ART 485-01, Senior Seminar: Leonardo da Vinci

Abstract

This course will introduce students to advanced critical methods of art history through an extensive examination of Leonardo da Vinci. Students will be introduced to the artist, and consider current debates, scholarly issues, and even the effect of the artist on popular culture. Students will fully engage with an extensive bibliography, intensive critical debates, and critical issues of iconography, connoisseurship, patronage, interpretation, and the contextualization of works of art. A crucial aspect of the course is to learn how art historians select objects and subjects for research, how they investigate works of art, and how they employ different methodologies in the course of critical analysis.