ale nodarse-jammal

The pandemic continues to reduce our mobility and to increase our technological dependency.  Given this state of precarity and isolation, we turn to a set of artistic objects which have sought to engage, extend, or otherwise alter the human body. Drawing from Donna Haraway’s “A Cyborg Manifesto,” this J-Term course proposes a visual history of the “cyborg,” of altered bodies in which nature and artifice, machine and organism, meet. This course will develop skills of visual analysis as well as tactics for speaking about art comparatively, thematically, and creatively. The first two sessions will combine a historical overview with an introduction to the study of art in isolated conditions. How can we find new meaning in art when we are unable to see it in person? The focus in the second two sessions will shift towards developing writing and presentation skills (applicable beyond the scope of the course), as students will draft short talks on individual works of art that engage the themes of the course. How, we will ask, do works of art operate as tools for rethinking the present?

For Harvard students: to view the schedule and syllabus on canvas, click here.

(Cover Image: Automaton of a Friar, 16th-Century, School of Juanelo Turriano, National Museum of American History.)

Instructors:

Alexandra Dennett (adennett@fas.harvard.edu)
Alejandro Octavio Nodarse (anodarse@fas.harvard.edu) 

PhD Students, History of Art & Architecture

Course Application Form: Click Here. (Enrollment will be limited to 20 students.)

Schedule:

January 11, 13, 15, 19.

11:00 – 1:00 (may be adjusted to accommodate time-zone differences)

Syllabus:

Session 1: A Brief History of Cyborg

(Monday, January 11)

Advanced Reading: Donna Haraway, “A Cyborg Manifesto”

A first session will involve a brief history of the cyborg from the sixteenth-century to the twentieth-century. We will begin with Leonardo’s inventions—wings to propel human bodies, buoys to keep them afloat—and conclude with the emergence of the robot in early twentieth-century science fiction. In discussion sections, emphasis will be given on drawing thematic connections across disparate works of art. Our aim is to reconsider (1) the human in relation to the machine and (2) the relation, mediated by such objects, between past and present. To what extent have artists asked, and answered, questions which we continue to pose? 

Session 2: From Isolation to Extension: Rebecca Horn’s Work 

Visit with Lynette Roth, Curator, Harvard Art Museums

(Wednesday, January 13)

Advanced Watching:

1) Check out the short Introductory Video on Rebecca Horn.

2) Watch this great documentary on Horn’s work, featuring the artist herself: An Erotic Concert.

Our second session dwells on the work of contemporary artist Rebecca Horn, whose artworks (exhibited at the Harvard Art Museums in 2015) seek to extend the body in challenging and provocative ways. Horn’s “bodily extensions,” as she describes them, emerged from an experience of prolonged isolation. How might such interventions help us consider our present moment? Our guest visitor, Lynette Roth (Daimler Curator of the Busch-Reisinger Museum and Head, Division of Modern and Contemporary Art, Harvard Art Museums), will introduce Horn’s work. 

After class:

If you’d like to look at other examples of Horn’s work in concert with the works of earlier artists (like Beuys, Oppenheim, etc.), check out the Centre Pompidou’s exhibit, Theatre of Metamorphoses.

Session 3: Workshop: Speaking through Objects

(Friday, January 15)

In our third session, we provide an introduction to visual (or formal) analysis, also known as “close-looking,” and consider tactics for speaking about art comparatively, thematically, and creatively. A series of short exercises will development techniques for engaging with art (and are useful tools for writing and presentation skills more broadly).  

Students will be randomly assigned an artwork and a series of quick writing prompts:

• Choose 1 word to encapsulate what most strikes you about this work (1 minute)

• Now, turn that word into a sentence that would make a person who hasn’t seen this piece curious to see it (2 minutes)

• Does this piece make you think differently about your own body? How so? (3 minutes)

• How would you summarize the way this work engages with the ideas explored in this class to a friend? (4 minutes)

These short prompts lay the groundwork for a 5 minute talk about the art piece. Students will have 5 minutes to convert their short responses into an informal presentation, which they will then practice in breakout rooms. 

Session 4: Symposium

(Tuesday, January 19)

Advanced Work:

Students will select a work of art and prepare a five-minute talk about it, expanding on the model established in the workshop. The choice of artwork is open. However, we will provide a pool of objects from which students may select a work. We will hold weekend office hours for students who wish to discuss their projects.

To conclude, students will take turns giving their short object presentations and receive feedback from instructors and their fellow students.

Please contact Alejandro or Alexandra with any questions.