preparation for work in museums, galleries, studios, and arts organizations. Assessment will be based on participation, completion of assigned work hours, and regular written responses to exhibitions on campus, locally, and/or in New York City.

Faculty

• John O’Connor

Open, Studio—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 3358

Note: Also offered as First-Year Studies ARTS 1358.

This course will examine the video image as an artistic medium through the study of contemporary video art. The course will focus on identity and self-exploration. Students will make one work in two phases: first, a video investigation of the self and second, a screen-based installation of that work using projectors, monitors, and found technology. Students will be expected to develop fluency in video as a critical and aesthetic practice, to conduct independent research into the current state of the medium, and to situate their own work within the contemporary field. Projects will be developed through skills-based demonstrations and iterative critique. While there is no access to custom fabrication in this course, students are encouraged to experiment with available equipment and innovative surfaces.

Faculty

• Angela Ferraiolo

Open, Studio—Year | 10 credits

ARTS 3353

This course will be a hands-on, project-based studio that explores special topics in art and technology, asking what “electronic” can be as an artistic medium. Students will experiment with digital and electronic tools as systems and ways of organizing images, stories, bodies, sounds, and spaces. Workshops will introduce concepts such as interactive web narratives, creative coding, image archive systems, interactive systems, sound, sensors, machine learning, augmented reality (AR), and 3D or spatial media. Through short assignments and larger projects, students will combine these skills to develop work rooted in their own questions and interests. The goal is the ability to think fluidly across tools and make strong artistic decisions with electronic media. The course will culminate in one comprehensive yearlong installation that brings together technical experimentation, artistic research, and expanded studio practice.

Faculty

• Sophia Sobers

Open, Studio—Spring | 5 credits

ARTS 3358

This course will examine the video image as an artistic medium through the study of contemporary video art. The course will focus on identity and self-exploration. Students will make one work in two phases: first, a video investigation of the self and second, a screen-based installation of that work using projectors, monitors, and found technology. Students will be expected to develop fluency in video as a critical and aesthetic practice, to conduct independent research into the current state of the medium, and to situate their own work within the contemporary field. Projects will be developed through skills-based demonstrations and iterative critique. While there is no access to custom fabrication in this course, students are encouraged to experiment with available equipment and innovative surfaces.

Faculty

• Angela Ferraiolo

Open, Concept—Spring | 2 credits

ARTS 3356

This course will investigate the forces lying between art and contemporary society. We will begin with two essential theorists of modern technology. First, we will read a part of Paul Virilio’s The Accident, which argues that every technology invents its own undoing. Next, we turn to filmmaker Adam Curtis whose documentary work traces how a cybernetic became an important operating logic of our world. From there, we move to Kate Crawford's Atlas of AI, which grounds that fantasy in the physical and political reality of extraction. Finally, Matteo Pasquinelli's The Eye of the Master gives us the deepest account of what machine intelligence actually is—a form of abstracted labor, a way of seeing that was never neutral.

Faculty

• Angela Ferraiolo

Open, Concept—Spring | 2 credits

ARTS 3375

This course will explore how artists use digital tools and ecological observation to translate the natural world into images, sounds, systems, and experiences. Students will consider nature as a source of patterns, signals, rhythms, structures, and forms of intelligence, while asking how technology changes what we notice, measure, imagine, and represent. Through readings, screenings, discussions, field observation, and short studio exercises, students will examine artists working with environmental data, field recording, mapping, sound, simulation, projection, responsive systems, and speculative ecological narratives. Projects may include sound walks, visual field notes, digital collages, diagrams, maps, scores, or proposals for interactive and immersive works. Over the semester, students will build a personal archive of ecological research and develop a final project or proposal that translates a natural phenomenon through artistic, digital, or electronic means.

Faculty

• Sophia Sobers

Open, Studio—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 3060

Note: Also offered as First-Year Studies ARTS 1060.

