Download Incorporating Arts Into History Curriculum

Incorporating Arts Into
History Curriculum
An image is worth a thousand words. This session will present one
school's commitment to deliberately use art and art history in historical
and cultural studies in order to engage students' imagination and
challenge their conceptual thinking of history as a subject.
By Yevgenia Arutyunyan
History Department Chair
Charlotte Country Day School
Brief History
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2000
Why?
Coordination between art and history departments
Purpose: bring to life cultural history and enrich student visual experience of history
Courses: World History I (9th grade) and World History II (10th grade)
Collaboration: all involved teachers in art and history departments, but later inspired
independent research and work within history department
• So what does it look like? Presentations & worksheets
• Sources: art and history department faculty, Carol Strickland’s Annotated Mona Lisa, other
Range of Presentations & Art: World History I
• Divinity Unit:
• Hindu Deities in Art, Buddhist Art, Islamic Art & Architecture, Christian Art & Architecture
• Power Unit:
• Greek Architecture, Theater & Sculpture, Chinese Pre-Dynastic Art, Chinese Dynastic Art,
Roman Works
• Creativity Unit:
• Mughal Art & Architecture, the Renaissance Art
• Contact Unit:
• Pre-Columbian Art in the Americas, African Influence on European Art & European Influence
on African Art, Art in the Cycle of African Life, Body Art – African Influence on EuroAmerican Culture
Range of Presentations & Art: World History II
• Revolution Unit:
• Art & Poetry of the French Revolution & Napoleon: Neoclassicism, Absolutism in
Architecture & Music, Counter-Reformation and the Baroque Arts and Music
• Progress Unit:
• Art of the Industrial Age: Impressionism & Photography, Romanticism in Art, Poetry, and
Ballet, Realism in Art & Literature, The Classical Music Tradition & Nationalism, PostImpressionism in Modern Consciousness, 1920s Culture and Trends, Expressionism
• Totalitarianism Unit:
• Nazi & Soviet Propaganda (art, literature, film), Art with Political Message: China
• Identity & Self-Determination:
• Art, Music, and Culture of the 2nd half of the 20th Century
Islamic Architecture
Space and Pattern
Today’s topics:
•Architecture, a definition
•Islamic architecture, a definition
•Common features in Islamic
Architecture
•Two Islamic architectural forms: the
palace and the mosque
•Uses, orientation and parts of the
mosque
•Architectural decoration and design
motifs
Dome of the Rock, Jerusalem
World History I – Divinity UnitCharlotte Country Day School
•Homo Faber in religious architecture
Common Features in Islamic Architecture
• rhythmic order
• symmetry
• the use of water as an integral part
of the design.
• rich surface decoration: pattern
Alhambra Palace, Granada, Spain
The Mosque of Cordoba, Spain
The capital of the Islamic caliphate in Spain was Cordoba. The Mosque was begun in 786.c
The Middle East, A-3
The repetitive patterns create the impression of infinite repetition
which in turn may suggest the infinite nature of God.
Common Formal Features in
Islamic Architecture Symmetry
Note the use of water to achieve
symmetry.
Water was not only much appreciated and
valued by the Arabs, coming as they did
from a very arid land, but it was also used
for its reflective qualities to achieve
symmetry and rhythm.
The reflected world in pools and fountains is
a metaphor for how our world reflects
Paradise.
How did Versailles support Louis XIV’s
Absolutism?
• “L’etat c’est moi”
• 2000 nobles + 18,000 soldiers - WHY?
• Keep an eye on nobles (earlier rebellion – The Fronde) + army to keep
an eye on the nobles
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Keep nobles & their family “hostage” – why?
Keep nobles spending money
Keep nobles fighting for king’s attention vs … ?
Royal rising & retiring, royal meal (498 people)
Place to impress: zoo, Chinese carousel, gondolas on an artificial
canal
The Sun King Ballet
• Haut Couture – emergence of ‘high fashion’
• Cost: male court fashions - $ 5,000.00
female - $ 15,000.00, jewelry – up to $ 500,000.00
• First " historic " male principal dancer - King Louis XIV himself
• Sensual clothes and moves
fainting…
SO…learn from the King’s moves!
• Then reception, SO…new dress
…SO…more money
Neoclassicism (1780-1820)
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Reaction against Rococo
Age of Enlightenment
“ennobling” virtue of art
“Demand is now for heroism
and civic virtues” (Goethe)
• Art is serious, moral, and
patriotic, stoic
• Inspiration from newly
unearthed Classical ruins
• “Reason, not emotion should
dictate art”
Death of Marat by David (1793)
Liberty Leading the People (1830)
The Third of May, 1808 (1814)
The Great Composers of the Classical Tradition & Social Trends
• Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791)
• Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) (Classical / Romantic)
……..the times….
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In the 18th century more people made more money
Public concerts
Music lessons, printed music, and instruments were in demand.
Composers took the concerns of the middle class into account . . .
Because they were members of the middle class themselves
Napoleonic wars
Light in Paris . . .Industrial Connections…
• Scientific discoveries about the nature of light
• The new knowledge about the physiology of the eye
• Creation of art works in a new style: impression
• Development of technology to reproduce images
• Lithography
• The invention of the camera: photography
• photo--light
• graph--drawing
According to the impressionists . . .
• A painting explores a way of seeing or
experiencing the world =
IMMEDIATE VISUAL
SENSATION = IMPRESSION
• Breaks down natural light into its
component parts
• Use of primary colors
• Tech advancements: synthetic oils
• Color wheel was actually developed
during this period
• RADICAL DEPARTURE from
Renaissance tradition of perspective,
balance of composition, idealized bodies
and chiroscuro
• Gare Saint-Lazare (1877) by Claude Monet
Nationalism in music . . .
• “Musical nationalism was expressed when romantic composers deliberately created
music with a specific national identity, using the folk songs, dances, legends and
history of their homelands.” (Roger Kamien)
• Rimskiy-Korsakov (Russia), Sibelius (Finland). Dvorkak (Czech),
Overture 1812
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Sombre mood in the beginning: Russian hymn—God Preserve Thy People
Russian folk song interwoven with the new French anthem, the Marseillaise
National anthem: God Save the Czar
Intended for outdoor performance : cannon shots and church bells
Chess
• 1984 – concept album, 1986 – West End, 1988 – Broadway,
2002 – Sweden
• “Chess is very dark, portraying a world where you can trust no one and
love can not survive” (T. Rice)… Cold War Rivalries
• Characters: Freddie, Anatoly, Florence, The Arbitor
• “One Night in Bangkok” – Arbiter
• Former ABBA & Tim Rice co-production
• It peaked at #3 in both US, Canada, at #12 in the UK.
• Other Musical teams: Boublil/Schonberg
• Les Miserable, Miss Saigon