HA 706/955

This seminar will explore still life, expansively construed and primarily in Europe and America from the 18th century to the present, as a genre of subject matter and a material practice in various mediums. Considering still life in relation to materiality, the environment, colonialism, botany, gender, and phenomenological concepts of embodiment, we will examine the ways in which this traditionally lowest of genres bristles and is alive with affect, value, significance, and criticality, at the levels of theme, form, and facture. Artists to be considered will likely include: J.B.S. Chardin, Anne Vallayer-Coster, J.F. Liotard, Edouard Manet, Henri Fantin-Latour, Paul Cézanne, Giorgio Morandi, Vija Celmins, Jennifer Packer, and Zoe Leonard. Students’ research paper topics may fall within or outside of the chronological and/or geographic scope of the course.