Constellations: HAA 2602 Special Topics Asian - Representations of Space and Place

Karen Gerhart and Gyewon Kim

This course explores new ways of understanding culture through an examination of how spaces and places were conceived and represented in the visual arts. Although Japan will figure centrally to the readings and discussion, application of the same principles of analysis could be applied to other parts of the world. We will seek to understand for what purposes paintings and prints of spaces and places in Japan were made, for whom, and how. By tracing the different trajectories of making and remaking places, the course will offer an alternative to a chronological understanding of Japanese visual culture and will develop a new awareness of how and why spaces and places were created at particular historical moments. The course will emphasize thematic relationships and cross-cultural interconnections.