ARTH 365 Studies in 17th- and 18th-Century Art and Architecture

• Mondays, 14:45-17:15 pm
• Course delivery TBA
• Instructor: Laura Enriquez

The goal of this course is to offer a general introduction to key themes and current historiographic trends in the study of Dutch and Flemish art, 1600-1700. The course will focus on Northern European painting, although other artistic manifestations may be considered, and connections with other traditions will be made. 

The course will examine major artistic developments in seventeenth-century Dutch painting, in relationship with a broader cultural, intellectual and sociopolitical context. It will cover the emergence and consolidation of pictorial conventions such as still life painting, Dutch portraiture, genre scenes, and landscape painting. It will address the following topics: the Reformation, Calvinism, and the rise of a Northern secular tradition; the Dutch Republic and the making of a national identity; global exchange and commercial culture; the new philosophy, and connections between art and science.

Taking into account current trends in the history of art, including materiality and the senses, artisanal epistemologies, and the global turn, this course will centre on the relationship between art and cultural and intellectual concepts and practices, while touching on related historiographic and philosophical issues, such as the nature of representation, knowledge, and multiculturalism.