HKUB11051U Contemporary Art and Introduction to Art Historical Praxis

Volume 2017/2018
Education

History of Art

Content

The course will provide insight into the international contemporary art tendencies and its place in today´s societies. The so-called contemporary art covers (and has always covered) not only painting and sculpture, but also various kinds of other media and materials like sound, nstallation, performance, architecture, telecommunication tools, to the digital and biological ‘code’ themselves and beyond. 

As in other disciplines, there are no common rules within the contemporary art studies existing, upon which the diversity of contemporary art may be diagrammed universally. It has to do with the fact that the modern- and contemporary art and the visual and cultural practices in general are no longer dealing exclusively with images of a temporary finite nature. Their processual structure demands specific sensibility for the description, appraisal and presentation of the related performative, installative, film- and videographic or (hyper-)textual – material. 

The emphasis will therefore lay on the introducing, contextualization and verbalization of the works and projects of the past ca. 40 years. Through written and oral exercises as well as discussions, the course is designed to cultivate the ability to articulate the experiences of the contemporary art practices on the basis of specific artworks. The course consists of lectures and excursions in order to set the stage for discussions and student exercises of written and verbal kind.

Program

ART HISTORY AND ITS THRESHOLD: PROCESS ARTS

1. Introduction and allocation of tasks

2. Conceptual Turn?

3. SMK-excursion

4. From Photo to Painting

VISUAL CULTURE AND ITS TRIPLE BOUND: MIRRORS, FRAMES, IMMEDIACY

5. Process Art & Closed Circuit (Video)

6. ARKEN-excursion

7. (Self-)Observation and (Neo-)Avant-garde (performance, installation and gender)

8. Margins moved to the Middle. Process Arts and Visual Studies

TRACKING BACK AND LOOK AHEAD: HERITAGE AND ENVIRONMENT

9. Envisioning the post visual condition (Globalization, Public space, Site-Specific)

10. Hyper-text in hyper-chaos? Net Art

 

Some readings:

Stalabrass, J 2006, Contemporary Art: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press, Oxford

O’Doherty, B, Inside the White Cube. The Ideology of the Gallery Space (Expanded Edition); University of California Press & Berkeley & Los Angeles, London, 1991 (1. publ. in Artforum 1976

Hawker, R 2009, Idiom Post-medium: Richter Painting Photography. In Oxford Art Journal no 32, vol. 2, pp. 263–280

Hopkins, D 2006, ‘Re-thinking the Duchamp Effect’. In Jones, A (ed), A Companion to Contemporary Art  Since 1945. Blackwell, Malden, Mass., pp. 145-163

Nochlin, L 1971, ‘Why There Have Been No Great Women Artists?’ In Art News 69 (January) (Reprint in: L. Nochlin, Women, Art, and Power and Other Essays; Harper & Row, New York 1988

Belting, H 2009, ‘Contemporary Art as Global Art. A Critical Estimate’. In Belting H & Buddensieg, A (eds), The Global Art World, Cantz, Ostfildern

  • Category
  • Hours
  • Exam
  • 84
  • Guidance
  • 1
  • Lectures
  • 42
  • Preparation
  • 293
  • Total
  • 420
Credit
15 ECTS
Type of assessment
Other