Visual Arts - undergraduate program

Visual Arts

[ undergraduate program | graduate program | faculty ]

All courses, faculty listings, and curricular and degree requirements described herein are subject to change or deletion without notice.

Courses

For course descriptions not found in the UC San Diego General Catalog 2019–20, please contact the department for more information.

Note: The following list of courses represents all visual arts offerings; not all courses offered each year.

Lower Division

VIS 1. Introduction to Art Making: Two-Dimensional Practices (4)

An introduction to the concepts and techniques of art making with specific reference to the artists and issues of the twentieth century. Lectures and studio classes will examine the nature of images in relation to various themes. Drawing, painting, found objects, and texts will be employed. This course is offered only one time each year. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 2. Introduction to Art Making: Motion and Time-Based Art (4)

An introduction to art making utilizing the transaction between people, objects, situations, and media. Includes both critical reflection on relevant aspects of modern and contemporary art practices (Marina Abramovic, Allen Kaprow, Adrian Piper, James Luna, Stelarc, Ron Athey, conceptual art, performance art, new media art, etc.) and practical experience in a variety of artistic exercises. This course is offered only one time each year. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 3. Introduction to Art Making: Three-Dimensional Practices (4)

An introduction to art making that uses as its base the idea of the “conceptual.” The lecture exists as a bank of knowledge about various art world and nonart world conceptual plays. The studio section attempts to incorporate these ideas into individual and group projects using any “material.” This course is offered only one time each year. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 10. Computing in the Arts Lecture Series (4)

Designed around presentations by visiting artists, critics, and scientists involved with contemporary issues related to computer arts and design. Lectures by the instructor and contextual readings provide background material for the visitor presentations. Program or materials fees may apply. Students may not receive credit for both VIS 10 and ICAM 110. This course is offered only one time each year. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 11. Introduction to Visual Arts (4)

This course examines the significant topics in art practice, theory, and history that are shaping contemporary art thinking. A wide range of media extending across studio art practice, digital media, performative practices, and public culture will be considered as interrelated components. This course is required for visual arts transfer students. Students may not receive credit for both VIS 11 and VIS 111. This course is offered only one time each year during winter quarter. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 20. Introduction to Art History (4)

This course examines history of Western art and architecture through such defining issues as the respective roles of tradition and innovation in the production and appreciation of art; the relation of art to its broader intellectual and historical contexts; and the changing concepts of the monument, the artist, meaning, style, and “art” itself. Representative examples will be selected from different periods, ranging from Antiquity to Modern. Content will vary with the instructor. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 21A. Introduction to the Art of the Americas or Africa and Oceania (4)

Course offers a comparative and thematic approach to the artistic achievements of societies with widely divergent structures and political organizations from the ancient Americas to Africa and the Pacific Islands. Topics vary with the interests and expertise of instructor. Students may not receive credit for VIS 21 and VIS 21A. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 21B. Introduction to Asian Art (4)

Survey of the major artistic trends of India, China, and Japan, taking a topical approach to important developments in artistic style and subject matter to highlight the art of specific cultures and religions. Students may not receive credit for VIS 21 and VIS 21B. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 22. Formations of Modern Art (4)

Wide-ranging survey introducing the key aspects of modern art and criticism in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, including neoclassicism, romanticism, realism, impressionism, postimpressionism, symbolism, fauvism, cubism, Dadaism and surrealism, abstract expressionism, minimalism, earth art, and conceptual art. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 23. Information Technologies in Art History (4)

This seminar introduces fundamentals of art historical practice such as descriptive and analytical writing, compiling annotated bibliographies with traditional and online resources, defining research topics, and writing project proposals. Prerequisites: none. Art history majors only.

Note: Prerequisite for VIS 112 and highly recommended for all other seminars. Must be taken within a year of declaring major or transferring into the art history program.

VIS 30. Introduction to Speculative Design (4)

Speculative design uses design methods to question and investigate material culture with critical creative purpose. This course provides a historical, theoretical, and methodological introduction to speculative design as a distinct program. Emphasis is tracing the integration of interdisciplinary intellectual and technical problems toward creative, unexpected propositions and prototypes. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 41. Design Communication (4)

This course provides a strong foundation in contemporary techniques of design communication, including: digital image editing, typography, vector-based illustration and diagramming, document layout, as well as basic digital video editing tools, and web-production formats. Emphasis is on mastery of craft through iteration and presentation of multiple projects. Students may not receive credit for VIS 140 or ICAM 101 and VIS 41. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 60. Introduction to Digital Photography (4)