Technical exploration, perception, development of ideas, intuition, invention, representation and communication are at the core of this course. We will begin this course in an observational mode, introducing practical information about the fundamentals of painting: color, shape, tone, edge, composition, perspective, and surface. We will paint still lifes and transcribe a masterwork. We will look at the work of both old masters as well as contemporary painters. We will also take a trip to a museum/galleries to look at paintings in the flesh. The course will include demonstrations of materials and techniques, slide presentations, films and videos, reading materials, homework assignments, and group and individual critiques. In the second half of the course, we will complete a series of projects exploring design principles as applied to nonobjective (abstract) artworks. Using paint, with preparatory collages and drawings, we will engage with strategies for utilizing nonobjective imagery towards self-directed content. Each week will bring a new problem, with lessons culminating in independent paintings. Projects will emphasize brainstorming multiple answers to visual problems over selecting the first solution that comes to mind. The last part of the course will be devoted to a personal project. Students will establish their theme of interest, which they will present during conference meetings; then, they will carry out research and preparatory work to develop a series of paintings. Drawings will often be produced in tandem with paintings in order to solve painting problems and illuminate visual ideas. Revisions are a natural and mandatory part of this course. The majority of class time will be spent in a studio/work mode. The studio is a lab where ideas are being worked out and meaning is made.  It is important that students are curious and travel to unexpected places rather than merely relying on existing skills and experiences, instead challenging themselves to openness and progress. The process will be part critical thinking, part intuition, and in large part physical labor. Working rigorously inside and outside of class is required. The goal is to establish the roots of a healthy and generative personal studio practice. Students will also strengthen their knowledge of art history and take into consideration the wider cultural, historical, and social contexts within which art is being made today.

Faculty

• Yevgeniya Baras

Open, Concept—Fall | 2 credits

ARTS 3087

In this course, we will look at ways we can build a collection of inspiration and research. Guided by students’ interests and previous knowledge, we will use this research to work toward a body of work that pushes past expectations. This will take the form of readings, exploratory walks, in-class collaboration, chance, and moving images, among other avenues. This course will be guided by the principle that artists can work intentionally toward research and that there is also unexpected research that happens when you are curious and open. We will discuss and play with strategies for facilitating both. Assignments will consist of weekly prompts and longer projects that incorporate sketchbook brainstorming and planning. We will talk about artists’ collections, and Wunderkammers, also known as cabinets of curiosities, and students will build their own collection over the course of the semester that will culminate in a final project. This course will be a supportive environment for those just starting out, as well as for students with more making experience. Students can expect to end the semester with 6-10 finished pieces.

Faculty

• Niki Kriese

Intermediate, Studio—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 3479

Prerequisite: Introduction to Painting (ARTS 3060) or equivalent

This course will focus on painting at an intermediate level, with an emphasis on working from observation as well as imagination, invention, and material experimentation. This course will start with a foundation of figure drawing and painting to set the stage for further exploration in identity, collaboration, and touch. We will use the body as an opportunity to build skills in proportion and perspective, but also consider it as a location of power and vulnerability. From lectures and independent research, we will learn about traditional and experimental portraiture and think about how we can use both to communicate. We will consider the different roles involved in a work of art (maker, collaborator, subject, viewer, etc.). We will discuss topics such as clothing and fashion, agency, the five senses, and Frankenstein, to name a few. We will begin with weekly prompts and transition to longer projects and conference work, building toward a body of 8-12 completed paintings.

