Photography in Contemporary Art – MA seminar
with Christine Hansen
In Why Photography Matters as Art as Never Before (2006) the influential art historian Michael Fried connects the most celebrated contemporary photographers, photographers such as Thomas Demand and Jeff Wall exclusively to the modernist painting tradition. In the recent Words without Pictures (2009), a book that debates the current role of photography in contemporary art, the L. A. based curator Christopher Bedford argues that Fried, by doing this, ignores the long history of all the other functions, such as for example observation and recording means that photography has had throughout history. Those are functions that have to be taken into consideration even when we discuss the work of Wall and Demand, Bedford argues.
The course will discuss the contemporary role of photography and examine the way in which photography entered the art world as a ‘medium without history’ in postmodernism. We will look at photo projects that interact both with the history of photography and recent art history, and attempt to come to terms with photography’s position in today’s art world.
Week: 48
Kurs/Prosjektleder: Christine Hansen, Associate Professor
Workform:
The course will be divided between lectures and discussions
Monday: Introduction. Lecture 10-12 (4th floor lecture room)
Tuesday: 10-12. (4th floor lecture room) Reading and discussing “Qualifying Photography as Art, or, Is Photography All It Can Be?” Christopher Bedford, p. 4- 11 and discussion forum p. 12- 26 in Charlotte Cotton/Alex Klein, Words Without Pictures, Aperture, 2009.
Thursday: 10-12. (4th floor lecture room) Reading and discussing “Remembering and Forgetting Conceptual Art”, p. 120-130 and discussion forum and panel discussion p. 131- 155 in Charlotte Cotton/Alex Klein, Words Without Pictures, Aperture, 2009.
Assignment: write a response to one of the two texts. 1000 words
Book: Charlotte Cotton/Alex Klein, Words Without Pictures, Aperture, 2009 (excerpt)
Language: English (or depending on the group: Norwegian)
Prequalifications:
The course starts 29/11/2010 / Week 48, and ends 03/12/2010 / Week 48
Location: Vaskerelven 8
Provider: Foto
MA kunst
Target group: MA Kunst
Target year of study: Master 1
Master 2
Capacity: 12
Academic staff: