Dushko Petrovich

This three hour seminar is a professional practice class which examines what it means to have a productive, critical practice. Students not only refine their own identity as generative artist-scholar-citizen but also learn to represent that practice professionally with CVs, portfolios, project proposals, artist statements, and scholarly abstracts. Students also work collaboratively on exhibition projects to experience how different creative roles such as artists, curators, writers, and venue directors interact in the art world.

In this class we will prepare the student for life out of school through looking at at the lives of artists through their writings and biographies. Artists writings/biographies will include Joan Mitchell, Fairfield Porter, Andrey Tarkovsky, Seth Price, Laura Owens, among others. Group critiques and a field trip to an artist studio will be included, as well as practical advice on documenting work and writing artist statements.

This course looks at the range of concerns that inform and shape the making as well as the reception of paintings in a contemporary context. As a class, we will read, discuss and debate a range of historical and contemporary texts by artists, art historians, cultural theorists and critics on the continuing role and impact of painting as an art form, market force, and culture shaper, along with readings addressing the ability of art --and of painting in particular-- to effect political, ethical, and psychic change on both an individual and a broader social and cultural level.

Thematic topics, readings and screenings will vary but are typically chosen in reference to specific VAP or Departmental artist lectures offered during the semester of the course. Readings/topics may relate to one or more of the following: disability theory and the relationship of art to self-care; the relationship of visibility politics to current impulses in painting; the relationship of art to work, labor and leisure; the case of 'zombie formalism' and market effects on painting trends; the role of autobiography in art making and painting practices in particular.

Mandatory individual studio critiques of 45-60 minutes each; weekly written outlines/quick bullet-point responses to one or more class readings; mandatory attendance to VAP lectures and other lectures if scheduled at same time as seminar class; final paper consisting of a critical review of a painting exhibition currently on view in Chicago.

Publishing yourself and publishing others will both be addressed in a start-to-finish manner as we cover the key aspects of publishing as a creative enterprise, from pitching and editing to fundraising and promotion. We will look at various historical and current models for both digital and print publications as students develop and produce their own publishing projects.

This seminar will look at the mental faculty of attention and the role it plays in the production and reception of art, specifically how attention mediates experience between artists and viewers. We will examine the attempt to direct attention as a basis for making meaning within artworks, particularly in moving-image, spatial, and place-related work. We will also ask how the issues of attention and attention span that have become so ubiquitous, may impact the art context. In short, we will take up attention as an attribute, tool, or condition for making work in relation to other subjects rather than as a subject in itself, treating attention as a register for looking at artworks. The seminar will consist of readings and screenings drawn from philosophy, psychology, art theory, film theory, fiction, and other disciplines.