Curated Guides > Syllabus > World Art History Syllabus
World Art History Syllabus
This one-semester world art history course looks at art across time and across continents, with a focus on works of art that tell stories of cross-cultural exchange.
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Collapse AllStudying art’s history helps us develop empathy for people in the past and for cultures different from our own. This unit offers both a critical look at the discipline of art history and offers “brief histories” that provide a foundation for the course material.
World map (underlying map © Google)
- Why art history? Developing empathy
- Why you don’t like art history
- What is art history and where is it going?
- Who was left out of art’s history (until recently)?
- Why are there so few female artists?
- An interview with Fred Wilson about the conventions of museums and race
- Background
- Common questions about dates
- The five major world religions
- The earliest art
- Bhimbetka cave paintings
- Apollo 11 Cave Stones
- Camelid sacrum in the shape of a canine
- Lion Man
- Warty pig cave painting in Sulawesi, Indonesia
- What are the five major world religions, and do they differ in their approach to religious images?
- What are some of the reasons women are under-represented in museums and galleries today?
- How has art history changed?
- What are some of the definitions of art offered in this unit?
- What does the earliest art discovered tell us about human beings many thousands of years ago?
- Ancient (c. 3000 B.C.E. to c. 400 C.E.)
- Middle Ages / medieval (c. 400 C.E. to c. 1400 C.E.)
- Renaissance (c. 1400 to 1600)
- Early Modern (c. 1600–1800)
- Modern (after c. 1800)
- Hinduism
- Judaism
- Buddhism
- Christianity
- Islam
Key Questions
Key Terms
This unit begins with an image of a woman created on a rock wall from around 6000 B.C.E. in Northern Africa. In ancient Egypt, between 5000–3000 B.C.E. artistic conventions expressing the ideology of kingship were established that would last millennia, and south of Egypt, in Nubia, we find the kingdom of Kush (about 2500–1500 B.C.E.), the oldest sub-Saharan African kingdom.
Map of Africa (underlying map © Google)
- Introduction
- Historical overview: to 1600
- Algeria
- Prehistoric
- Running Horned Woman, Tassili n’Ajjer, Algeria
- Egypt
- Predynastic
- Predynastic and Early Dynastic, an introduction
- Palette of King Narmer
- Old Kingdom
- King Menkaure (Mycerinus) and queen
- New Kingdom
- Temple of Amun-Re and the Hypostyle Hall, Karnak
- Mortuary Temple and Large Kneeling Statue of Hatshepsut
- Hunefer’s Judgement in the presence of Osiris
- Ptolemaic period
- The Rosetta Stone
- Roman period
- The Temple of Dendur
- Sudan
- Ancient Nubia
- Ancient Nubia and the Kingdom of Kush, an introduction
- Pylon of the Nubian Lion Temple at Naga
- What are the dangers in bringing our own assumptions to works of art?
- What are the longstanding artistic conventions that emerge during the Old Kingdom period in ancient Egypt?
- What are some unique characteristics of the art of ancient Nubia?
- scarification
- Nile
- hieroglyphic writing
- votive objects
- ka
- Giza plateau
- Old Kingdom, Middle Kingdom, New Kingdom
- pylon
- hypostyle hall
- clerestory
- Kingdom of Kush
- Pharaoh / Pharaonic period
- Greco-Roman
- Mummification
- Second Aswan (High) Dam
- cavetto cornice
Key Questions
Key Terms
Pyramids, large cities with apartment complexes, temples, images of deities, animals, rulers, small life-like figurines—there is an abundance of visual culture from the ancient Americas to learn about.
Map of North America and South America (underlying map © Google)
- United States
- Clovis
- Clovis culture
- Moundbuilders
- Poverty Point, Louisiana
- Mexico
- Mesoamerica, an introduction
- Tlatilco
- Tlatilco Figurines
- Olmec
- Olmec Colossal Heads
- The Lord of Las Limas
- Teotihuacan
- Pyramid of the Moon and Pyramid of the Sun, Teotihuacan
- Costa Rica and Nicaragua
- Doe Shaman Effigy
- Peru
- Introduction to Ancient Andean Art
- Cupisnique
- Feline-Head Bottle
- Chavín
- Chavín de Huántar
- Complexity and vision: the Staff God at Chavín de Huántar and beyond
- Why is the term “pre-Columbian” problematic?
- How do we see the theme of transformation (one thing changing into another) in the art of the Americas from this period?
