Introduces students to the fundamental principles of two-dimensional art and design and focuses on analyzing the concepts of line, color shape, value, space, form, unity, balance, scale, proportion, texture, and emphasis to be used to express complex ideas. This course is a hybrid studio/lecture. Students are billed for a materials fee.
Introduces students to the fundamental principles of three-dimensional art and design through basic concepts, techniques, and technical practice. Focuses on three-dimensional art and the design fundamentals of sculpture, public art, architecture, and the industrial-design process and production. This course is a hybrid studio/lecture. Students are billed for a materials fee.
Introduces students to the fundamental principles of four-dimensional/time-based art and design through basic concepts, techniques, and technical practices. Computers and video, photo, sound, and lighting equipment are used to create short-form, time-based work. This course is a hybrid studio/lecture.
Introduction to the methods, materials, and purposes of drawing to develop perceptual and conceptual skills through a series of assignments, providing various approaches to drawing as a tool for creative exploration. Discussions and critiques facilitate the development of critical skills. Designed for students considering the art major. Students are billed a materials fee. (Formerly course 20.)
Introduces the methods, materials, and history of printmaking and drawing as a tool for creative exploration. Understanding and development of concepts and skills are achieved through a series of lectures, studio demonstrations and practice, assignments, and critiques. Students are billed for a materials fee.
Introduces sculpture and art in public space. The course is composed of lectures, readings, discussions, studio assignments, and demonstrations. Students are billed for a materials fee.
Introduces basic skills and conceptual development in photography and related digital media through image-making in the field, on the web, and in laboratories, through readings, discussions, and critiques. Students are billed for a materials fee.
Introduces the material practices of painting in combination with the formal vocabulary of the visual arts. A discussion of values, form, color, and figure/ground relationships enters into each class. Students are billed for a materials fee.
Introduces digital and new media art practice. Explores the use of the computer as tool and medium. Provides a hands-on introduction to the fundamentals of graphics; digital-image acquisition and manipulation; video; web design; and computer programming. Lectures, readings, and discussions examine the history of technology artwork and technology's relationship to contemporary culture. Students are billed for a materials fee.
Drawing course using traditional media taught online through demonstration videos, digital submissions, and small-group critiques. Introduces the basics of observational drawing in a progression designed to develop and build skills in sighting, measuring, value, and rendering. Familiarity with Canvas, access to a digital camera, and purchase of art supplies are required. Assumes 30 hours per week of coursework.
Survey of print medium: basic terminology, techniques, application of tools, materials, and condensed history of development of printmaking. Assignments consist of individual and collaborative projects aimed at building skills and gathering technical experience. Introduction to relief printing (black and white and color), intaglio, letterpress, and interface between photography/computer and the handmade print. Exploration of print media for communication of issues including formal aesthetics, social/psychological and personal narrative. Students are billed a materials fee.
Examines ways artists engage, interact, and comment upon ecology and nature in their artworks by examining environmental art from the 1960s through the present.
Introductory course for beginners. Various techniques examined and assigned in specific exercises. Work on projects using color film; this is a non-darkroom course. Examples given of photography from 1826 to the present. Balances historical study and practice through assigned homework exercises. Students must provide their own camera, preferably one with a manual setting. No phone cameras allowed. Students are billed a materials fee. (Formerly Introduction to Photography.)
Examines the ways artists engage, interact, and comment upon ecology and nature in their artworks by examining environmental art from the 1960s through the present. Offers students a foundational introduction to art and artists working in the field of environmental and ecological art/activism.
Digital media was positioned as a radical new social and creative medium in the 1980s and 1990s. The ensuing decades have seen this area become ubiquitous mass media with structural inequalities, centralized ownership, environmental damage, and precarious labor conditions. At the same time, it has become the language of our time and remains a site of creativity and intervention and offers opportunities for social changes. This course provides an introduction to key issues in this area through the lens of race and ethnicity.
Introduces the digital tools and mediums available to contemporary art practices. Tools are explored from a historical and theoretical context and from a technical perspective through hands-on tutorials. A variety of artworks that use digital mediums are also examined. Covers photo and vector editors, sound and video editing, basic 3D modeling, and images and interactions generated by code. Students should have basic computer literacy.
What is sexually explicit imagery all about? Is it art, porn, trash, political hot potato, or hot commodity? This course enables students to critically explore these questions and more in an academic setting.
Students submit petition to sponsoring agency.
Combines an introduction to computer programming for beginners with special topics that are essential for the digital arts. Basic concepts of programming are developed in the JavaScript language and applied to digital arts media, such as algorithmically generated still images and animations in two and three dimensions, sound art, and music composition. Presentation of digital artwork in the theater and via the web are covered in detail.
