ARTH 210
Intro to Latin American and Latinx Art: Contradictions & Continuities, Postcolonial to the Present Fall 2023
Division I Difference, Power, and Equity

Class Details

This course introduces students to the breadth and richness of the visual arts in Latin American and U.S. Latinx art. The course begins in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, when artists and writers first began formulating the notion of an art “native” to Latin America, and continues through the ever-expanding cultural expressions developed throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. Through a contextual approach, we will pay particular attention to Latin American artists’ shifting relationships to race, class, and gender issues, their affiliations with political and revolutionary ideals, and their critical stance vis-à-vis the European avant-gardes. Similarly, we will analyze the emergence and development of Latinx artistic practices in the postwar U.S., tracing these artists’ own exploration of race, class, and gender dynamics. This class introduces Latin American and Latinx artistic practices and scholarship to enable students to develop a critical understanding of the historical specificity of diverse movements, their relation to canonical definitions of modern and contemporary art, and their relevance to issues of colonialism, nationalism, revolutionary politics, and globalization. We will consider a vast array of genres–from painting and sculpture to printmaking, photography, conceptual, installation, and performance art–and will draw from artist statements, manifestos, and secondary interpretive texts to consider both the impetus behind these dynamic artworks and their lasting legacies.
The Class: Format: lecture
Limit: 30
Expected: 30
Class#: 1330
Grading: yes pass/fail option, yes fifth course option
Requirements/Evaluation: midterm exam and non-cumulative final exam, short writing assignments, attendance, and active participation
Prerequisites: none
Enrollment Preferences: if overenrolled, waitlisted students will be selected on a lottery
Distributions: Division I Difference, Power, and Equity
DPE Notes: This course fulfills DPE requirements through historical, visual, and thematic analyses that explore the cultural biases and geopolitical forces that have restricted the exposure of Latin American and Latinx art in the canon of Western art history. The course also centers on contextualizing Latin American and Latinx artistic practices and analyzing them in relation to race, gender, and class dynamics, and to issues of colonialism, nationalism, revolutionary politics, and globalization.
Attributes: ARTH post-1800
LATS Countries of Origin + Transnationalism Elect

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