- Why is some art from this unit described as “deliberately complex, confusing, and esoteric”?
- celt
- Clovis point
- Andean
- Mesoamerica
- Olmec
- Prehistoric
- Pre-Columbian
- shaman
- stele
- slip
Key Questions
Key Terms
From the world’s first cities and settlements, this unit looks at works of art meant to honor the gods, encode laws, celebrate a ruler, accompany the dead into the afterlife, mark documents, and store rice or warm wine.
Map of Asia and Oceania (underlying map © Google)
- Iraq
- Sumerian
- White Temple and ziggurat, Uruk
- Standard of Ur and other objects from the Royal Graves
- Babylonian
- Law Code Stele of King Hammurabi
- Assyrian
- Lamassu from the citadel of Sargon II
- Pakistan
- Indus Valley Civilization
- The Priest-King sculpture from the Indus Valley Civilization
- Dancing Girl from Mohenjo-daro
- Thailand
- Ban Chiang, a prehistoric archaeological site
- China
- Liangzhu culture
- Jade Cong
- Shang dynasty
- Tigers, dragons, and, monsters on a Shang Dynasty Ewer
- Japan
- Jōmon period
- Deep bowl and Dogū, Jōmon period
- Korea
- Gold belt buckle, Seokam-ri Tomb 9 (Pyongyang)
- Oceania
- Lapita
- Terracotta fragments, Lapita people
- What can we learn about ancient cultures from studying archaeological sites?
- Many of the works in this unit come from gravesites. What can these works tell us about the cultures that made them?
- What can we learn about ancient cultures from their surviving pottery?
- Uruk
- ziggurat
- theocracy
- stele
- cuneiform
- metallurgy
- stratigraphy
- striations
- Shang dynasty
- slip
- James Cook
- anthropomorphic
- looting
Key Questions
Key Terms
This unit takes us to famous sites like Stonehenge (England) and the Parthenon (Greece), and ends with the ancient Roman Republic—soon to be replaced by the Roman Empire, in 27 B.C.E.
Map of Europe (underlying map © Google)
- England
- Neolithic
- Stonehenge
- Ireland
- Neolithic
- Newgrange, a prehistoric tomb in Ireland
- Greece
- Ancient Aegean
- An introduction to the ancient Aegean
- Early Cycladic figurines
- The Treasury of Atreus
- Archaic
- Kouroi and Korai, an introduction
- Euphronios, Sarpedon Krater
- Early Classical
- Polykleitos, Doryphoros (Spear-Bearer)
- Classical
- The Parthenon, Athens
- Hellenistic
- Nike (Winged Victory) of Samothrace
- Italy
- Etruscan
- Tomb of the Triclinium
- Roman Republic
- Head of a Roman Patrician
- Temple of Portunus, Rome
- When a culture didn’t have written language, or used a language we have not been able to translate, interpreting the meaning of a work of art or a site can be difficult. What evidence can we use to understand these ancient cultures?
- What do Polykleitos’s Doryphoros (Spear-Bearer) and the Parthenon have in common? What does this reveal about what was important to the ancient Greeks?
- Explain the terms “ideal” and “real” and how they are useful for understanding the art of this period.
- trilithon
- hoard
- contrapposto
- canon
- trafficking
- Roman Republic
- Kouros (plural, Kouroi)
- Kore (plural, Korai)
- Acropolis
- Athens
- Athena
- Doric, Ionic
- Pericles
- triglyphs and metopes
- tholos
- corbelling
Key Questions
Key Terms
This unit begins with a mummy from Egypt when it was under Roman rule, and then explores the growth of Christianity in Egypt and East Africa followed by the rise of Islam.
Mummy of Herakleides, 120–140 C.E. (Romano-Egyptian), human and bird remains, linen, pigment, beeswax, and wood (The Getty Villa, Los Angeles)
- Egypt
- Roman period
- Mummy of Herakleides
Getty conversations - Byzantine and Coptic
- Byzantine Egypt and the Coptic period, an introduction
- The Red Monastery, Sohag
- Abu Mena
- Ethiopia
- Aksum
- City of Aksum
- The kingdom of Aksum
- Libya
- Ancient Roman Empire
- Leptis Magna
- Sudan
- Nubia
- Medieval Nubian Kingdoms, an introduction
- Tunisia
- Ancient Roman Empire
- Amphitheater of El Jem
- Aghlabid
- Arts of the Islamic world: The early period
- Kairouan (from UNESCO)
- The Great Mosque of Kairouan
- How do we see ancient Roman culture in North Africa?