Faculty

• Niki Kriese

Open, Studio—Spring | 5 credits

ARTS 3060

This course will focus on the foundations of making a painting, from learning about basic tools and materials, to value, color, composition, and to how to develop our ideas and communicate them. Drawing is an important part of painting, and we will work on developing an understanding of line, perspective, mark-making, and gesture. We will work from observation, such as still life setups and our environment, as well as invention and imagination. Within these modes of working, we will incorporate and discuss both abstraction and representation, looking at examples and defining these for ourselves. While focusing deeply on the hands-on nature of making, we will keep an eye on the contemporary art world as well as historical examples, through individual research and in-person gallery visits. Participation in individual and group critique is a crucial component, and will strengthen our analytic eye and expand our vocabulary. Critiquing the work of peers’ will be a requirement and we will talk through strategies for the best way to do this. For the first part of the semester, work will consist of in-class exercises and weekly prompts, which are intended to strengthen skills taught in class, as well as challenge students to stretch their imagination and make connections. Later, we will transition to longer projects and conference work, which will be more open but structured by brainstorming, writing, and planning. All of this work will require preparatory sketching, problem solving, and rethinking of your first idea. The classroom will be a laboratory where students can experiment, get feedback, and make bold moves, while building a strong foundation in learning about other artists and artworks that have come before. The goal is to grow as artists by being open to these challenges, being curious, and being willing to go outside your comfort zone.

Faculty

• Niki Kriese

Intermediate, Studio—Spring | 5 credits

ARTS 3036

Prerequisite: experience with drawing as well as painting; Introduction to Painting (ARTS 3060) or equivalent

This course will be a project-based painting intensive. Students will be given specific prompts, which will lead to investigations and experimentation in painting. Prompts will result in students generating work that is theirs. Each assignment will encourage visual and personal research in preparation for making. Technical exploration, perception, development of ideas, intuition, invention, representation, and communication are at the core of this course. We will have a chance to explore different ways of working with acrylic paint and expand on the idea of what painting is by integrating alternative painting materials. The paintings made will consider the meaning of materials; transformation of materials through touch; and working with found, as well as repurposed, materials. Paintings may be three-dimensional and may or may not stay within a rectangle. Curiosity and giving yourself permission to travel to unexpected places, rather than merely relying on skills and experiences which are part of you already, is an important part of this course. This course is for people who are interested in surprising themselves! Participants will engage in critical group dialogues and individual critiques to hone the fundamental aspects of their work and deepen their understanding of contemporary art practices. This course is for people who are interested in learning to work both representationally and abstractly. In the context of this course, abstraction is grounded in specificity, research, and in looking for personal, particular ways to communicate. Classwork will be accompanied by the creation of a separate group of paintings, conference work. This intermediate course is a rigorous painting environment, where students will be producing a lot of work: sketches, collages, and variations on paintings. Students will also be considering how to best install work in order for the work to communicate most clearly.

Faculty

• Yevgeniya Baras

Open, Studio—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 3113

This course seeks to consider and engage with photography from a few angles. The first, and perhaps narrowest, will be as introduction to the fundamentals of photography using digital cameras, Photoshop, and inkjet printing. No previous experience is necessary, but those with experience should feel welcome too—the technical bases will be covered and kept in mind, but not lingered on. More substantially, students will marry these processes and techniques to their own concerns and impulses. Through readings, lectures, and field trips, we will look at how others have employed photography as a means for expression, enquiry, and experiment. And via prompts, discussion, and mutual support, we will chart a path to figure out what that might look like for us individually. The last angle is perhaps the widest yet most difficult to see and address. It concerns the current state of photography in the general scheme of things. The extent to which it is folded into our early 21st century lives provides much convenience, joy, and productive chaos. Yet these are accompanied by other realities: surveillance, fakery, and the flattening effect wrought by the weight of endless images. As people hoping to use cameras to express ourselves, what about these conditions works for us? What works against us? What should we do?

Faculty

• Nicholas Relph

Open, Studio—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 3153

Definition of photography: The art or process of producing images by the action of radiant energy, and especially light, on a sensitive surface (such as film or an optical sensor). First known use: 1839. Etymology: The word “photography” was created from the Greek roots φωτός (phōtos), genitive of φως (phōs), “light” and γραφή (graphé), “representation by means of lines” or “drawing, together” meaning “drawing with light.”