An in-depth exploration of the camera and image utilizing photographic digital technology. Emphasis is placed on developing fundamental control of the processes and materials through lectures, field, and lab experience. Basic discussion of image making included. Program or materials fees may apply. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 70N. Introduction to Media (6)

Operating as both a lecture and production course, this introductory class provides a technical foundation and theoretical context for all subsequent production-oriented film and video studies. In the laboratory, the student will learn the basic skills necessary to initiate video production. Completion of Visual Arts 70N is necessary to obtain a media card. Program or materials fees may apply. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 80. Introduction to the Studio Major (4)

A practical introduction to the studio art major and a conceptual introduction to how diverse strategies of art making are produced, analyzed, and critiqued. Introduces historical and contemporary topics in painting, drawing, sculpture, installation, and performance art and field-based practices. Required for all studio majors and minors including transfer students. Must be taken in residence at UC San Diego. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 84. History of Film (4)

A survey of the history and the art of the cinema. The course will stress the origins of cinema and the contributions of the earliest filmmakers, including those of Europe, Russia, and the United States. This course is offered only one time each year. Program or materials fees may apply. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 85A. Media History (4)

A survey of media history, theory, and art in a range of national and international contexts. Offers historically situated analysis of print, audio, text-based, image-based, and time-based media in narrative, avant-garde, and documentary forms across different movements, genres, and styles with attention to associated theories and conventions (such as mechanical, electronic, graphical, lens-based, video, digital, and mixed media). Specific works and emphases may vary by year and instructor. Program or materials fees may apply. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 85B. Media Aesthetics (4)

Analysis and interpretation of a specific media art movement, style, genre, or set of conventions in light of aesthetic, philosophical, and/or theoretical frameworks. Specific works and emphases may vary by year and instructor. Examples include video art of the 1970s-80s, media art and industry, media archaeology, and computational aesthetics. Program or materials fees may apply. Prerequisites: none.

VIS 87. Freshman Seminar (1)

The Freshman Seminar Program is designed to provide new students with the opportunity to explore an intellectual topic with a faculty member in a small seminar setting. Freshman Seminars are offered in all campus departments and undergraduate colleges, and topics vary from quarter to quarter. Enrollment is limited to fifteen to twenty students with preference given to entering freshmen. Prerequisites: none.

Upper Division

VIS 100. Introduction to Public Culture (4)

This course examines the expansion of visual arts into contemporary fields of public culture and social practice, including new forms of research and practice intervening across urban socio-economic and political domains, environmental, spatial and community-based dynamics, architecture, information-design, and visualization. Prerequisites: VIS 41.

VIS 100A. Design of Public Culture (4)

This course will explore design strategies that engage today’s shifting public domain structures, situating the problematic of “the public” and the politics of public sphere as sites of investigation, and speculating new interfaces between individuals, collectives, and institutions in coproducing more critical and inclusive forms of public space and culture. Prerequisites: VIS 100.

VIS 101. Introduction to Urban Ecologies (4)

This course examines expanded meanings of the urban and the ecological into new conceptual zones for artistic practice and research, introducing urbanization as complex and transformative processes of interrelated cultural, socio-economic, political and environmental conditions, whose material and informational flows are generative of new interpretations of ecology. Prerequisites: upper-division standing.

VIS 101A. Designing Urban Ecologies (4)

This course will explore design strategies that engage peoples’ shifting geopolitical boundaries, bioregional and ecosystems, urban structures and landscapes, and recontextualize the city as a site of investigation by developing new ways of intervening into expanded notions of urban space, including virtual communities and new speculations of urbanity. Prerequisites: VIS 101.

VIS 102. Democratizing the City (4)

Introduction to urban inequality across the Tijuana–San Diego region, and the border flows that make the marginalized neighborhoods within this geography of conflict into sites of socioeconomic and cultural productivity, laboratories to rethink the gap between wealth and poverty. Prerequisites: upper-division standing.

VIS 103. Architectural Practices (4)

We can learn a lot from the spatial, aesthetic, and formal strategies of architects, as well as their critical stance on the shifting cultural, socio-political, and economic dynamics in the contemporary city. This is an introductory course to explore some of the most important, innovative contemporary architectural practices in the world, and their role in shaping new paradigms in design, material, urban, and environmental culture. Prerequisites: upper-division standing.

VIS 103A. Contemporary Arts in South Korea (4)

The course will examine the theories and practices of contemporary art in South Korea, and its systems of cultural productions and disseminations. Highlighting the work of representative artists, institutions, and events, the course focuses on the predominance of governmental and corporate sponsorships, and how its cultural system is positioned for national and global presence, as well as the emergence alternative art spaces that promote the decentralization of cultural programs. Renumbered from VIS 127A. Students may not receive credit for VIS 103A and VIS 127A. This course is part of the Korean studies minor program. Prerequisites: upper-division standing.