- Describe the Coptic period in Egypt and the architecture that served Christians there.
- Describe the significance of the city of Kairouan and its mosque.
- Geʽez
- Maghreb
- Kairouan
- Nubia
- hypostyle
- minaret
- qibla wall
- mihrab
- tempera paint
- Osiris
- Coptic
- Umayyad
- Abbasid
- Aghlabid
Key Questions
Key Terms
This unit begins by exploring the cosmology of Han China and ends with the Kaaba and the Dome of the Rock, the most sacred structures in the Muslim faith. Significant Hindu, Buddhist, Jewish, and Christian art and architecture are also discussed.
Mirror with game board design and animals of the four directions, 1st–2nd century C.E. (Han dynasty, China), bronze with black patina, 16.8 cm diameter (The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)
- China
- Han dynasty
- Mirror with game board design and animals of the four directions
- Tang dynasty
- An introduction to tomb figurines, Tang dynasty
- Japan
- Kofun period
- Haniwa Warrior
- Korea
- Three Kingdoms period
- Gold and jade crown, Silla Kingdom and beyond
- Gilt-bronze pensive bodhisattva (National Treasure 78)
- Pakistan
- Gandharan
- Gandharan sculpture
- India
- Chola dynasty
- Queen or goddess?
- Vietnam
- Chams
- Mỹ Sơn Hindu temple complex
- Israel/Palestine
- Late Antique
- Mosaic decoration at the Hammath Tiberias synagogue
- Umayyad
- The Dome of the Rock (Qubbat al-Sakhra)
- Saudi Arabia
- The Kaaba
- Egypt
- Byzantine
- Icon with Virgin (Theotokos) and Child between Saints Theodore and George
- How can the Dome of the Rock be understood at the intersection of Islam, Christianity, and Judaism?
- How was the Queen Sembian sculpture transformed when in use?
- How do some of the works in this unit address different concerns and beliefs about the afterlife?
- Discuss the use of different materials and what they signify (for example, mosaic, bronze, and gold)?
- TLV mirror
- Han dynasty
- Tang dynasty
- Gandhara
- Silk Road
- Chang’an
- Kofun period
- Three Kingdoms period
- Silla kingdom
- bodhisattva
- diaspora
- hajj
Key Questions
Key Terms
This unit explores cities and cultures that once thrived in what is now the United States and Mexico, Central America, and the Andean region in South America.
Yoke, c. 1–900 C.E. (Classic Veracruz culture), greenstone, 11.5 x 38 x 41.5 cm (American Museum of Natural History, New York)
- Mexico
- Classic Veracruz
- The Mesoamerican ballgame and a Classic Veracruz yoke
- Maya
- Vessel with a mythological scene
- Yaxchilán—Lintels 24 and 25 from Structure 23 and structures 33 and 40
- United States
- Moundbuilders
- Fort Ancient Culture: Great Serpent Mound
- Ancestral Puebloan
- Introduction to Chaco Canyon
- Panama
- Isthmian
- Mirror Pendant in the Form of a Bat-Human From Grave 5, Sitio Conte
- Peru
- Moche
- Funerary bundle of the Señora de Cao
- Pair of Earflares, Winged Messengers
- Wari
- A Wari tunic
- Wari feather panels
- Bolivia
- Tiwanaku
- Semi-subterranean Court at the site of Tiwanaku
- Ecuador
- Jama-Coaque
- Jama-Coaque ceramics
- Colombia
- Muisca
- Muisca Raft
- Explain the symbolism of gold and silver in Moche culture.
- How did the Wari use the cochineal beetle when making tunics?
- Discuss the different depictions of animals in some of the art in this unit.
- How are the two faces at the ends of the Classic Veracruz yoke described?
- Tiwanaku
- Wari
- Andean
- Mesoamerica
- lintel
- yoke
- ballgame
- Puebloan
- effigy
- anthropomorphic
- cinnabar
- encaustic
- Fort Ancient Culture
- slip
Key Questions
Key Terms
This unit covers the Roman Empire and Medieval Europe, the rise of Christianity, and the contributions of Judaism and Islam to the visual culture of this period.
