American Art History (Bachelor Year 2 / Spring)

This class will examine American art from the Civil War until today. Different artistic movements and artists will be studied following on the class of L1 in order to understand how American art took over European art in the second half of the 20th century. American art at the end of the 19th century was largely influenced by various European movements, especially impressionism and post-impressionism. At the beginning of the 20th century, the American avant garde led by Alfred Stieglitz, an art dealer and photographer, stormed on the art scene. The interwar period was characterized by the Harlem Renaissance movement and the great projects led by the Work Progress Administration, especially the large murals commissioned to contemporary artists. The aftermath of World War II witnessed the arrival of abstract expressionism, and in the 1960s Pop art, pushing forward the superiority of the USA on the international art scene. The last part of the class will be dedicated to American contemporary art, particularly the representation of diversity from various perspectives from the work of Jean-Michel Basquiat to Kehinde Wiley.