Relationships: Starting Course Interest in APArt History

AP Art History Course Next Year
I am proud to be teaching APAH next year and have 24 students already enrolled in this course of arts, ideals, patrons, and explorations of the real and ideal. Follow me @APArtHistory1#APAH #wcasag

This class will be an amazing adventure! It is designed to have students define art across the ages and cultures of humanity, define art for themselves, appreciate the great art movements, and understand our needs for expression as humans. This course follows the prescribed syllabus of the College Board.

The class is structured to prepare students for the recommended College Board Advanced Placement examination, and SO MUCH MORE! . The class activities, discussions, slide shows and essential questions introduce us to 30,000 years of history between August and May. There will be several field trips; attendance is expected. In addition to readings, independent research, oral presentations and Socratic seminar, there will be tests and quizzes. After the AP exam, we will focus on more in-depth research and an optional excursion for those available to go to Italy and Greece.

This course is an introduction to subjects normally grouped under the heading of humanities, and extends our discourse concerning Western, Asian, and African religion, philosophy, cultural history, literature, and anthropology, all of which are examined through the visual/cultural evidence contained in art history. Questions regarding the formation of cities, power and social structures, and systems of belief are of prime importance during the first few reflective conversations. Issues regarding visual perception, the need for narrative, the nature of materials and technology, and theunderstanding of the human body are a major focus throughout the course.

The evolving relationships between artists and audiences wind their way through each art historical period. Students learn to identify iconography, media, stylistic traits and the function of art in each society that we explore. Students will use their skills in Socratic conversations to amplify their experiences with essential questions of art, faith, truth, conflict, and beauty. The nature of representation, idealization, realism, illusionism, modernism and post-modernism are defined through the study of specific cross-cultural artworks. In addition to the established canon of western, eastern and African art, students will study cultural artifacts around the world from earliest times to the present. And finally, students will make meaning of the idea that art history is an area of study invented partially to organize information, rather than an organically existing subject. What an exciting why to see the world through the great achievements, talents, and expressions of gifts found in the hearts, minds, souls, and spirits of humanity!

What a joy to be preparing for this course! What are you excited about? How are you sharing that enthusiasm for your excitement?