IS233

The histories of sculpture, painting, drawing, and print have been shaped by the idea of a set of rules or expectations. In ancient Egypt, the canon dictated proper proportions and forms and made for consistency in representation for thousands of years while in ancient Greece, the canon established by Polykleitos created the ideal in human representation. The system was perpetuated by art education: master artists trained their apprentices according to these rules. When formal art institutions emerged in Tang dynasty China and 17th-century Europe, the process was further codified. The establishment of art academies as part of colonial efforts exported the rules and expectations of imperial powers around the globe. Rules, however, are made to be broken and artists have responded to these expectations in a myriad of ways: some embracing them, some perfecting them, some challenging them, and some forcefully rejecting them. The History of Studio Arts looks at the establishment of rules - why they developed in the way that they did and their cultural underpinnings - and then at the processes of negotiation and rejection that followed. The course material will be presented chronologically with the bulk of the material from the 15th through 21st centuries.

Pacific Northwest College of Art

Portland