This course is designed for students who wish to pursue their own projects through a close analysis and exploration of analog photographic and digital processes, formally and conceptually. The course is designed to help students think “photographically” and to make art through a conceptually photographic model or framework. While we are in the midst of/already passed a technological shift in photography—from “wet” processes that use negatives and tangible film to virtual and electronic processes, we will primarily be reading texts about and looking at artists who work with “old school” photography. The use of all technically possible and theoretically appropriate media is encouraged. We will have technical demonstrations, group and individual critiques, PowerPoint, video, and film presentations of, as well as reading discussions about, historical and contemporary photography and art that deal with issues surrounding “documentary” and “art” photography; representation; narrative; the personal as political; the technical and conceptual history of photography; indexicality and the heterotopic; and memory and fiction. Students are encouraged to utilize whatever media is conceptually appropriate for their ideas. Students can use iPhones, film and digital cameras, scanners, Xerox machines, Adobe Photoshop, found photographs, archives, text, and anything that is conceptually photographic.

Faculty

• elin o'Hara slavick

Open, Studio—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 3128

This course will be an introduction to visual/photographic culture, studio art practices and theories, and photography in general through formal and conceptual experimentation. This course is designed to introduce students to: basic black and white darkroom practices—while encouraging play, chance and accidental miracles in the darkroom through solarization, chemical interactions, and image manipulation; alternative processes (like cyanotypes); pushing the formal limits of digital image production; and a critical understanding of historical and contemporary photographic theory and production. The course is designed to help students expand their notions of photography through trial and error. There is no such thing as failure—only research (or experimentation). The use of all technically possible media will be encouraged. We will have several group critiques and PowerPoint/video/film presentations of, and reading discussions about, historical and contemporary photography and art that engages with experimentation and pushing the boundaries of what constitutes “photography.”

Faculty

• elin o'Hara slavick

Open, Studio—Spring | 5 credits

ARTS 3113

This course seeks to consider and engage with photography from a few angles. The first, and perhaps narrowest, will be as introduction to the fundamentals of photography using digital cameras, Photoshop, and inkjet printing. No previous experience is necessary, but those with experience should feel welcome too—the technical bases will be covered and kept in mind, but not lingered on. More substantially, students will marry these processes and techniques to their own concerns and impulses. Through readings, lectures, and field trips, we will look at how others have employed photography as a means for expression, enquiry, and experiment. And via prompts, discussion, and mutual support, we will chart a path to figure out what that might look like for us individually. The last angle is perhaps the widest yet most difficult to see and address. It concerns the current state of photography in the general scheme of things. The extent to which it is folded into our early 21st century lives provides much convenience, joy, and productive chaos. Yet these are accompanied by other realities: surveillance, fakery, and the flattening effect wrought by the weight of endless images. As people hoping to use cameras to express ourselves, what about these conditions works for us? What works against us? What should we do?

Faculty

• Nicholas Relph

Open, Studio—Spring | 5 credits

ARTS 3118

Over its relatively short history, photography has often relied on well-worn conventions—the landscape, the portrait, the snapshot. As in all artistic mediums, every advance has built on what has come before. In this course, we will explore how these tropes have morphed in recent years, and we will look at some newer forms such as the typology and the directorial mode. Through discussion and practice, we will work towards creating images that mutate and reimagine these genres. Artists that we will look at will include Bernd and Hilla Becher, Michael Schmidt, Allan Sekula, and Jeff Wall. Others to be studied include Larry Sultan, Diana Markosian, and Tarrah Krajnak. Students will be encouraged to question their own picture making habits and to embrace experimentation as a means of pushing beyond the familiar.

Faculty

• Joel Sternfeld

Open, Studio—Spring | 5 credits

ARTS 3111

In this critical look at the relationship between fine art photography and narrative forms, students will study historic and contemporary artists whose work creates a narrative, oftentimes through written word. Students will simultaneously produce their own original work. Students will also gain a technical understanding of digital and film photography, photo editing, and inkjet printing.

