History of Art Critical Portfolio (U01148)

? Credit Points : 40 ? SCQF Level : 10 ? Acronym : ACE-3-HCritPort

This course invites penultimate-year students to adopt the role of art critic. During the first semester, students are expected to review four temporary exhibitions of their choice, preferably taking place in public venues in Scotland. The reviews should each be 750 words (total 3,000 words). In the second semester, they produce a retrospective essay of 3-4,000 words documenting their experience as an art critic. The essay will explain what their criteria were for reviewing exhibitions and how they devised them; what the problems were in this type of exercise and their long-term benefits.

Entry Requirements

? This course is not available to visting students.

? Pre-requisites : History of Art 2

Subject Areas

Home subject area

History of Art, (School of Arts, Culture and Environment, Schedule A)

Delivery Information

? Normal year taken : 3rd year

? Delivery Period : Full Year (Blocks 1-4)

Summary of Intended Learning Outcomes

This course gets students out of the seminar room and into the public exhibition gallery. It challenges them to think and write about art historical issues from a different perspective to that of the art historian. It enables them to dispense with some of the traditional baggage of art historical writing (such as essays, references and bibliography) and to find their own critical voice. The essay requires them to articulate the challenges they face in taking-on the Critical Portfolio. The critic's task is nowhere usefully defined, so one of the key outcomes of the project is for students to decide what it involves. In part, this will be based on their practical experience. But they will also engage with the literature about and around the critical tradition: from Diderot in the Salon to Sewell in the Standard. The critical faculties and journalistic writing this course requires gives students a fresh perspective on art history and its writings.