ARTH 266(S) Twentieth-Century Russian Art and the Birth of Abstraction (Same as Russian 208)
Such revolutionary artistic movements as Cubo-Futurism, Suprematism, and
Constructivism profoundly influenced the development of twentieth-century art
throughout the Western world-just as the 1917 Russian Revolution upset the
world's political balance. This course will investigate Russian art within a cultural framework and explore the relationship between artistic production and
politics. We will begin with a brief overview of important developments in Russian art that prefigured the twentieth-century artistic revolution: the introduction
of icons from Byzantium, the founding of St. Petersburg and the rise of Western-
style portraiture, and the fin-de-siecle movements that united painting with music and ballet. However, the focus of the course will be 1910-1930, when radical
innovation was the order of the day and revolutionary ideas sparked entirely new
conceptions of art. We will then look at the Socialist Realist style of the Stalin
era, Soviet dissident art and Moscow conceptualism, ending the semester with
an exploration of current trends in post-Soviet Russian art.
Requirements: active class participation, two 5- to 8-page papers, and a final
10-page paper or exam.
No prerequisites. Enrollment limit: 16.
Satisfies the non-Western requirement.