IAHIS 5365 Pre-Columbian Art & Its Legacy
This course is designed as a general introduction to Pre-Columbian art and its impact on Western culture. As such, the course will introduce students to the dominant art forms in the New World and consider how the Columbian Exchange influenced artistic production in the Western world. More specifically, the course will examine how the arts of the Inka, Aztec, and Maya informed Western thought and image. This course is primarily structured as a historical overview of major works and styles of Pre-Columbian art, culminating in an investigation of the impact that Pre-Columbian art had on artists of the modern movement - including Pablo Picasso and Barnett Newman. Finally, the course will consider the current use of Pre-Columbian imagery by Chicano artists such as Guillermo Gomez-Peña and Native North American artists like Jaune Quick-to-See Smith.