Art, Society and Culture

This online course is an introduction to the social conditions and cultural movements that shaped nineteenth-century European visual arts in their global context. 

Two main themes will be stressed:  

1. the tension between modernity and anti-modernism and 
2. competing views on the very nature of the visual arts.  

The dramatic social and political developments of the period were reflected in diverse cultural movements, some of which embraced change while others rejected it and looked to the past for artistic models.  Closely related to these cultural movements was the fundamental question of what comprised the visual arts.  For example, increased exposure to non-Western visual culture challenged European assumptions about art.