Ara Pacis Augustae (Altar of Augustan Peace), 9 B.C.E., marble (Ara Pacis Museum, Rome; photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
- Italy
- Ancient Roman Empire
- Ara Pacis Augustae
- Column of Trajan
- The Pantheon (Rome)
- Early Christian and Byzantine
- Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus
- Santa Maria Antiqua
- Basilica of Santa Sabina, Rome
- San Vitale and the Justinian and Theodora Mosaics
- Turkey
- Byzantine
- Hagia Sophia, Istanbul
- England
- Medieval
- Sutton Hoo Ship Burial
- The Lindisfarne Gospels
- Germany
- Carolingian
- Palatine Chapel, Aachen
- Ottonian
- Cross of Lothair II
- Spain
- Umayyad
- The Great Mosque of Córdoba
- What material made the construction of the Pantheon possible?
- What religion is practiced in the Great Mosque of Córdoba today?
- What is the connecting theme of the mosaics of San Vitale?
- Pax Romana
- acanthus
- Dacia
- coffer
- sarcophagus
- palimpsest
- basilica
- centrally-planned space
- mosaic
- tesserae
- fibula
- carpet page
- spolia
- mihrab
- vellum
Key Questions
Key Terms
The diversity of societies, languages, and cultures in Africa is unique in the world and the continent’s art responds to both ancient traditions and modern urban life. The violence of European colonialism gave way in the 20th and 21st centuries to independence movements and art informed by global modernisms.
Double Egg Pendant from Igbo-Ukwu, Nigeria, c. 9th–11th century C.E., leaded bronze, 8-1/2 inches (National Museum, Lagos, Nigeria)
- Nigeria
- Igbo-Ukwu
- Igbo-Ukwu
- Kingdom of Benin
- Benin Plaques
- Zimbabwe
- Great Zimbabwe
- Great Zimbabwe
- Tanzania
- Kilwa Kisiwani, Tanzania
- Democratic Republic of Congo
- Kongo
- Power Figure (Nkisi Nkondi), Kongo peoples
- Gabon
- Kota reliquary (mbulu ngulu)
- Mali
- Djenné
- Great Mosque of Djenné (Djenné peoples)
- Timbuktu
- Saving Timbuktu’s manuscripts
- 20th century
- Malick Sidibé, Nuit de Noël (Happy Couple)
- Ethiopia
- Solomonic dynasty
- Gospel Book
Getty Conversations - 20th century
- Battle of Adwa
- Skunder Boghossian, Night Flight of Dread and Delight
- South Africa
- 20th century
- Santu Mofokeng, Train Churches
- How do notions of protection and preservation inform some of the art in this unit?
- How do some of the works in this unit bring together multiple visual traditions or cultures?
- Bits of ceramic from a distant culture can be found embedded in the walls at Kilwa. Where did these vessels come from and how did they get there?
- Swahili
- skeuomorphic
- crotales
- lost-wax casting technique
- biomorphic
- pan-African
- Primitivism
- afrofuturism
- diaspora
- Emperor Menelik
- Shona peoples
- apartheid
- Afrapix Collective
- struggle photography
- power figure
Key Questions
Key Terms
The Indigenous peoples of the Americas created works of art and architecture that both built on and diverged from the traditions established by their ancestors. In the 16th century, Europeans began colonizing, enslaving people, and extracting resources in the Americas. The troubled legacies of these cultural entanglements continue to inform the art and architecture of these continents.
Terraces visible at left, Machu Picchu, Peru, c. 1450–1540 (photo: Matthew Paulson, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
- Peru
- Inka
- Machu Picchu
- Viceroyalty of Peru
- Luis de Riaño and Indigenous collaborators, The Paths to Heaven and Hell, Church of San Pedro de Andahuaylillas
- Brazil
- Kayapó
- Kayapó Headdress: a glimpse of life in the Amazon rainforest
- 20th century
- Tarsila do Amaral, Abaporú
- Puerto Rico
- Spanish Caribbean
- José Campeche, Portraitist of 18th-century Puerto Rico
- Mexico
- Mexica (Aztec)
- The Templo Mayor and the Coyolxauhqui Stone
- Viceroyalty of New Spain
- Screen with the Siege of Belgrade and Hunting Scene (or Brooklyn Biombo)
- Romanticism
- José María Velasco, The Valley of Mexico from the Santa Isabel Mountain Range
- Surrealism
- Frida Kahlo, The Two Fridas (Las dos Fridas)
- United States
- Antebellum period
- David Drake, Double-handled jug
- Abstract Expressionism
- Jackson Pollock, Autumn Rhythm
- Contemporary
- Pepón Osorio, En la barbería no se llora (No Crying Allowed in the Barbershop)
- Wendy Red Star, 1880 Crow Peace Delegation
- Who would have worn the Kayapó headdress?
