ART/ARH 363 Baroque Art and Architecture

This course investigates European art and architecture of the seventeenth century. Known as the Baroque, this artistically rich period saw the rise of major artists including Caravaggio, Bernini, Gentileschi, Velasquez, Rembrandt, Vermeer, Rubens, Claude and Poussin. Best known for dramatic, narrative scenes of intense psychological and emotional power, Baroque art, in its extravagant excitement, reflects the tumultuous times in which it was created. This course looks at regional stylistic variations - Italy, Spain, Flanders, Holland, France, England - within the context of historical circumstance including new ideas about the nature of time and space, the rebranding of the Catholic Church (on the offensive after the onslaught Protestantism), the consolidation of power by an absolute monarch (Louis XIV), and the creation of the Dutch Republic with a mercantile-based economy.