This is a basic introduction to music with emphasis on elements of music and musical styles. The course seeks to develop an understanding of music as well as the levels and spheres in which music is appreciated. Offered in the fall semester.

The student is acquainted with the principles and historical aspects of the world of classical and theatrical dance and their implications for developmental movement, creative expression and educational activities.

This course explores the art and architecture from Ancient cultures to the mid 16th century. Students will be introduced to a broad overview of major developments in painting, sculpture, and architecture. We will analyze the works of art in relation to their historical, cultural, and social contexts and from a variety of art historical methodologies.

This course explores the art and architecture from the late 16th century to the present era. Students will be introduced to a broad overview of major developments in painting, sculpture, architecture, photography, film/video, and new media. We will analyze the works of art in relation to their historical, cultural, and social contexts and from a variety of art historical methodologies.

In this course, students will explore the many elements that go into a theatrical production: the script, acting, directing, art direction, staging, etc. We will read scripts of plays currently in local production, and attend rehearsals and performances of those plays, studying the production elements from all angles. Students will have the opportunity to meet with and learn from theater professionals, and will culminate the semester by writing their own 10-minute plays or directing or acting in plays written by their fellow students.

Students will explore the basic elements of photography and the DSLR camera or Advanced Digital camera with an emphasis on photography as an interpretive art. Students learn digital capture and output methods while developing technical and analytical skills. Students are encouraged to embrace creative risk as they respond to conceptual and aesthetic challenges, exploring the possibilities of the medium, and refining their craft. The historical and contemporary functions of still imagery are investigated as students begin to produce and visualize their work in a broader context. The course also fosters a critical awareness of how images in our culture are produced and used to disseminate specific perspectives.

This course introduces students to the basic studio experience. Students will explore a variety of drawing techniques and black and white drawing media to develop skill and perception, with an emphasis on line and perspective.

This course introduces students to the basic studio experience. Students will explore a variety of drawing techniques and drawing media to develop skill and perception, with an emphasis on color and form.

This course introduces students to the fundamental visual design concepts of form, line, shape, value, texture, color, space, and composition as they apply to two-dimensional image making and color theory. Using a variety of media, students will develop critical abilities and artistic awareness, while also gaining hands-on experience in developing the necessary basic skills and techniques for using a variety of traditional and contemporary design tools. No experience required.

In this course, students will study the human body through direct observation of cadavers and models, and study techniques and practices of drawing and illustration as they learn to accurately demonstrate what they have observed.

Critical inquiry is the process of gathering and evaluating information, ideas, and assumptions from multiple perspectives to produce well-reasoned analysis and understanding, and leading to new ideas, applications and questions. This course is intended to introduce new students to intellectual inquiry at the university by engaging them in in-depth study of a single topic utilizing a variety of perspectives and methods. The course emphasizes the essential role of critical and creative thinking to their lives as students, citizens, future professionals, and productive members of their communities.

Critical inquiry is the process of gathering and evaluating information, ideas, and assumptions from multiple perspectives to produce well-reasoned analysis and understanding, and leading to new ideas, applications and questions. This course is intended to introduce new students to intellectual inquiry at the university by engaging them in in-depth study of a single topic utilizing a variety of perspectives and methods. The course emphasizes the essential role of critical and creative thinking to their lives as students, citizens, future professionals, and productive members of their communities.

This course will introduce students to the fundamentals of character development through work on short scenes from major plays. A review of various theories of acting from Stanislavski and Uta Hagen to the Meisner approach to acting,will dovetail the development of a living character on stage with script analysis.

This course explores movement, wellness and conditioning methods for the everyday person, including body awareness, exercise and rest. No dance experience is required.

This course is an introduction to oil painting, with emphasis on understanding color, paint handling and observation. Attention is given to the approach of painters, both past and present, through periodic slide presentations.

Visual images pervade our everyday lives. We negotiate the world through visual culture, and the world itself is negotiated politically through visual images. This class introduces students to key issues of visual culture and to the critical and historical concepts necessary for understanding the images we routinely consume and produce. We will examine the politics of images, the role images play in producing cultural meaning, seeing and power relations, and images as forms of communication.

This course surveys the elements of musical theater, e.g., lyrics, score, dance and design. The historical development of musical theater from opera to American stage musicals are covered.

Climate scientists and geologists have determined that we are now living in a new geological era defined and shaped by human activity: the Anthropocene. While this new era has triggered a barrage of questions about our species, our planet, and our conjoined future, one thing is clear: the concept of the Anthropocene is unsettling the stories we tell about our past, present and future. According to artist Elizabeth Ellsworth, "We humans do not yet know what it means to 'live the Anthropocene.' It is an unresolved, yet urgent, question." In this course, we will be searching collectively and individually at the intersection of art, science, activism, culture, and literature to find the places where new stories are emerging about who we are, how we might go about living the Anthropocene, and what this means for our future. Collectively we will explore new stories and storytellers with an eye toward what they tell us about the perspectives, skills, and practices that might be required for living in the Anthropocene. Individually, you will be making your own journey into the Anthropocene, a journey that will be documented through writing and creative projects.