Physical computing examines bodily sound, movement, and other physical phenomena as an interface to a computer or microcomputer. Students investigate electronics and devices for use in interactive art-making to create sculptural or installation-based projects. Students receive hands-on experience working with sensors, motors, switches, gears, lights, circuits, and hardware store devices to create kinetic and interactive works of art, programming and interface design. Students are billed a materials fee.
Examines computer interactivity and interface in art making through theory and practice. Students develop interactive installation and sculptural works of art. Assignments may include the acquisition and creation of digital images, two-dimensional animation, programming with MAX/MSP/Jitter, basic electronics and sensors, and digital video and audio. Discussions, readings, and critiques address content, aesthetics, concepts, and expression as well as a practical grasp of relevant software. Students are encouraged to develop research projects and explore experimental practices. Students are billed a materials fee.
An exploration of the video medium including production using the digital video format. Digital video cameras will be used to produce digital source material to be manipulated in a non-linear digital editing system. Image manipulation, effects, and editing will be explored. A variety of video structures, theories, concepts, and forms will be examined through production, discussions, and viewing students' and artists' work.
Introduces animation techniques, practices, history, and theories. Students learn techniques and process in 2D, stop-motion, and digital animation. Projects teach students the workflow of animating including script development, storyboarding, frame-by-frame animation, animatic, digital, and post-production. Students are required to research artists, both historical and contemporary, working in the field of animation and to be able to discuss the work. The course teaches theoretical and historical perspectives on animation and requires students to develop a critical analysis and vocabulary. (Formerly Introduction to 2D Animation).
Introduction to imagining, producing, and creating stop motion animations. Includes hands-on work in storyboarding, drawing and paper-based animation, pixalization, animation of everyday objects, and Claymation with basic characters and sets. Historical and contemporary animations will be viewed in class to inspire animation ideas, aesthetics, and practices. Students are billed a materials fee. (Formerly Introduction to Stop Motion Animation.)
Independent and collaborative creative projects using advanced computer methods. May include networking projects, virtual representations, interactive multimedia, installation, performance, 3D modeling and animation, or robotics. Emphasis on advanced critical and experimental approaches to computers as a unique art medium, and contemporary research issues. Students are required to enroll in scheduled lab section. Students are billed for a materials fee. (Formerly Introduction to 3D Modeling and Animation.).
This project-centered studio course introduces 2D animation concepts, history, techniques and contemporary practices, production strategies, processes, and tools from a practical approach rooted in a historical/theoretical context. During each project's development, students research artists working within relevant categories and/or topics of animation, presenting findings to assist in their creative process.
Provides students with firsthand experience developing new media artworks in relationship to the needs of specific communities and social struggles. Students develop content using new media practices, tools, systems, and strategies. The final artwork can utilize video, film, digital media, social networks, and app development, among other new media art forms. Students are billed for a materials fee.
Work moves toward individual directions in drawing. A variety of media are explored. Each student is expected to do 150 hours of drawing over the quarter. Students are billed a materials fee.
Focuses on drawing from the human figure and exploring the figure for the purpose of personal expression and social communication. Intended for the intermediate/advanced drawing student. Students are billed a materials fee.
This course stresses alternative drawing processes, techniques, and materials. Intended for the intermediate or advanced student. Students are billed a materials fee.
This drawing/painting class is taught using New Yorker magazine covers as examples of illustration at a level of excellence that is accessible and which are examined for content and formal qualities. Work is done in drawing and painting media; some digital and mixed media may be incorporated. Painting will be water-based. Wit, humor, restraint, and sophistication are discussed, as well as inclusivity, exclusivity, and explicit and implicit social issues.
Special topics in drawing as announced. Students are billed a materials fee.
Explorations of the role of an artist as someone who integrates a variety of media to explore conscious subject matter. Emphasis on contemporary art forms that incorporate scores, mapping, found objects, time-based elements, and interactivity. Students are billed a materials fee. (Formerly Introduction to Intermedia.)
Investigation in combining media, materials, and forms to explore a variety of contemporary art practices. Students develop their projects thematically throughout the quarter. Assignments encourage experimentation with time and motion, text and images, collaboration, installation, performance, and interactivity. Discussions, reading handouts, and critiques further the development of perceptual and conceptual skills. Skill workshops introduce new techniques. Students are billed a materials fee.
Special subjects to be offered by regular staff or visiting artists as announced. Students are billed a materials fee.
