Constantine Verevis
12 points - 2 hours per week plus 2-hour weekly screening - Second semester - Clayton - Prohibitions: VSA4290, CRT4270
Objectives On successful completion of this course students should have gained an understanding of the principal relationships between the field of cultural and critical theory and the visual field; applied cultural and critical theories to a range of visual works; become familiar with a number of contemporary discourses of visuality; developed the confidence to discuss the historical positions and theoretical constructions of visuality; and accumulated the critical and expressive resources to write clear, concise, accurate and independent essays on topics related to this subject.
Synopsis This subject addresses the relation between cultural and critical theory and the visual field. The range of visual products whose theorisation will be considered includes photography and film, painting, sculpture, architecture, performance, non-Western visual practices, and common objects. Discussion will take place on the historical positions and the theoretical construction of these products with reference to the discourses of modernism and modernity, postmodernism, the body, totalitarianism/post-totalitarianism, museology and institutions, and 'the everyday'.
Assessment Essay (3000 words): 30% - Longer essay (6000 words): 60% - Seminar participation: 10%
Recommended texts
Buck-Morss S The dialectics of seeing: Walter Benjamin and
the arcades project MIT
Cooke L and Wollen P (eds) Visual display: Culture beyond appearances
Bay Press
Crary J Techniques of the observer: On vision and modernity in the
nineteenth century MIT
Friedberg A Window shopping: Cinema and the postmodern
U California P
Jay M Downcast eyes: The denigration of vision in twentieth century French
thought U California P
Petro P (ed.) Fugitive images: From photography to video
Indiana U P