Art and Visual Culture

Professors Balco (chair) and Rand (Art and Visual Culture and Gender and Sexuality Studies); Associate Professors González Valencia and Nguyen; Assistant Professor Boomer (Art and Visual Culture, Classical and Medieval Studies, and Religious Studies); Visiting Assistant Professors Droge, King, and Nolan; Lecturer Dewsnap; Visiting Lecturer Fairbairn.

Visual literacy and visual acuity – looking with awareness and intention – are fundamental to liberal arts education. The Department of Art and Visual Culture centers creation and critique, providing foundations in studio practice and in contemporary and historical analysis, while attending to how power and privilege have shaped our fields in their local and global contexts. Students pursue interdisciplinary pathways to learning, situating making, materials and media, objects and monuments, and ideas and ideologies in new frames. 

The department offers majors in Studio Art and the History and Criticism of Art and Visual Culture, and a minor in History and Criticism of Art and Visual Culture. Students intending to study abroad must discuss fulfillment of major/minor requirements with their advisor and the department chair in advance.