Art History and Visual Culture Rhodes University

Overview

More importantly, the course pays special attention to improving students reading and writing skills through written essays which the Art History and Visual Culture section has adopted as its principle student assessment method.

About the program

Although the focus of the course is history of art, both Western and African, a number of art historical discourses emerging from the Global South and African Diaspora are looked at. 

The Art History and Visual Culture program at Rhodes University is also structured in terms of themes, conceptual areas and cultural practices rather than in terms of a traditional historical approach in which students study the history of art as a sequence of periods and styles. In placing the emphasis on thematic modules, the intention is to equip students with critical and conceptual skills that would enable them to research selected areas of art history and visual culture independently.

Art History & Visual Culture courses are offered by the Department of Fine Art to students studying Fine Art Practice at Rhodes University as well as those who are not. For those studying Fine Art Practice as a major, Art History & Visual Culture is necessarily the second major in the degree (see Programmes). Students not studying Fine Art Practice may take Art History & Visual Culture as a credit for a year or two, and have the option of taking the course as a major.