AMST 584 - The Material Culture of America: Focus on Decorative Arts

Spring 3 Staff.

How do we describe the objects with which Americans have furnished their domestic and public buildings? What do they tell us about how American lived and what they thought about themselves, others, and their various worlds? From the time of the earliest seventeenth-century settlements until the present day, the decorative arts in America have both been closely tied to European heritage and to the colonies and nation. This course concentrates on artifacts made or used in America and explores issues of design, production, and distribution in relation to the changing American experience. (Not offered 2013-2014)