Sketches of Spain: Imagining the Iberian World in Early Modernity

Catalog description

In 1764 the Indigenous artist Jose Manuel de la Cerda made a series of lacquerware trays (batea) depicting scenes from Virgil's Aeneid using a pre-Hispanic lacquer technique. Produced in west-central Mexico, these astounding objects--which combine Roman subject matter with distinctly Indigenous motifs and techniques--speak to the visual consequences of Mexico's status as both a colonial possession of Spain, and as a vital bastion of artistic innovation. This course uses objects like this one as a point of departure to investigate the art of the Iberian world--a world that extended far beyond the European continent during the 16th-18th centuries. In this course we will focus on the nexus of transpacific and transatlantic trade that facilitated the production of objects like the batea. We will explore the ways that maps, illustrated travelogues, frescos, paintings and prints worked alongside decorative objects such as feathered headdresses, weapons, and carved ivory statuettes in order to interrogate the place of material culture in the formation of knowledge. Readings will be drawn from art history, anthropology, and sociology and will highlight decolonial methodologies for understanding racial representation and the history of collecting. Themes will include Iberian conceptions of race, caste, limpieza de sangre (blood purity) and settler colonialism. Students will have the unique opportunity to work on the Public and Digital humanities publication Baroque Without Boundaries--a digital mapping intervention facilitated by the CWRU Freedman Center. Offered as ARTH 318 and ARTH 418 and HUMN 318 and HUMN 418 . Counts as a Communication Intensive course. Counts as a Human Diversity & Commonality course. Counts as a Understanding Global Perspectives course.