VIS 103B. Architecture and Urbanism of Korea (4)

Covering the evolution of architecture and urban developments in South and North Korea since 1953. The course will examine how both states have shaped their political, economic, and cultural conditions. In particular, we will compare the apartment block communities, national identity architecture, and thematic architecture for entertainment and political propaganda. We will look at how traditional Korean architecture and urban structures were modified for modern life and political economy. Renumbered from VIS 127I. Students may not receive credit for VIS 103B and VIS 127I. Prerequisites: upper-division standing.

VIS 105A. Drawing: Representing the Subject (4)

A studio course in beginning drawing covering basic drawing and composition. These concepts will be introduced by the use of models, still life, landscapes, and conceptual projects. Prerequisites: VIS 80.

VIS 105B. Drawing: Practices and Genre (4)

A continuation of VIS 105A. A studio course in which the student will investigate a wider variety of technical and conceptual issues involved in contemporary art practice related to drawing. Prerequisites: VIS 105A.

VIS 105C. Drawing: Portfolio Projects (4)

A studio course in drawing, emphasizing individual creative problems. Class projects, discussions, and critiques will focus on issues related to intention, subject matter, and context. Prerequisites: VIS 105B.

VIS 105D. Art Forms and Chinese Calligraphy (4)

This course treats Chinese calligraphy as a multidimensional point of departure for aesthetic, cultural, and political concerns. This conceptually based course combines fundamental studio exercises with unconventional explorations. Students are exposed to both traditional and experimental forms of this unique art and encouraged to learn basic aesthetic grammars. There are no Chinese language requirements for this course. Prerequisites: VIS 80.

VIS 105E. Chinese Calligraphy as Installation (4)

This course concerns East–West aesthetic interactions. What are the conceptual possibilities when calligraphy, an ancient form of Chinese art, is combined with installation, a contemporary artistic Western practice? Emphasis is placed on such issues as cultural hybridity, globalization, multiculturalism, and commercialization. Prerequisites: VIS 105D.

VIS 106A. Painting: Image Making (4)

A studio course focusing on problems inherent in painting—transferring information and ideas onto a two-dimensional surface, color, composition, as well as manual and technical procedures. These concepts will be explored through the use of models, still life, and landscapes. Prerequisites: VIS 80.

VIS 106B. Painting: Practices and Genre (4)

A continuation of VIS 106A. A studio course in which the student will investigate a wider variety of technical and conceptual issues involved in contemporary art practice related to painting. Prerequisites: VIS 106A.

VIS 106C. Painting: Portfolio Projects (4)

A studio course in painting emphasizing individual creative problems. Class projects, discussions, and critiques will focus on issues related to intention, subject matter, and context. Prerequisites: VIS 106B.

VIS 107A. Sculpture: Making the Object (4)

A studio course focusing on the problems involved in transferring ideas and information into three-dimensions. Course will explore materials and construction as dictated by the intended object. Specific problems to be investigated will be determined by the individual professor. Prerequisites: VIS 80.

VIS 107B. Sculpture: Practices and Genre (4)

A studio course in which the student will investigate a wider variety of technical and conceptual issues as well as materials involved in contemporary art practice related to sculpture. Prerequisites: VIS 107A.

VIS 107C. Sculpture: Portfolio Projects (4)

A studio course in sculpture emphasizing individual creative problems. Class projects, discussions, and critiques will focus on issues related to intention, subject matter, and context. Students may not receive credit for both VIS 107C and VIS 107CN. Prerequisites: VIS 107B.

VIS 108. Advanced Projects in Art (4)

A studio course for serious art students at the advanced level. Stress will be placed on individual creative problems. Specific orientation of this course will vary with the instructor. Topics may include film, video, photography, painting, performance, etc. May be taken for credit three times. Prerequisites: senior standing. Open to media, studio, ICAM, and speculative design majors.

VIS 109. Advanced Projects in Media (4)

Individual or group projects over one or two quarters. Specific project organized by the student(s) will be realized during this course with instructor acting as a close adviser/critic. Concept papers/scripts must be completed by the instructor prior to enrollment. Two production-course limitation. May be taken for credit three times. Prerequisites: senior standing. Open to media, studio, ICAM, and speculative design majors.

VIS 110A. Contemporary Issues and Practices (4)

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This course for the advanced visual arts major examines topics in contemporary studio art practice. The course is divided among research, discussion, projects, field trips to galleries, and visiting artists, and will encourage student work to engage in a dialogue with the issues raised. Prerequisites: senior standing y upper-division...