University Bulletin
Undergraduate Degree Programs
A ED 211
(GA)
Interpreting Art Experience: Social and Behavioral Perspectives (3) Examination of psychological, cultural, aesthetic, philosophical and educational perspectives on creation and response to art in children, adolescents and adults.
A ED 211 Interpreting Art Experience: Social and Behavioral Perspectives (3)
(GA)
(BA) This course meets the Bachelor of Arts degree requirements.
This course will examine the shared human experience of making and responding to visual images and artifacts from the broadest possible range of perspectives, encouraging students to develop an understanding of the role of art experience in their own lives and in the lives of others. How art is learned within specific cultures and subcultures, how understanding and appreciation of particular images and objects evolves, and how experience and learning interacts with fundamental processes of perception, cognition, and interpretation are central themes. Students will draw upon their own personal and cultural histories and consult accounts written by others to explore the role of visual art in contemporary life. Classic and contemporary studies of artistic development and aesthetic response will be reviewed through well-illustrated lectures and amplified through students' active involvement in small scale, collaborative research studies based upon methods commonly used to study the art experience of children, adolescents, and adults without professional expertise in the visual arts; these activities will include close observation, interviews, and the design of preference and drawing studies. As a final course project, each student will construct a case study of a child, adolescent, or adult which describes in detail one perspective on that individual's experience of art in the home, school, museum, and/or other cultural institutions and settings.