Seminar in the History of Art, Architecture, and Design
Examination of historical method in art, design, and/or architecture, focusing on periods and problems determined by the research interest of the faculty member leading the seminar. Emphasizes critical reading and viewing and direct tutorial guidance. Additional work required of students taking the graduate version. Limited to 15.
Spring 2014 · The Art Museum: History, Theory, Controversy
Art museums are powerful and contested institutions. They are also innovative sites of architectural and artistic practice. From the exhibitionary complex of the nineteenth century to the experiential complex of today, this course investigates the art museum from historical and contemporary perspectives, striking a balance between theoretical investigation and case studies of recent exhibitions and museum buildings. Where and why did the concept of the public art museum emerge, and how have its functions changed over time? How do art museums continue to shape our definitions of what art is? How have they responded to recent critiques of the self-described 'universal' museum and to claims for the ethical display of ill-gotten artifacts or the restitution of such objects as Greek vases and bronzes looted from Benin? And why is the Euro-American art museum so compelling a model that it has spread around the globe? To address these and other questions, we will also go behind the scenes. Visits to local museums and discussions with curators are an essential component of the course.
Readings
- [McClellan] = McClellan, Andrew. Art Museum from Boullee to Bilbao . University of California Press, 2008. ISBN: 9780520251267.
- [Preziosi and Farago] Grasping the World:The Idea of the Museum . Edited by Donald Preziosi and Claire Farago. Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2004. ISBN: 9780754608356.
- [Rothfield] = Unsettling Sensation: Arts–Policy Lessons from the Brooklyn Museum of Art Controversy . Edited by Lawrence Rothfield. Rutgers University Press, 2001. ISBN: 9780813529356.
- Thakurta, Tapati Guha. “The Demands of Independence: From a National Exhibition to a National Museum.” In Monuments, Objects, Histories: Institutions of Art in Colonial and Postcolonial India . Permanent Black, 2004, pp. 175–204. ISBN: 9780231129985.
- Wilson, Fred. “Mining the Museum: Artists Look at Museums, Museums Look at Themselves.” In Mining the Museum: An Installation by Fred Wilson . Edited by Lisa Corrin. New Press, 1994, pp. 1–22. ISBN: 9781565841086.
- [Preziosi and Farago] Clifford, James. “Histories of the Tribal and the Modern (1985).” pp. 636–62.
- Altshuler, Bruce. “1989: Magiciens de la Terre.” In Biennials and Beyond : Exhibitions that Made Art History, 1962–2002 . Edited by Bruce Altshuler. Phaidon Press, 2013, pp. 281–94. ISBN: 9781409954828.
- Appiah, Kwame Anthony. “Whose Culture Is It, Anyway?” In Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers. W. W. Norton, 2006, pp. 115–35. ISBN: 9780393061550.
- Director’s Forward and Davis, Bostwick, et al. “A New World Imagined: Artistic Innovation and Inspiration in the Americas.” In A New World Imagined: Art of the Americas . MFA Publications, 2010. ISBN: 9780878467600. [Skim rest of book]
- SES #: 11 · TOPICS: Lightning Talks · READINGS: No readings.
- [Preziosi and Farago] Haacke, Hans. “Museums, Managers of Consciousness (1987).” pp. 400–12.
- Wallis, Brian. “The Art of Big Business.” Art in America , June 1986, 28–33.
- McClellan, Andrew. Art Museum from Boullee to Bilbao . University of California Press, 2008. ISBN: 9780520251267.
Prerequisites & course information
Subject meets with 4.608 Prereq: Permission of instructor Acad Year 2027-2028: Not offered Acad Year 2028-2029: U (Spring) 3-0-9 units. HASS-A Can be repeated for credit.
Sources
- Course catalogue ↗2026–2027
- MIT OpenCourseWare ↗Spring 2014
- MIT OCW readings ↗
- MIT OCW syllabus ↗
- Historical MIT OpenCourseWare offering. Named reading entries and schedule topics are automatically extracted from the linked source pages.