ARTH 095. Cracking Visual Codes

How do we understand the visual? What ways of seeing do we engage in and what kinds of questions do we ask when analyzing paintings, buildings, sculptures, ceramics, photographs, or prints? How do we crack the visual codes specific to images, objects, and structures of a given time and place? This colloquium will explore various approaches to the interpretation of the visual arts through the critical reading of important texts of the discipline and writings that propose or challenge a variety of analytic strategies. Students will directly engage in the interpretive process by researching, writing, and presenting on a work of art or architecture in the Philadelphia area, an exercise that will assist the exploration of questions central to their own interest in the study of visual culture. Through this course students will acquire the skills for interpreting images we encounter every day-such as advertisements, logos, icons, and other forms of visual culture.
This course is only open to Art and Art History majors and Art History minors.
Humanities.
Writing course.
1 credit.
Catalog chapter: Art and Art History: Art History
Department website: http://www.swarthmore.edu/art

Access the class schedule to search for sections.

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