Writing is a voyage into the imagination, where we can discover the mystery and wonder in the small moments of everyday life. In this introductory workshop, student writers experiment with techniques and methods of translating their experience of the world into a language and form that show rather than tell; that illuminate rather than dictate; that can touch others in unfathomable ways. The philosophy of a workshop is that writers learn to be better writers by working with other writers as you all work toward the same goals. We will spend some of our class time engaging in informal, in-class writing exercises and discussions of published poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, and drama. Once you begin drafting your own work, you will also begin reading and responding to your classmates' work in in-class constructive critique sessions. The workshop provides students not only with the invaluable gift of an attentive audience for their works-in-progress, but also the gift of learning to give and receive thoughtful, constructive criticism.

What's your story? The deep human need for narrative is as old or older than the most ancient cave paintings. And new media have changed the way that we tell and process stories. Every day, artists and writers are producing new types of narratives about a world transformed by computers and communications networks. This course investigates the ways that new media have changed contemporary society and the cultural narratives that shape it. Through short creative assignments and collaborative group projects, students will have the opportunity to work with text, digital imaging, sound, video, and other media to create new kinds of digital stories that will resonate for them on a personal and, in some cases, a professional and/or societal level as well.

This course explores the radically transformative potential of writing. Students will develop a regular practice of writing as a powerful tool for community activism and political action. We will read, discuss, and write a variety of genres explicitly connected to social and political activism, including: personal narratives, manifestos, action campaigns, letters to the editor, op-ed columns, videos, debate arguments, interviews, blogs, social media campaigns, interactive media projects, etc. We will also explore the role of culture-jamming and DIY art, film, performance, and digital activism as vehicles of participatory social and political action. Assignments will be designed to foster both expressive and critical thinking and writing skills, problem-solving, the ability to research, organize, and synthesize material, and to generate writing that will deeply explore and interrogate social and political systems, particularly those that produce and perpetuate injustices.

In this course, we will investigate how cultural, political, aesthetic, ideological, and historical notions of race, class, gender, sexuality, and ability are represented and explored in the medium of film, and consider film as both product and (re)producer of American culture. We will pay special attention to the way stories by and about marginalized persons are told, and note what happens to these representations when persons of marginalized identities are behind the camera. Further, we will consider the extent to which filmmakers of all identities have navigated, challenged, transformed, subverted, and/or accepted the predominant norms and assumptions of the mainstream systems of film production. Ultimately, we will consider the overall role of film representations and filmmakers in building or sustaining a diverse and democratic society.

In this course, students explore the relationships between gender, power, and the media. Through a rigorous study of popular media (film, TV, music videos, social media, news media, and advertising) in conjunction with theoretical texts, we will investigate culturally constructed and learned meanings, ideologies, and gendered power relations in our society that inform and perpetuate the production, consumption, and reception of media. In turn, we will analyze the role of the media in structuring and reproducing gendered power relations in contemporary society. In their projects, students will produce their own media texts and images as a way to explore the process of representation and the power of representing themselves.

This course will focus on honing the screen and/or playwriting skills of students to help them develop a greater creative, critical, and aesthetic understanding of these genres. A variety of dramatic forms will be investigated, with an emphasis on the formal elements of plot, character, dialogue, setting, figurative language,etc. Through reading assignments, writing exercises, and critique of student work, students will hone the techniques of storytelling for film and/or theater and become familiar with a wide range of models and formal strategies for constructing and analyzing scripts. This fulfills the humanities core requirement as a fine arts course.

This course will focus on honing the poetry writing skills of students and to help them develop a greater creative, critical, and aesthetic understanding of this genre. A variety of poetic formats and forms will be investigated, with an emphasis on the formal elements of prosody, metaphor, imagery, language, structure, syntax, patterns, etc. Through reading assignments, writing exercises, and critique of student work, students will become familiar with a wide range of models and formal strategies for constructing and analyzing poetry. This fulfills the humanities core requirement as a fine arts course.

This course will focus on honing the fiction writing skills of students and to help them develop a greater creative, critical, and aesthetic understanding of this genre. A variety of short fiction formats and forms will be investigated, with an emphasis on the formal elements of plot, character, dialogue, setting, point of view, tone, imagery, figurative language, etc. Through reading assignments, writing exercises, and critique of student work, students will become familiar with a wide range of models and formal strategies for constructing and analyzing short fiction. This fulfills the humanities core requirement as a fine arts course.

