Theme: The essay is to be thematic; comparing, based on the themes presented in the textbook exploring such topics as the impact of colonialism, indigenous histories, race, gender, labor, identity politics and so forth. Your essay should not be artists biographies. The artworks do not have to be from the same time period or in the same medium.
Artworks: Select at least five artworks or pieces of architecture to research and write about that further your thesis. Go beyond the textbook. Do NOT select the specific artworks discussed in the textbook or previous assignments. These artworks must have a body of academic published material (books, articles and academic Internet sources) to base your research on. You may write about a work by an anonymous (unknown) artist. If you cant find enough information on the specific art object, you can draw upon information about similar objects from the same culture and time period. Picking your topic is part of research; for assistance in evaluating your research materials see the short animated video Picking Your Topic IS Research! and others from NC State University Libraries: https://www.lib.ncsu.edu/tutorials (Links to an external site.)
Museums online: Look on the museum websites as a resource to explore and choose artworks. You can look at the websites of local museums or you can virtually travel globally.
Essay: The essay should be primarily in your own words describing and analyzing the works of art in relation to the theme. Include your reaction and feelings about the artwork in addition to your research on the artist and/or artwork. Comment why you were drawn to the artworks or architecture, either by attraction or dislike. Incorporate supplemental material from additional sources, with an additional page listing the bibliographic references.
Descriptions of the artworks: Describe each artwork in as much detail as you possibly can, as if no photograph exists of the artwork. By this process you will be able to further analyze the work in greater depth. Include the following: the title, the style. Discuss the composition: including the figures or objects and their relationship to each other and the setting or background. When analyzing the artwork note the media (i.e. stone, bronze, oils, tempera, et cetera).
Research the artworks: Research and cite at least three (do not include the textbook) academic sources from books and/ or the Internet for each artwork. This can include researching similar artworks or architecture. The research material should be woven in with your own observations, but it should be clear when you are quoting (with quotation marks) or paraphrasing (which should be explicitly noted) facts or other notes from your research. Discuss the intentions of the artist, if known, and what the artist/artwork might be trying to convey. Was this artwork created for a particular purpose, such as religious, spiritual, political, portraiture, decorative or all of these? Who was the intended audience? Who was the patron who financed the artwork? Was the artwork created for display in a home, public space or was the art created to be part of a religious or ritual ceremony, a dance or a performance and originally not intended to be separated from that context to be in a museum? How did the culture and time period affect how the artwork was created? How and what other art and artists influenced the artist and artwork? Unless relevant, exclude the name of the donors (the persons who gave the artwork to the museum). Do NOT write a biography of an artist. Discuss the artists life only in relationship to the specific artwork in question.
The textbook mentioned: Framing America: A Social History of American Art: Volume 1 and 2 ( fourth edition)
