HISTART 394-002

Special Topics in the Humanities:
The Art of Chinese Garden


M W 10:00 AM-11:30 AM
3 Credit Seminar

Is a garden a paradise? Is a garden a jungle? Is a garden a gendered world? Is a garden a heterotopia? Is a garden a toy? These and many other questions will be addressed in this seminar, in which we will look at the art of Chinese gardens throughout history. Considering gardens as forms of art, we will examine a wide range of materials including architecture, rock art, painting, print, and poetry. We will also consider gardens as material worlds by investigating waterways, bridges, hillocks, grottos, plants, vegetation, moss, and insects. Furthermore, we will deal with gardens as messworks of social relations, political domains, cultural arenas, and creative spaces. Students are expected to learn about the specificities of gardens and landscapes in China and to think critically about issues of scale, gender, and ecology in the processes of world-making.

HISTART Concentration Distribution: Asia; Transhistorical