Workshops introduce further investigation of materials and techniques. Students explore diverse methods of visual communication through a series of projects that require individual research and collaborative efforts. Students are encouraged to develop projects according to their motivation, expertise, and self-assessment. Emphasis placed on contemporary studio practices of installation, students will integrate a variety of materials and metaphor within the architectural and environmental space. Students are billed a materials fee.
Introduces students to environmental art and design through basic concepts, techniques, and studio practice. Students are billed for a materials fee.
Introduction to the fundamentals of architectural design. To convey their concepts clearly, students are introduced to visual representation techniques, including orthographic projections and paraline drawing. Students are also introduced to representation techniques of abstraction and perception, including diagramming and mapping. Students are billed a materials fee.
Studio addresses issues of race, gender, culture, personal identity, and visual representation. Examines ways ideas of identity are given visual form and communicated in fine arts and mass media. Students research ways traditionally underrepresented groups in society have been and are being represented in mass media; they then visually interpret that information in forms of visual artifacts. This process and interpretation serve as springboard to examination of expanded ideas of identity, including personal and/or family culture and history, gender, and ethnicity. Encourages use of broad range of mediums available to construct visual representations of identity. Students are billed a materials fee.
Exploring interactive strategies for making art. Projects experiment with combining forms and mediums to engage an audience. Students are billed a materials fee.
Continuation of the development of a basic foundation in painting with emphasis on the development of individual, experimental procedures. A foundation in drawing is recommended. Students are billed a materials fee.
Students learn the classical practice of painting the nude figure from life using traditional oil painting techniques. Students study short poses, limited color, and graduate to long pose, full color. Students are billed a materials fee. (Formerly course 102A.)
Exploration of abstract painting through studio work, lectures, and critiques with emphasis on progressive abstraction, minimalism, op art, and abstract expressionism as well as other 20th-century and 21st-century forms. A foundation in drawing is recommended. Students are billed a materials fee.
Explores contemporary landscape through the practice of plein air painting. Observational plein air painting will provides the foundation for the class. Instruction includes technical instruction in materials and technique as well as conceptual material. Student may work with oils, alkyds, or acrylic on panels, paper, or canvas.
Explores the materials and history of painting through lectures, demonstrations, and practice in oils, egg tempera, distemper, and Flashe paint. Students participate in group practices and also work independently on projects designed by them in consultation with the instructor. A foundation in drawing is recommended. Students are billed for a materials fee.
Special studies in painting as announced. A foundation in drawing is recommended. Students are billed a materials fee.
Students concentrate on darkroom practices and explore visual ideas, directing their work toward individualized goals. Required work includes making photographic prints, reading historical and theoretical works, and examination of photographs. Students are billed a materials fee.
Explores the processes, materials, and techniques of large-format photography. Students learn the concepts and theories related to the view camera. Emphasizes advanced understanding of negative exposure, sheet-film processing, tonal-range manipulation, digital scanning, and large-format output. Contemporary issues and concepts explored.
The natural evolution from still image making to motion picture image making is at the heart of this course as students look at this evolution from a historical, social, conceptual, and technical perspective. Artists who have been primarily working in still photography will learn to transition to visual storytelling through the lens of cinematography by addressing the technical requirements necessary to create motion pictures. Advanced discussions on film and digital formats, quality and quantity of light, exposure, composition, movement, camera support systems, and coverage for post-production will be explored through a combination of screenings, assignments, and readings. Students are billed a materials fee.
Explores historical and contemporary ways in which photography has been used to examine social issues and invites students to produce work that responds to issues that are important to them. We will learn about photograph's historical significance in raising social awareness, analyzing the aesthetic and methodological strategies of modern and contemporary photographers seeking to catalyze economic, political and cultural change through the production of images. Students are billed a materials fee.
Offers students the unique opportunity to live and learn and photograph outside the classroom, actively engaging locations across the state of California. Students will cover 2400 miles from Northern Mendocino County to the Salton Sea, Eastern Sierra, Death Valley, and Big Sur. Class exposes students to cultural, historical, and environmental issues facing California. Due to the rigor of the course, students must submit an application demonstrating the commitment and photo preparation necessary for successful completion of the class. Students are billed a materials fee.
Concentrates on photographic project development, developing analytical skills designed to help direct students' own photographic ideas. Helps students create a conceptual theoretical framework through image-making in the field and studio, through critique and discussion, through readings, and by studying the work of artists. Students are billed a materials fee.
Students produce a portfolio of photographs, read historical and theoretical works, and study photographs and other art works. Students are billed a materials fee.
Special studies in photography, concentrating on specific subject matter or media. Topics may include documentary photography, landscape, alternative processes, or mixed media. Students are billed a materials fee.