- How does the Brooklyn Biombo express the cultures of the Americas, Asia, and Europe?
- How does historical context add to the meaning of the Double-handled jug?
- What compelled Wendy Red Star to inscribe the historical photographs that are the basis of 1880 Crow Peace Delegation?
- Intihuatana
- Spanish conquest
- New Spain
- featherwork
- Manifesto Antropófago (Cannibalist Manifesto)
- monolith
- Tenochtitlan
- biombo
- enconchado
- Real Academia de San Carlos (Royal Academy of San Carlos)
- Abstract Expressionism
- unconscious
- Edgefield District
- kitsch / chucherías
- Medicine Crow
Key Questions
Key Terms
Although Asia is the largest continent in the world, religions, luxury goods, and ideas traveled along the Silk Roads and interconnected many peoples and cultures throughout the continent and into Europe. And although the Pacific is the largest ocean in the world, it’s seen as a connector rather than a separator by Oceania’s varied cultures. Artists in the modern era grapple with Asia’s long and complex histories.
The Master of the (Fishing) Nets Garden, Suzhou, China, originally designed by Shi Zhengzhi, 12th century (Southern Song Dynasty)
- China
- Song dynasty
- Master of the (Fishing) Nets Garden
- Yuan dynasty
- The David Vases
- Contemporary
- Ai Weiwei, Kui Hua Zi (Sunflower Seeds)
- Japan
- Heian period
- Illustrated scroll from the Tale of Genji
- Muromachi period
- Ryōanji (Peaceful Dragon Temple)
- Korea
- Goryeo dynasty
- Celadon Melon-shaped Bottle
- Iran
- Safavid
- The Court of Gayumars
- India
- Delhi Sultanate
- The Qutb complex and early Sultanate architecture
- Maratha Empire
- A Jain pilgrimage map of Shatrunjaya
- Contemporary
- Painting in Mithila, an introduction
- Tibet
- Wheel of Existence
- Oceania
- Voyage to the moai of Rapa Nui (Easter Island)
- How do we see ideas of pilgrimage and religious meditation in some of the works in this unit?
- Before turning to paper, on what surface did the women of Mithila paint?
- How do the traditions of different cultures come together in some of the works of art in this unit?
- How do ideas of travel and trade inform some of the works in this unit?
- Shahnameh
- apotropaic
- Jain
- Polynesian Triangle
- Zen Buddhism
- cobalt
- fukinuki yatai
- pilgrim / pilgrimage
- Goryeo dynasty
- bharni and kachni styles
- Chan Buddhism
- participatory art
- celadon
- moai
- pata
Key Questions
Key Terms
From a Gothic cathedral to a modern post office, European art has been shaped by, among other things, the Catholic Church, the rise of the nation-state, the Enlightenment, and the Industrial Revolution. Global colonial entanglements, wars of conquest, and the transatlantic slave trade also influenced the art of the continent.
Gloucester Cathedral, begun 1089 (photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
- England
- Gothic
- Gloucester Cathedral
- Italy
- Renaissance
- Michelangelo, David
- Baroque
- Artemisia Gentileschi, Judith Slaying Holofernes
- Belgium
- Baroque
- Peter Paul Rubens, Elevation of the Cross
- Portugal
- Renaissance
- The Cantino Planisphere
- The Netherlands
- Baroque
- Rachel Ruysch, Fruit and Insects
- France
- Renaissance
- Matthias Grünewald, Isenheim Altarpiece
- Impressionism
- A summer day in Paris: Berthe Morisot’s Hunting Butterflies
- Turkey
- Ottoman
- Mimar Sinan, Süleymaniye Mosque, Istanbul
- Ukraine
- Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
- The Gwoździec Synagogue
- Austria
- Vienna Secession
- Josef Maria Olbrich, The Secession Building
- Spain
- Cubism
- Pablo Picasso, Guernica
- Germany
- Contemporary
- Anselm Kiefer, Bohemia Lies by the Sea
- How did the legacy of classical (ancient Greek and Roman) art continue to influence the art of this period?
- How does the role of art change during this period?
- How has the placement of Michelangelo’s David changed its meaning?
- Ottoman
- flying buttress
- contrapposto
- Renaissance
- foreshortening
- Protestant Reformation
- Baroque
- still life
- Enlightenment
- Ottoman
- minaret
- Impressionism
- Secession
- en plein air
- polyptych
- Holocaust
