Art History 155/ Asian Studies 155
ART OF CHINA SYLLABUS
Winter
2002 – Block 6
Prof.
Tamara Bentley
Objectives: to learn to analyze and appreciate
visual qualities; to learn more about the history and culture of China; to
investigate a variety of art historical methodologies including social art
history and semiotics; to improve one’s writing, debating, and presentation
skills.
Course Description:
This course provides an introduction to Chinese art,
focusing on time periods of particular cultural significance: the Han, Six
Dynasties, Song, and Ming. Other
time periods will be considered as well but in less depth. Media covered include bronzes, tomb art, paintings, prints
and porcelains. In large part, we
will be investigating interrelationships between art, literature, religious
philosophy, and politics.
There will be a mid-term exam on Feb. 26th
covering the period from the Zhou dynasty to the Tang; and a final March 13th
covering the period from the Five Dynasties to the modern era.
There will be one day each full week allotted for reading and research,
and a 2-person presentation the following day on a reading or a group of
objects. Following each reading day
there will also be a jointly-written 2-3 page paper due in conjunction with your
presentation. There will also be numerous “reading response” assignments,
where you write a paragraph or two in response to specific questions about your
readings. At the close of the class
there will also be an individual research paper due (13 pages).
I encourage you to take an active role in your own
learning. It is useful to go over
your thinking and writing with people, and to ask librarians for help locating
sources relating to your research. Please
also come see me anytime you have questions or concerns.
Required Texts:
A large coursepack can be picked up at the Bookstore.
Occasionally you will also receive handouts in class.
Books which may be useful to you for images, for additional information,
or for background reading have also been placed on closed reserve at Tutt
library.
Evaluation:
The three presentations accompanied by short papers are
each worth 8% (three in total= 24%); the midterm is worth 15%; the final
research paper 25%; and the final exam 20%. In-class participation, attendance,
and reading response assignments count for 16% in all.
How you can reach me and how I can reach you:
I am often in my office, Packard Hall Room #203, in the afternoons so please come see me spontaneously, make an appointment if you like, e-mail me (above) or call me to talk (389-6368) if you feel lost, if you have any questions at all, or if you need suggestions as to what to read as you pursue your research. You can also call me at home before 9 pm if you are unable to reach me at the office (576-2743). If you get an answering machine there, I will call you back within the next day. Remember I am here to help you, so please ask for help anytime.
The secretary in the art dept., Sandy DeRhodo (389-6366),
has extra syllabi if you lose yours, and she can also inform on the status of
class, if for weather-related reasons or some other reason it is unclear if we
are holding class.
You must leave me an e-mail address which you check daily where I can reach you. Failing that, please leave me a phone number where you can be reached.
Course Policies:
Papers and Exams:
If an exam or paper due-date is missed for health or other reasons, a
doctor’s note or other documentation will be required.
Late papers lose one half a grade per day late. (I.e. a B+ becomes a B if
one day late. If turned in not the next day, but the day after that, a paper of
B+ quality would become a B-.)
Attendance and participation grade:
Any unexcused absences will lower your course grade by one half
(i.e. B+ to B). To be excused, a student must contact me by phone or e-mail
me the day of the absence or preferably before and explain the reason for the
absence. I will get back to you.
If there is an acceptable reason for the absence it will not affect your
grade; otherwise, as indicated, your grade will be lowered by one half.
Students are responsible for material they have missed for
any reason. Students should be
prepared to take their exams on the final day of each block, unless an exception
is arranged well ahead.
Your class participation grade considers a variety of
things: your thoughtfulness in posing questions and in presenting readings, your
apparent knowledge of all readings, and your involvement in discussions in
class.
The use of bronzes in the Shang and Zhou dynasties
Early Confucianism and Daoism in the Zhou dynasty
Six Dynasties Neo-Daoism, particularly the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove
Choose your final research paper topic
Have read: Audrey Spiro, Contemplating the Ancients, pp.1-121.
Prepare small group presentations and short papers on early Chinese art in relation to religious philosophy. Choose from: Zhou dynasty bronzes, Han mirrors, Mawangdui tomb, the Nelson sarcophagus, Gu Kaizhi’s paintings. This day is also a reading day for Han and Six Dynasties art and philosophy.
Have read: Franz Michael, China Through the Ages, pp.68-101.
(Group A) John Blofeld, Taoism: The Road to Immortality, pp. 1-18.
(Group B) Tu Wei-ming, Humanity and Self-Cultivation: Essays in Confucian Thought, pp.5-16.
Group presentations on early Chinese art topics.
Lecture on Tang court painting and Tang poetry
Have read: Craig Clunas, Art in China, pp.45-63; Arthur Waley, The Life and Times of Po Chu-i, pp.11-35.
Review of Zhou through Tang art, with stress on Han and Six
Dynasties art and religion
Have read: Peter Bol, This Culture of Ours, pp.32-75; Robert Harrist, The Embodied Image, pp.2-27.
Midterm exam (Zhou through Tang)
Prepare for Friday presentation on two different approaches
to your final paper topic. This day is also a reading day for your final paper
and for Northern Song art and philosophy.
Have read: Alfreda Murck, Poetry and Painting in Song China, pp.51-72.
Thurs. Feb. 28
9:15 Tutt Library 058// TLC Classroom 1
Sara Withee:Powerpoint Tutorial.
Five Dynasties and Northern Song monumental landscape painting; scholar art
Have read: Wen C. Fong, Possessing the Past, pp.120-137; Susan Bush, The Chinese Literati on Painting, pp.29-86.
Presentations on two different approaches to your final research topic.
Lecture further addressing dynamics between court and
scholars in Northern Song art; also Southern Song court art and zen art.
Have read: Michel Beurdeley, The Chinese Collector Through the Centuries, pp. 61-74 and pp.83-86; Laurence Sickman and Alexander Soper, The Art and Architecture of China, pp.243-271.
Yuan political protest in art
Have read: William Watson, The Arts of China 900-1620, pp.138-160; Michael Baxandall, Painting and Experience in Fifteenth Century Italy, pp.1-27.
The early and middle Ming
Have read: Michel Foucault, The Order of Things, pp. 125-165; (half group A; half group B) Anne DeCoursey Clapp The Painting of T’ang Yin, pp.47-100; (Group C) Anne DeCoursey Clapp, Wen Chengming: The Ming Artist and Antiquity, pp.27-34.
Late Ming
Dong Qichang, Wu Bin, Chen Hongshou
Have read: (Group C) James Cahill, The Compelling Image, pp.70-105; (Groups A and B) Wai-kam Ho, ed. The Century of Tung Ch’i-ch’ang, pp.42-54; Craig Clunas, Superfluous Things, pp.40-90.
Prepare presentation of your final paper. On Friday March 8 hand in 2-3 page 3-sentence per paragraph outline of your final paper and an annotated bibliography. This is also a reading day to read for your final paper.
Presentations of final papers nearing completion.
Lecture on Dong Qichang; early trade contact; notions of
“qing” and individualism.
No reading is due.
Final papers are due.
Lecture on Modern Chinese art and Communism
Have read: John MacKenzie, Orientalism: History, theory, and the arts, pp.20-42; D.E. Mungello, The Great Encounter of China and the West 1500-1800, pp.27-35 and pp.75-82; Nigel Cameron, Barbarians and Mandarins, pp.195-217 and pp.237-249.
review
Weds. March 13
Final exam, Five dynasties through Modern China with emphasis on Song scholars and middle and late Ming commodification.