Introduces the contemporary monotype, monoprint, and mixed media print processes facilitating a crossover between painting, drawing, and printmaking. Through lectures, demonstrations, and discussions on topics and class assignments, students will expand their creative possibilities in this exciting medium. Students are billed a materials fee.
Explores traditional, contemporary, and experimental processes, issues, and concepts of relief and mono/mixed media printmaking. Students gain in-depth information and working knowledge to specialize individual ideas and build artistic development through varieties of class activities.
Explores the history of printing from the world's oldest printed text developed in Korea to the latest cutting-edge technology, including laser cutting. Students study many aspects of both traditional and contemporary relief (woodblock) printmaking, both materials, tools, and techniques and the issues, concepts and history of the field. Through various class activities, field trips and cultural visits (to UNESCO World Heritage Sites) in Korea, students will be exposed to diverse and multi-regional art practices that will broaden their perspectives and increase their understanding not only in the fields of print media but in the larger contemporary visual culture.
Introduces students to various methods used in making intaglio prints. Encourages individual artistic growth of imagery and technique through assignments designed to explore the medium. Includes discussion and critique of work with equal emphasis on technique and concept. Students are billed a materials fee.
This presentation of advanced intaglio techniques emphasizes a variety of multi-plate color printing and photo etching processes. The course concentrates on individual development in style and concept through the intaglio process. Students are billed a materials fee.
Introduction to drawing, processing, and printing of lithographs from stone. Emphasis on discovery of tonal, textural, and expressive potential from the surface of the stone, while establishing individual directions in imagery. Condensed history of the medium, technical theory, and critique in lecture and demonstrations. Students are billed a materials fee.
Continuation of course 163A. Introduction of tusche wash, aluminum plates, transfers, photo-lithography (computer interface), and multiple color techniques. Emphasis on experimentation, refinement of craft and approach, defining individual imagery, and expanding scale. Further investigation of the history of the medium and contemporary practice. Students are billed a materials fee.
Examines the wonders of visual magnification of the natural world by using enlargement lenses, scanner, and microscopes to create photo-based and autographic prints that enhance strange and unperceived realities. Visits to the UCSC Norris Center for Natural History, Thimann's Roof Garden and Greenhouse will provide opportunities to explore natural world specimens for projects. Students are billed a materials fee.
Introduces water-based screen printing. Students are introduced to processes including basic equipment, printing techniques, printing papers, stenciling processes, and photographic and digital techniques. Emphasis is on continued development of content and aesthetic awareness through the possibilities of screen printing. Students are billed a materials fee.
Introduces water-based screen printing processes including basic equipment, printing techniques, printing papers, stenciling processes, and photographic and digital techniques. Emphasis is on continued development of content and aesthetic awareness through the possibilities of screen printing.
Explores a unique approach reviewing the printed images in visual communications. A wide blend of traditional and cutting-edge print media processes with an interdisciplinary focus will be taught for conceptualizing, producing, and presenting the printed image. Students are billed a materials fee.
Introduction to production of small edition books and multiples utilizing sequential visual imaging, narrative content, and mixed media in bookmaking. Provides instruction in conceptualizing, producing, and distributing printed artists' multiples. Ideas encouraged within a broad range of possibilities via the format of artists' books. Students are billed a materials fee.
Intermediate/advanced studio course exploring the processes, history, and the recent developments in contemporary photomechanical printmaking. Through experimentation and research students learn how to utilize photographic imagery, blending them in multiple layers and colors, thereby facilitating articulation of their conceptual foundations. Students are billed a materials fee.
Special studies in printmaking, as announced. Students are billed for a materials fee.
In-depth exploration of art in the public sphere. Students build an understanding of public art sparked by practical experience designing and developing projects. Theoretical aspects of contemporary public art, and an introduction to the range of current public art practices will be introduced through readings, lectures, and artist's talks. The combination of practical hands-on technique and theoretical ideology will enable students to fully develop their own project within the class. Students are billed a materials fee.
Expands traditional definitions of art making taking art beyond the museum. Students take art making to the streets. We explore art making in the public sphere from murals to graffiti, street art to shop dropping, protests to public commissioned projects and community engaged interventions.
More advanced fabrication techniques in sculpture using wood, metal, industrial, and other materials. Techniques include carpentry and woodshop skills, and an introduction to sculptural forms, processes, and ideas. Demonstrations, slide lectures, and critical discussion of work help develop technical and conceptual skills. Students are billed a materials fee.