Faculty

• Joel Sternfeld

Open, Studio—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 3201

This course will explore the fundamentals of printmaking. Students will engage with both traditional print technologies from relief, intaglio, and lithography to newer techniques like silkscreen, stencil, and digital applications. Students will gain an appreciation for the history of printmaking and its relationship to mediation, translation, and reproduction. Concepts and practices such as accumulation, appropriation, cutting, layering, mapping, masking, repetition, registration, sequence, and seriality will be covered. Experimentation and collaboration will be encouraged throughout the semester. Students will be required to create a portfolio of work that demonstrates a basic understanding of techniques learned in the course, make a notebook for recording technical information, ideas and experiments, and engage in group critiques. While primarily a studio-based class, the course will incorporate lectures, readings, and an off-site visit to a print collection.

Faculty

• Amy Pryor

Open, Studio—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 3212

This course will be an opening foray into the possibilities of painterly printmaking and experimental processes that merge printmaking with painting and drawing. The course will also cover fundamentals, such as basic drawing and color mixing. As a means to explore an individual idea, students will investigate a wide range of possibilities offered by monoprint techniques. The course will experiment with inks, watercolor, stencils, multiple plates, and images altered in sequence. Students will begin to develop a method to investigate meaning, or content, through the techniques of painterly printmaking. There will be an examination of various strategies that fluctuate between specific in-class assignments and individual studio work. Class projects will be supplemented with slide presentations, reading materials, film clips and video screenings, group critiques, and gallery visits.

Faculty

• Susan Ziegler

Open, Concept—Spring | 2 credits

ARTS 3211

This course will explore the principles of color theory through the material and conceptual practice of quilt making. Through hands-on textile projects, foundational quilt making techniques, including fabric selection, cutting, piecing, hand and machine sewing, will be introduced alongside investigations into color interaction, perception, composition, and meaning. Drawing on writings and theories of Isaac Newton, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Johannes Itten, and Josef Albers, the course will examine color as both a physical phenomenon and a visual language. Readings and discussions will connect historical color theory to the work of textile artists and quiltmakers, including Anni Albers, the Gee's Bend Quilters, Nancy Crow, Rosie Lee Tompkins, Faith Ringgold, Bisa Butler, Yvonne Wells, and Sheila Hicks. Particular attention will be given to the ways color operates within textile traditions, contemporary fiber art, abstraction, improvisation, and visual storytelling. Studio exercises will focus on value, contrast, color harmony, color relativity, optical effects, and spatial relationships. Quilt making will serve as a framework for exploring how color functions across disciplines and cultures, while encouraging experimentation with pattern, structure, and materiality. Critiques, readings, and artist case studies will support the development of a deeper understanding of color as an expressive and communicative element in visual art. By the end of the semester, students will have a working knowledge of fundamental color theory and basic patchwork techniques, as well as a series of textile studies that integrate technical skill, visual inquiry, and creative experimentation.

Faculty

• Amy Pryor

Open, Studio—Spring | 5 credits

ARTS 3226

In this course, we will explore narrative through printmaking and bookmaking. Students will learn monochromatic and multi-color relief printmaking methods. The course will consider various storytelling methods, combining imagery and text to communicate and shape the narrative. Working with linoleum and woodblock, students will learn methods of carving and printing, along with key principles of design such as mark-making, value structure, color relationships, and composition. Bookbinding methods will include stab binding, pamphlet stitch, and Coptic stitch binding. Students will produce both one-of-a-kind artist books and an edition that can be reproduced and shared. We will consider the craft and conceptual foundations of bookbinding, artists’ books, and printmaking, taking inspiration from both historical sources and contemporary practices. In addition to studio time, the course will include technical demonstrations, critiques, and field trips.

Faculty

• Susan Ziegler

Open, Concept—Spring | 2 credits

ARTS 3425

Note: Open to beginners as well as more experienced students.

