MLS 505 - Aesthetics and Politics of Art

Credit(s): 4
This course is framed by the question “when does art/artistic representation have ethical impact?” It examines how aesthetic criteria for judging artworks might or might not overlap with ethical criteria. We will explore the work and life of Leni Riefensthal; cultural imperialist tendencies of glossy tourist-art-books about impoverished locations; the Bauhaus movement ; representational versus non-representational art; the “Warhol effect” of blurring art and everyday consumer goods; handmade artifacts versus mechanical reproductions; and the theme of “moral imagination through arts” of philosopher Martha Nussbaum and others.