Department of Art History and Visual Arts
The mission of the Department of Art History and Visual Arts is to educate students in the richness and complexity of the visual arts. Visual literacy is essential for informed participation and innovation within local and global cultures. Combining the disciplines of film / media theory and production, studio art, and art history, AHVA equips students to critically explore the interplay of culture, history, theory, analysis, and practice.
AHVA and the Remsen Bird Fund Present...
Art@Hand: An Exploration of the New Art Making Terrain
Digital technologies have transformed art and media production and exhibition in surprising and unanticipated ways. This 2009-2010 AHVA Remsen Bird Programming series features a cross section of prominent Los Angeles artists whose practices embody this reinvigorated sense of hybridity and invention in the digital age. A series of artist lectures combined with studio workshops will encourage students to actively interpret new tecnologies and notions of space in relation to politics, art and culture.
Monday March 1: Weingart 10, 1:30-2:45 PM
A conversation with animator/designer Theo Alexopolous:
Animation and Motion Graphics: Art, Design, Commerce, Consciousness
Followed by an introduction to Adobe After Effects 3-4:25 PM (Limited space: RSVP to bfox@oxy.edu required)
Tuesday March 2: Johnson 200, 1:30-2:45 PM
A conversation with cinematographer and filmmaker Patti Lee:
Digital Documentaries: Technology, Ethics, and Visual Storytelling
Followed by a documentary cinematography workshop 3-4:25 PM (Limited space: RSVP to bfox@oxy.edu required)
Wednesday March 3: Weingart 1, 1:30-4:25 PM
After Effects Workshop 2 with Theo Alexopolous (Limited space: RSVP to bfox@oxy.edu required)
Wednesday March 3: Weingart 117, 4:30-5:30 PM
A conversation with LA Freewaves founder Anne Bray:
Alternative Exhibition Public Space/Virtual Space
Followed by a campus venue scouting walk 5:30-6:30 in prep for OxyFreewaves.
Thursday March 4: Weingart 10, 6-8 PM
Cinematograpy Workshop 2 with Patti Lee:
Digital Storytelling: Image, Light, and HD
Friday March 5: Weingart 1, 1:30-4:30 PM
After Effects Critique Sessions with Theo Alexopolous (For workshop participants only)
Friday April 23: various campus spaces, 8-10 PM
The results of the Art@Hand series will be seen on campus in the OXYFreewaves Media Festival. In cooperation with Anne Bray and LA Freewaves, Oxy Film & Media Studies students will screen programs of recent work in public space venues around campus as a part of Oxy Arts Weekend. You might be surprised where you encounter media!
THEO ALEXOPOULOS—digital artist, motion designer, and teacher. Having trained at USSB, VIDE in the Netherlands, and Art Center in Pasadena, Theo is an award-winning motion designer, telling stories and communicating ideas through a combination of traditional animation and digital motion graphics techniques. Theo’s short film Preparedness Now, produced in coordination with the US Geological Survey to raise awareness about earthquake preparedness is both visually arresting and chilling. The piece will be featured in National Design Triennial, Smithsonian Institution Cooper-Hewitt Design Museum in May of 2010. Theo continues to blend art, design, and social purpose in interesting fashion, working last year with Art Center students to help them produce public service announcements (PSAs) for the United Nations Population Fund. He is currently working with another Art Center class to help them create PSAs for the Pan American Health Organization. View examples of Theo’s work at: http://people.artcenter.edu/~alexopou/
ANNE BRAY—artist, nonconformist, cultural catalyst and advocate-- has been delighting, enlightening and terrorizing Los Angeles for 20 years. One of the most respected voices in new media art and social awareness, Bray has co-opted gas stations, shopping malls, movie theaters, billboards, and department stores--transforming them into showcases for art. Bray's vision exceeds even her artistic reach. She has also become a guide and instructor to a new generation of artists, teaching new genre arts at Claremont Graduate University and public art at the University of Southern California. Currently, Bray serves as Founding and Executive Director of LA FREEWAVES, a growing democracy of arts organizations, schools, libraries, cable stations, programmers and video makers. The coalition produces a major festival every 2 years, presenting attitudes, stories, facts, aesthetics and angles unseen in mass media. LAFREEWAVES continues 24/7 online at www.freewaves.org
PATTI LEE—producer and director of photography is a Los Angeles native. After earning a Bachelors Degree at UCLA's Film School, Patti began her career in the Lighting Department on movies, commercials and television shows, working with notable cinematographers such as Newton Thomas Sigel and Guillermo Navarro. Patti's cinematography credits include SOMEBODIES (BET), THE BERNIE MAC SHOW (FOX), STARTING UNDER (Warner Brothers) and BUNNY, which was nominated for two Independent Spirit Awards. Patti has also shot several documentary projects, among them Sundance Channel's series BIG IDEAS FOR A SMALL PLANET and AMERICAN MULLET. Lee shot and co-directed the documentary A SMALL ACT, which premiered at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival. Read the DV.COM article on Patti at: http://www.dv.com/article/91720
Art History and Visual Arts
Visiting Professor of European Art History
The position is funded for two years, and we invite applications from candidates interested in either a one-year or two-year appointment in Ancient, Medieval, or Renaissance art history, beginning in the fall of 2010. Experience in teaching undergraduates is a distinct asset. Occidental College is a national liberal arts college with a broadly diverse student body and faculty. The annual teaching load consists of six classes spread over two semesters, including five courses in the department and one Cultural Studies Seminar (a first-year writing seminar taught on the topic of your choice – see a description of the program and the courses offered this year here). Departmental courses include “Introduction to European Art” (given every year) and a variety of courses covering the fields of ancient, medieval, and renaissance art. Course descriptions can be found in the college catalog at:
http://departments.oxy.edu/registrar/catalog/ahva.html#arthistory (courses with the prefix ARTH are art history courses).
Applicants should send a letter of application, curriculum vitae, sample of scholarship, and two letters of recommendation, in PDF format, to: yuhas@oxy.edu
Mailing Address:
Prof. Louise Yuhas, Chair
Department of Art History and Visual Art
Occidental College, M-2
Los Angeles, CA 90041
(323) 259-2748
Applications will be reviewed in the order received, until the position is filled.