This course will explore the role of chance operations as a generative tool in mixed-media drawing and printmaking. Working with a range of materials such as ink, charcoal, paint, monotype printmaking, and collage, students will employ unpredictable techniques to open up the process of art making and expand the possibilities of visual expression. We will take inspiration from historical models such as Dadaism and Surrealism, the innovations of artists in the 1960s and 1970s, as well as contemporary approaches. Students will work with automatism, the playful Surrealist drawing and painting techniques of frottage and decalcomania, and the printmaking processes trace monotype to develop imagery in unexpected ways. Students will draw subject matter from observation, process-based practices, and the imagination. Students will work collaboratively and individually, experimenting with a variety of methodologies and ultimately designing their own chance operations to create a body of work. The course will begin with small works on paper and move into large scale pieces.

Faculty

• Susan Ziegler

Sophomore and Above, Studio—Spring | 5 credits

ARTS 3208

This course will explore traditional intaglio printmaking techniques, as well as contemporary and advanced applications. Originating in the 15th century with the engravings of Martin Schongauer and Albrecht Dürer, intaglio techniques continue to evolve today. Intaglio is a method of printing in which ink is forced into ink-holding recesses on a plate, the surface wiped clean and run through an etching press to transfer the image. Non-acid and acid techniques can be applied to create an image. Techniques explored in this course will include dry point, embossing, machine engraving, hard-ground, soft-ground, aquatint, sugar-lift, open bite, and masking. Students will practice plate preparation, ink mixing, wiping, paper preparation, damp-packing, registration, multi-plate printing, and chine collé to produce consistent multiples. Requirements will include creating a portfolio of editioned prints, participation in group critiques, readings, and a site visit to a museum or print publisher. Artist’s work examined in this course will include: Baeza, Barney, Bearden, Bourgeois, C. Brown, Cassatt, Cutler, Dix, Doig, Dunham, Dürer, Eisenman, Gallagher, Goya, Picasso, Schutz, K. Smith, and Van Rijn.

Faculty

• Amy Pryor

Open, Studio—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 3305

Note: Also offered as First-Year Studies ARTS 1305.

This introductory course will explore the fundamentals of sculpture, with an emphasis on how objects function in space and the connections between two-dimensional and three-dimensional forms. This course will focus on the process of building and constructing and working with varied materials and tools. Students will explore various modes of making, binding, building, fastening, and molding, using wood, cardboard, plaster, and found materials. Using Richard Serra’s Verb List as inspiration, students will use verbs as a guide for building. Technical instruction will be given in the fundamentals of working with hand tools, as well as other elemental forms of building. This course will include an introduction to the critique process, as well as thematic readings with each assignment. Alongside studio work, the course will look at historical and contemporary artists, such as Jessica Stockholder, Martin Puryear, Judith Scott, Rachel Whiteread, Simone Leigh, Louise Nevelson, Alexander Calder, Donald Judd, Robert Morris, Eva Hesse, and Louise Bourgeois, among others.

Faculty

• Katie Bell

Open, Concept—Fall | 2 credits

ARTS 3357

How have artists approached the object, materiality, texture, and thing-ness in video? How have systems and practices been articulated, elaborated, described, deconstructed, and torn apart on the screen? What does it mean to tackle this ugly dynamic through the language and sensibilities of art making as opposed to the formal languages of cinema or journalism? In this course we will closely observe seminal and semi-forgotten exemplars of these messy materialistic tendencies in video art. Based around screenings and discussions, the course will culminate in a public screening series of student works.

Faculty

• Joseph Buckley

Open, Studio—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 3354

This course will explore the potential of figuration within contemporary sculptural practice. What can we achieve by incorporating a humanoid figure into our sculptural works? How far can the human form be pushed while remaining legible? Who controls and is invested in this legibility? What do histories of figuration have in common with objectification and dehumanization? And can we extract utility, today, from these dynamics? Alongside material demonstrations, lectures, readings, and critiques, we will investigate unpopular media in order to explore the work of contemporary artists alongside ideas and genres such as the uncanny valley, horror, science fiction, and more. 