Explores strategies artists use to engage political subject matter in the 21st century. Students create their own projects, research and test approaches, techniques and strategies learning from the ways national and international artists encode and convey information in creating political work. Methods range from community collaboration; to tactical culture jamming, participatory collaborative projects, activism and intervention, symbolic and gestural work, artist-led projects, performances and community projects. Students are billed a materials fee.
A research-based, studio art class in which students experiment with ideas and processes, and pursue projects exploring the materiality of color, including social and cultural effects and environmental implications. Following a sequence of short assignments paired with class critiques, students design and complete their own research-based art projects (in any media) that investigate color as a material phenomenon. Class discussions address physical, perceptual, psychological, geological, biological, cultural, social, political, philosophical and aesthetic aspects of color in concert with readings, guest lectures, field trips, technical demonstrations and visual presentations. Students harvest, make, and use dyes from plant materials grown at the UCSC Farm, and contribute to the ongoing development of a dye garden on campus. Students are billed for a materials fee.
Focus on teaching intermediate to advanced students the processes and techniques of direct metal fabrication for contemporary sculpture and design. Explores a range of welding, cutting, and forming techniques and processes through demonstrations, slide lectures, field trips, and studio time. Demonstrations, slide lectures, and critical discussion of work help develop technical and conceptual skills. Students are billed a materials fee.
Emphasizes the conceptual aspects of 3D art and design using the laser cutter to prototype and experiment with construction methods and materials to create, represent, respond to, and reflect on 3D forms in space. Students learn about mixed-media fabrication techniques, materials, and processes that include using a woodshop and metal-fabrication shop. The course is structured around assignments that develop individual expressiveness, research skills, creative industry, and class participation. Students are billed a materials fee. (Formerly 3D Art and Design Studio 1.)
Expands 3D art and design principles, methodologies, process, and skills via structured projects using 3D printers and modeling. The metal-fabrication shop and the woodshop allow students to prototype and experiment with construction methods and materials used to develop assignments. The course is structured around assignments that develop critical thinking, individual industry, research skills, creative expressiveness, and class participation. Students are billed a materials fee. (Formerly 3D Art and Design Studio 2.)
This intermediate/advanced course provides the information and facilities necessary to express ideas through the indirect process of metal casting. The lost wax method is used to manifest ideas in sculpture. Lectures and demonstrations are combined with work time in class. Students generate sculpture forms in wax then gate, invest, weld, chase, patina, and present at least one finished piece. Students are billed a materials fee. May be repeated for credit.
Special topics in sculpture as announced, concentrating on specific aspects of subject matter and media. Students are billed a materials fee.
Provides practice in using writing as a tool to support creative work--to generate ideas, to critically analyze and interpret artworks, and to communicate clearly with others about one's own work. Lectures, discussions, and visiting artist talks introduce and explore contemporary art contexts, ideas, discourses, artworks, artists, and practices to build students' capacities to place their work in the world. Readings introduce and unfold ideas for discussion, and provide examples of writing formats and purposes as they relate to art practice.
Advanced senior art majors create and complete a senior project to fulfill their comprehensive graduation requirement. Focuses on a weekly lecture, studio work, peer critique, and professional practices such as the documentation and exhibition of work. Students are billed for a materials fee.
Designed for art majors at the upper-division level. Each student assists in a lower-division art course under the direct supervision of a faculty member. Students assist in technical instruction, critiques, and class discussions. May not be repeated for credit. Does not count toward upper-division major requirements. Enrollment restricted to art majors.
Teaching of a lower-division seminar under faculty supervision. (See course 42.) Students should have upper-division standing with a proposal supported by a faculty member willing to supervise. Students submit petition to sponsoring agency.
Supervised off-campus study conducted under the immediate and direct guidance of a faculty supervisor. To be used primarily by upper-division students doing part-time off-campus study. Students submit petition to sponsoring agency. Petitions may be obtained in the Art Department Office.
A non-media specific class introducing a range of contemporary visual practices, contexts, issues, forms, and UCSC resources of use to artists, emphasizing relationships between material, form, meaning and between private expression, public communication, and systems of exchange. Students are billed a materials fee.
Student will concentrate on completing work for comprehensive exhibition under the direction of his or her art adviser, with help from other faculty as needed. Students submit petition to sponsoring agency. (Formerly Senior Project.)
Individual study in areas approved by sponsoring instructors. Students submit petition to sponsoring agency.
Provides for department-sponsored independent study programs off campus for which faculty supervision is not in person (e.g., supervision is by correspondence). Students submit petition to sponsoring agency.
Individual study in areas approved by sponsoring instructors. Students submit petition to sponsoring agency. Students are billed a materials fee.
Tutorial
Independent study or research for graduate students. Students submit petition to sponsoring agency.