Course Schedule
Week 1: Theorizing a 21st Century Visual Culture.
From Reading List:
Ackbar Abbas, “Faking Globalization,” The Visual Culture Reader
Brian Holmes, “Do it Yourself Geo-Politics,” The Visual Culture Reader
Handouts: (excerpts from): Jameson, Fredric. Postmodernism, or, the cultural logic of late capitalism. Duke University Press, 1991.
Look at: Adelita Husni Bey, Jon Rafman
Watch: Black Mirror, Series 3 (excerpts)
Week 2 From Genius to Celebrity to Selfie -- The Role of the Image in Constructing the Self
From Reading List:
Amelia Jones, “The Body And/In Representation,” The Visual Culture Reader
Handouts: (excerpts from):
Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, 'Plateau 11: 1837 - Of the Refrain', in A Thousand Plateaus, London: Athlone, 1988
Jean Baudrillard, ‘The Hyperrealism of Simulation’’, Art in Theory: 1900-2000
Look at: Michelangelo, Cindy Sherman, The Kardashians, the Selfie
Watch: Vaporwave Videos, Ed Atkins (artist’s video)
Weeks 3-4: The Curating of Everyday Life
From Reading List: Lisa Nakamura, “Digital Racial Formations and Networked Images of the Body”
Handout: (excerpts from) Karen Archey, “Post Internet Curating: An Interview with Carson Chan,” Rhizome, 2016
Harald Szeemann, “The exhibition in the exhibition, Lorenzo Benedetti,” Cura magazine, 18, 2014
Jacques Attali, Noise: The Political Economy of Music, 1985
Look at: Gallery Visits: Frutta Gallery, Gavin Brown Enterprises (in Trastevere)
Discuss: What do we do with the cultural manager or curator in the age of the internet?
Weeks 5-7: Surveillance and Resistance + Midterm Exam
From Reading List: Mark Fisher, ‘It’s Easier to Imagine the End of the World Than the End of Capitalism,” The Visual Culture Reader
Theodor Adorno. ‘On Commitment.’ Art in Theory, 1900-2000
Handouts: Claudia Mesch, and Michely Viola, eds. Joseph Beuys: The Reader. IB Tauris, 2007
Michel Foucault, 'What is Critique'?, in Sylvère Lotringer and Lysa Hochroth eds. The Politics of Truth (New York: Semiotext(e), (1997)
Michel Foucault, ‘Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison’, Vintage, 1977
Look at: Chto Delat?, Pussy Riot, Tania Bruguera, Teatro Valle Occupato
Watch: Adam Curtis, Oliver Ressler, (excerpts from) The Filth and the Fury (2000)
Weeks 8-9: The Body and Identity Politics
From Reading List: Fred Moton, “The Case of Blackness,” The Visual Culture Reader
Lisa Nakumura, “Digital Racial Formations and Networked Images,” The Visual Culture Reader
Malek Alloula, “From the Colonial Harem,” The Visual Cultural Reader
Handouts: Judith Butler, “Subjects of Sex/Gender/Desire,” in Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (London: Routledge, 1990), ch. 1
(excerpt from) Shulamith Firestone, ‘The Dialectic of Sex: The Case for Feminist Revolution’, Macmillan, 1970
Look at: Theaster Gates, Martine Syms
Watch: Jayson Musson ‘Art Thoughtz’
Week 10: Analyzing Contemporary Culture. Discussion of
Research Methods, Group Presentations critiquing a contemporary cultural object.
Weeks 11-12: Hyperreality -- The Politics of Time and Space in the 21st Century
From Reading List: Boris Gruys, ‘On Art Activism’, June 2014, Eflux
Handouts: (excerpts from) Jean Baudrillard, ‘Simulations’, Semiotext(e), 1981
Gilles Deleuze, ‘Cinema 1: The Movement-Image’, 1986
Martin Heidegger, ‘Basic writings: from Being and time (1927) to The task of thinking (1964), 1977
Williams, Alex, and Nick Srnicek. ‘# ACCELERATE MANIFESTO for an Accelerationist Politics.’ Critical Legal Thinking 14, 2013
Uncivilization, the Dark Mountain Manifesto, 2009
Watch: Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared, YouTube, Episode 2, On Time
Film Theory: The HIDDEN LORE of Don't Hug Me I'm Scared!, YouTube
Week 13-14: Conclusion -- The Digitization of the Self and Society
Films, discussion and concluding remarks.
Final Exam and Hand-In of Internet Meme or Curatorial Proposal. Presentation to class of memes.
From Reading List:
Eyal Weizman, “Urban Warfare; Walking through Wall,” The Visual Culture Reader
Faye Ginsberg, “Rethinking the Digital Age,” The Visual Cultural Reader
Handouts:
Geert Lovink, “On the Social Media Ideology,” September 2016, EFlux