Faculty

• Joseph Buckley

Open, Studio—Fall | 5 credits

ARTS 3362

This sculpture course will be a chance to explore metals over the course of the semester. Beginners are welcome, and will be trained to use the metalshop and woodshop. Students who have taken previous courses with metalshop training can deepen their practice in sculptural space and form through learning new intermediate techniques. Students will use these new tools to create sculptural work that challenges their prior experience in scale and material. Class time will include slideshows on contemporary art, discussions on topics of context, time, and material meaning, as well as a trip to New York City to view exhibitions. Emphasis will be on developing personal projects and problem solving. Other material use will be allowed and encouraged in assignments—including performance, video, and installation.

Faculty

• Jessica Segall

Open, Studio—Spring | 5 credits

ARTS 3319

Layered, built, found, saved, applied, collected, arranged, salvaged...Jean Dubuffet coined the term “assemblage” in 1953, referring to collages that he made using butterfly wings. Including found material in a work of art not only brings the physical object but also its embedded narrative. In this course, we will explore the various ways in which the found object can affect a work of art and its history dating back to the early 20th century. We will look at historical and contemporary artists, such as Joseph Cornell, Robert Rauschenberg, Hannah Höch, Betye Saar, Richard Tuttle, Rachel Harrison, and Leonardo Drew. This course will tackle various approaches, challenging the notions of “What is an art material?” and “How can the everyday inform the creative process?”

Faculty

• Katie Bell

Open, Studio—Spring | 5 credits

ARTS 3389

Once upon a time, sculptors struggled in their studios with wood and clay and felt and wire. They still do, of course, but now we have access to tools and technologies that until very recently were the preserve solely of science fiction. We can scan a physical object and remake it wholly and digitally, simulated within a digital modelling environment. Inversely, we can take an object that has only ever existed as series of digital coordinates and remake them as a singular physical, plastic object in the real world. Privileging the real, this course of study will explore and investigate these newly available strategies for artists working in sculpture. How are other artists, at the cutting edge, dealing with these technologies? What can we achieve when working with these new tools?

Faculty

• Joseph Buckley

Open, Concept—Spring | 2 credits

ARTS 3276

Over the last 50 years, ecofeminist artists have used means such as photography, performance, and community engagement as a way to approach ecological crises, using the body as a site of resistance, kinship, and violence. Methods such as deep listening, endurance performance, slow cinema, foraging and gathering, cartography, and communal urban gardens are just a few of the approaches of ecofeminist artists. These artworks address ecological issues of sustainability, extraction, and marginalization that impress both upon vulnerable bodies and the nonhuman world. Many of these works fall within an economy of care, which we will examine as gendered and racialized work. This course is an art class, with an emphasis on reading and discussion. This course will research and discuss artists whose work combines feminist and ecological themes. We will look, listen, and read seminal works of artists, with a focus on primary sources such as artist and theorist writings, artwork, and interviews—and with a goal in mind to synthesize and respond to this subject in our own works. Each week will introduce a new topic or category of ecofeminist methodology. Each week will include a discussion board and a thematic exercise. The course will culminate in a final project.

Faculty

• Jessica Segall

Open, Studio—Spring | 5 credits

ARTS 3318

This sculpture course will familiarize students with tools and methods in woodworking, metalwork, and clay. This practical knowledge will be put into a series of assignments considering interspecies design and using skills as a sculptor to make functional form with outdoor sculpture and ecological stewardship in mind. In this course, we will look at artists who work on constructed material form and public sculpture. We will also look at the merging of landscape architecture and gardens toward a holistic approach to building site-specific sculpture and ideate toward a proposal for public works. 

Faculty

• Jessica Segall