The images flickering across the cinema screen are the closest thing to our own dreams that humans have created. The medium of film may be the perfect vehicle for creating bizarre dreamscapes, imaginative riddles, and impossible paradoxes. In this course, we will consider movie representations of dreams, consciousness, memory, identity, and time. Exploring these topics from the perspectives of physics, psychology, philosophy, and poetics, we will consider the unique power of film to represent and reflect the nature and limits of human (and non-human) consciousness.

The human body is at once the most intimately private and the most sensationalized and public part of our personal identity. We celebrate its beauty in art and objectify it in advertising; we construct strict rules about which bodies are beautiful and which are not; which are healthy and which are diseased; which body parts may be exchanged or even sold; which bodies are sacred and which profane. Our bodies allow us to affect the world around us, and yet they also allow governments and businesses to control and shape our lives in crucial ways. Our bodies intersect with every other aspect of our identities: gender, gender identity, race, class, age, ability, sexual orientation, sexuality, illness, and health. Even in the virtual world, our bodies seem to matter. This course will introduce students to a wide range of contexts in which the human body is perceived and represented in our culture. We will consider how social relationships, cultural images, and technological and medical practices shape our perceptions and awareness of (our) bodies, and investigate the many possible responses to the question of why bodies matter.

What is an image? Why do human beings make art? Why do we enjoy looking at art? What is creativity? This course explores the complex relationships between brain, mind, body, eye, and the image. Students will investigate the nature of creativity, develop a critical and creative eye, and build a rigorous practice of the imagination through regular reading, writing, and image-making activities. No artistic experience or talent is required, but in order to take the class, students must commit to 1) an active interest in learning about the physical structures of the brain and the limitations of neuroscience; 2) a deep curiosity about how the mind, body, images, and stories work together to construct our experience; 3) a desire to explore the relationship between our hands and thinking; and 4) a mind open to mystery and wonder.

The history of the arts has often been intertwined with the history of social justice movements, whether it has been through art created in the service of those movements, art inspired by the desire to change the world, or art that has inspired others to work for a more just world. We will consider how the arts effect social change and how they are affected by it, and examine historically how art has been integrated into or associated with social movements. Further, we will investigate the extent to which the arts themselves can be considered as integral to civic life in a democratic society and what happens to a culture in which the arts are marginalized.

In this introductory course, we will consider film as an artistic, personal, cultural, and political medium of expression. We will investigate how the medium of film has been used to reinforce and to rebel against tradition. Further, we will identify the specific properties and power of film to tell stories in ways unique to the medium, and stretch the boundaries of what we conventionally think "telling a story" means. The interaction of form and content will be central to our focus on the ways in which cinematic form, structure, and style are inextricable from the ideology, politics, and narrative strategies of storytelling. We will investigate the ways in which film artists over the years have pushed and experimented with the medium in order to continually rediscover, redefine, and reinvent what cinema can do and what it can be.

This course combines an art-historical overview of contemporary artists using performance, happenings, action-based art, with influential critics, writers and photography with hands-on studio art-making.

This course focuses on representations of race, gender, sexual orientation, ability, class, and other identities in popular culture and news media. Students will learn to critically analyze the relationships between media, audience, information, and power and consider the intersections of representation and power. Through an investigation of the politics of representation, students will learn to recognize and analyze visual and textual systems of cultural codes and ideologies at work in mass media. In their own projects, they will make use of this knowledge to create their own media messages and self-representations by disrupting visual and cultural codes they wish to challenge.

This course will focus on one significant topic or theme and its representation in film; topics will vary from semester to semester. Selected topics may include, but will not be limited to: Masculinity in Film; Women and Film; Sports in Film; Illness in Film; Science in Film; Race and Film; The Environment and Film, etc. Students will consider these topics in terms of how they are framed and represented in cinema.

Theater can be an incendiary device for revolution, a tool for critical reflection, and a practice of critical resistance. In this course, students will explore the radical potential of theater and performance to effect positive social and political change in the world and in their own communities. We will consider theater artists and movements focused on the potential of performance to effect social change. Students will investigate the ways in which theater has served as a forum to rethink and rehearse notions of community, citizenship, justice, power, authority, and responsibility. Readings and projects will explore what forms and examples of theater best inspire political action; which tactics have had the greatest impact; and in what ways performance might intervene in contemporary crises at home and abroad. Students will experiment with developing scripts and performances based on current events and may collaborate with community groups on performative projects.

Internships are proven to help students develop knowledge and skills that will enrich their lives and complement a wide range of careers. Internship placement possibilities may include (but are not limited to): museums, galleries, print media, broadcast media, media production companies, theaters, nonprofit organizations, community organizations, design, advertising, and marketing companies. Students will work with an IMA professor to apply for an internship related to their personal and professional interests.