Module Information
Course Delivery
Assessment
| Assessment Type | Assessment length / details | Proportion |
|---|---|---|
| Semester Assessment | Presentation (talk, performance or artistic response to an artwork featured in one of the lectures.) 20 Minutes | 50% |
| Semester Assessment | Research Essay Critical case study in adaptation of a cultural product existing in at least three different media. 2000 Words | 50% |
| Supplementary Assessment | Personal Written Response to an artwork featured in one of the lectures. 2000 Words | 50% |
| Supplementary Assessment | Research Essay Critical case study in adaptation of a cultural product existing in at least three different media. 2000 Words | 50% |
Learning Outcomes
On successful completion of this module students should be able to:
Apply interdisciplinary approaches to the interpretation of works of art and visual culture
Debate the importance of the canon in literature and the visual arts
Understand the canonical uses and art historical biases of constructs such as ‘genius’ and ‘originality’
Engage with concepts such as appropriation, reflexivity and transience to assess the strategies and motivations underlying postmodern art and contemporary culture
Research, document and evaluate primary and secondary sources in relation to the subject
Brief description
The module approaches adaptation – or version making – as a regenerative take on past performances. It looks at adaptation within cultural, socio-political and ecological contexts, both as an adjustment to changing times and as a means of bringing about change through artistic vision and artful revision. It raises questions as to the underlying motivations of remaking and unmaking culture and invites reflections on responses such as nostalgia, camp and the uncanny. It asks why the move forward is indebted to looking back – in admiration, agony and anger.
This module aims to foster interdisciplinary approaches to art and culture, and encourage student critical thinking and thoughtful creativity, exploring and questioning notions of ‘art’ and ‘originality’.
Content
In a series of lectures and seminars, this interdisciplinary module investigates how artists adapt, translate, appropriate, remix, assimilate, transcode, reboot, and otherwise engage with art and culture. It explores relationships between form and content, genre and mode, integrity and hybridity, durability and transience, culture and commerce, as well as art and environmentalism. Why did Marcel Duchamp draw a moustache on the Mona Lisa? What happens when a novel inspires a movie which inspires a sculptor? The topics covered in classes investigate such questions through close analysis of a diverse range of cultural practices, which will draw from the latest developments in contemporary art practice, art historical knowledge, and the School of Art staff’s cutting-edge research and practice.
Module Skills
| Skills Type | Skills details |
|---|---|
| Communication | Articulating ideas through seminar discussions and presentations, as well as academic writing skills in the essay. |
| Improving own Learning and Performance | Independent study through seminar assignment research and preparation. |
| Information Technology | Information retrieval from various academic research portals and online museum collection databases. |
| Personal Development and Career planning | Emphasis on professional presentation of research and annotated bibliography using MLA style documentation. |
| Problem solving | In seminar preparation and discussion, essay research and writing, and in the examination. |
| Research skills | In seminar preparation, essay research and writing, and in the examination. |
| Subject Specific Skills | N/A (module is designed to be interdisciplinary) |
Notes
This module is at CQFW Level 6