Ranging from ancient architecture to contemporary art and cultural studies, the broad scope of faculty specialization within the Department of Art History exhibits the diversity of approaches and topics that students can explore during their MAPH year. Those who wish to supplement their study in Art History with coursework in other areas often take classes in Cinema and Media Studies, Classics, Comparative Literature, East Asian Languages and Civilizations, English Language and Literature, Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, Latin American Studies, and Visual Arts.
Selected Faculty
Sample Courses
Who's to Blame for the Renaissance? (ARTH 32814) Winter 2027
Gombrich once called periodization a "necessary evil", an epistemological need that nonetheless distorts what it claims to describe. This seminar takes up the problem of periodization in art history, focusing on the division between medieval and Renaissance (or "early modern") Europe. We will read foundational accounts of stylistic change alongside critiques that question periodization's ideological underpinnings and its flattening of regional diversity. Case studies may include figures long credited with inaugurating new eras, such as Giotto, Van Eyck, and Dürer, as well as objects and images that resist tidy classification. Throughout, we will ask what such divisions enable and foreclose, how they shape canons and hierarchies, and whether the medieval/Renaissance boundary looks different when viewed from outside western Europe or from other disciplines entirely. Students are encouraged to bring questions about periodization from their own subfields to bear on our discussions. (Tamara Golan)
Art and Ethnography (ARTH 38303) Spring 2027
This course provides an overview of the intersections between art and ethnography, with a focus on modern and contemporary art of the Global South. The aim of the course is to equip advanced undergraduates and graduate students with historical and theoretical foundations in art and ethnography, as well as helpful skillsets for intensive field research, artistic or creative research, artist interviews, and critical/engaged ethnography. The first half of the course will focus on analyzing relevant texts and projects produced from the 1990s to the present; the latter half is dedicated to project workshops, with greater emphasis on sharing practical skills and familiarizing students with best practices for working in the “field.” The course will be especially useful for students across disciplines who plan to undertake field research in the near future, although those at earlier brainstorming stages are also welcome. (Soyoon Ryu)
Materiality and Artistic Intent: The Object, Conservation and Art History Suzanne Deal Booth Seminar (ARTH 37799) Autumn 2026
This course will investigate materiality in the context of art-historical study. Decades ago, technical art history was a burgeoning field of study among a small number of museum conservators, curators and scientists. Today curatorial/conservation partnerships are common and analytic methods to examine and characterize artworks are sophisticated and often nondestructive. The intersection of the three disciplines – art history, conservation and materials science – has made it possible to study art in a more holistic and objective manner to better understand art-making materials, methods of using them, and the conscious choices made by artists to achieve their aesthetic goals. Additionally, changes to works of art, whether the result of inherent instability, external environmental factors, or artist’s intent may be more readily identified and assessed. Case studies will be presented to show how artists’ methods and materials can be informative within a broader art-historical context. The course will address the meaningful integration of technical study into one’s own curatorial/art history practice. Students will examine works of art firsthand to determine the materials and methods used in their making, to assess their condition and to see how various manipulations of different art-making materials inform their appearance. Students will evaluate selected readings and recent technical studies. Class participation is encouraged and expected. (Harriet Stratis)
Approaches to Art History (ARTH 39800) Multiple offerings - required for MAPH students focusing on art history
This seminar examines a range of methods for doing the work of art history with an eye toward strengthening your own original contributions to the field. Through close reading and discussion of recently published scholarship, we will interrogate how art historians generate novel ways of seeing and understanding the objects that they study. This course will be structured around the framework of scale. What is the scale of art historical analysis? Moving from macro to micro, we will traverse units ranging from canons, empire, and environments to art scenes, institutions, and audiences, to the artist, the art object, and the fragment. We will examine how scholars constitute the objects of their criticism, the breadth and explanatory force of their arguments, and the ethics of their endeavors. This approach traverses perspectives from feminism and queer theory, post- and decolonial thought, Black studies, material culture, social history, and critical theory.
For an extended listing of classes and descriptions, visit the Art History course page.
Art History Specialization
The Art History Specialization allows students to structure their coursework and thesis around the study of Art History within MAPH. Students who complete the following requirements will receive an Art History notation on their transcript:
- MAPH Core Course (Foundations of Interpretive Theory)
- ARTH 39800: Approaches to Art History
- Enrollment in 3 additional graduate-level courses with an ARTH course number
- Thesis, creative or traditional, should be approved by one of the preceptors, or the Art History MAPH coordinator
Please direct any questions you may have about specializing in Art History to maph-support@uchicago.edu.
Curatorial Studies
Art history students may also be interested in the Curatorial Studies Specialization, which allows MAPH students to focus specifically on the object-driven research and skills that are central to the discipline of Art History as well as to professional or scholarly careers in museums, collections, and exhibition spaces.
Recent Art History Thesis Projects
"Surface as Evidence: Material Process and the Early Abstraction of Lillian Thomas Burwell"
Arletha Greer, MAPH '26
Advisor: Darby English
"The Movement and the Museum: Chicago Muralists at the MCA"
Evan DaYu Ling, MAPH '26
Advisor: Christine Mehring
“Fire Drilling at the Lower Temple of the Jaguars, Chichen Itza”
Michel Brun, MAPH ’25
Advisor: Claudia Brittenham
“Picturing the Self: Vernacular Photography Under Mao”
Peng Liu, MAPH ‘25
Advisor: Wei-Cheng Lin
"Sound as It Ought to Be Seen: Looking at Sound Art Again through Christine Sun Kim"
Christian Bumala, MAPH '24
Advisor: Christine Mehring
"Reframing Trance and Dance in Bali"
Luh Natalia Granquist, MAPH '24
Advisor: Carl Fuldner