Victorian Visions: Art, Industry and the Modern
| Module title | Victorian Visions: Art, Industry and the Modern |
|---|---|
| Module code | AHV3004 |
| Academic year | 2019/0 |
| Credits | 30 |
| Module staff | Professor Fabrizio Nevola (Convenor) |
| Duration: Term | 1 | 2 | 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Duration: Weeks | 11 |
| Number students taking module (anticipated) | 30 |
|---|
Module description
This module studies the intersection between the visual, literary, and decorative arts in Victorian Britain; it focuses on how these arts developed in conjunction with industrial innovation and the changing features of modern life. In the nineteenth century, art, industry and modernity were intertwined in complex, reciprocal and multifaceted ways. Victorian artists – of all kinds – had to engage with a key question – how to paint ‘modern life’ at a time when the traditional hierarchies and forms of art were disintegrating. The Great Exhibition heralded a new age in which art and industry would be combined in order to bring beauty to the masses. Verbal and visual modes were drawn closer together as the development of the realist novel was complemented by the popularity of narrative painting, while Aesthetes claimed that all arts should aspire to the perfection of music. At the same time, developments in visual technology such as the illustrated press, photography, and the cinematograph not only created a new world of popular art; they changed the period’s understanding of subjectivity and perception in ways that reverberated throughout culture. This module will explore these key issues through such fascinating topics as Technology and Visual Perception; Art and Industry and Word/Image. It will examine how key Victorian art movements including the Gothic Revival, Pre-Raphaelitism, Aestheticism and Arts and Crafts, was not only engaged with the modernity of the period but also intersected with literary developments.
Module aims - intentions of the module
This module aims to:
- introduce you to a range of disciplinary perspectives on the connection between art and industry in the Victorian period and the revolutionary impact of industrial innovation upon the fine arts
- examine the influence of technological, social and cultural change on the understanding of vision and perception in the nineteenth century
- introduce you to a diverse range of fields including the fine and applied arts, engraving, architecture, science and optical toys, and photography
- consider a wide range of images of Victorian modern life in paint and in print
- investigate links between texts, images and their social and cultural contexts.
The module will be taught through a 2 hour seminar and a 1 hour session that will include lectures, workshops with materials held in special collections, and a field trip to discover the Victorian architecture of Exeter. The hands-on approach of the workshop sessions will draw on the rich resources of the Bill Douglas Cinema Museum and the collections of the Royal Albert Memorial Museum. Victorian Visions is designed to work across disciplines. Art History and Visual Culture students will be given the tools necessary to read and interpret literary texts, and for English Literature students will be introduced to the study of images as a way of enriching their understanding of the literary cultures of the period.
Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)
ILO: Module-specific skills
On successfully completing the module you will be able to...
- 1. demonstrate an advanced critical understanding of key texts, artists, art movements and authors from the nineteenth century
- 2. demonstrate an advanced awareness art works and the essential characteristics of art production of this period
- 3. demonstrate critical engagement with important theoretical concepts related to aesthetics, technology, visual culture and perception in the nineteenth century
ILO: Discipline-specific skills
On successfully completing the module you will be able to...
- 4. demonstrate an advanced ability to analyse nineteenth-century visual and literary texts and relate them to their historical and cultural context
- 5. demonstrate an advanced ability to work within a multi-disciplinary framework, and to interrelate texts and discourses specific to their own discipline with issues in the wider context of cultural and intellectual history
- 6. demonstrate an advanced ability to understand and analyse relevant theoretical ideas, and to apply these ideas to literary and visual texts
ILO: Personal and key skills
On successfully completing the module you will be able to...
- 7. through seminar discussion and presentations, demonstrate advanced communication skills, and an ability to work both individually and in groups
- 8. through essay-writing, demonstrate appropriate research and bibliographic skills, an advanced capacity to construct a coherent, substantiated argument, and a capacity to write clear and correct prose
- 9. through research for seminars, essays and presentations demonstrate advanced proficiency in information retrieval and analysis, an advanced capacity to make critical use of secondary material, to question assumptions, and to reflect on their own learning process
Syllabus plan
Whilst the content may vary from year to year, it is envisioned that it will cover some or all of the following topics:
Art and Industry
- South Kensington: Industrial Art and Design
- Gothic Revival: Ruskin and Medievalism
- Photography - A Mechanical Art?
- Arts and Crafts
Perceiving the ‘Modern’
- Realism and the Observer
- Eyes, Lies and Illusions: Optical Devices and Technologies
- Shop, Drawing Room and Studio: Professionalism and the Spaces of Work.
- Fashion and Modernity
Word/Image
- Aestheticism and the 'Impression'
- Shop, Drawing Room and Studio: Professionalism and the Spaces of Work
- Cartoons, Illustrations and other Graphic Tales
Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)
| Scheduled Learning and Teaching Activities | Guided independent study | Placement / study abroad |
|---|---|---|
| 39 | 261 | 0 |
Details of learning activities and teaching methods
| Category | Hours of study time | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Scheduled learning and teaching activities | 33 | 11 x 1 hour seminars and 11 x 2 hour seminars |
| Scheduled learning and teaching activities | 33 | Study group preparation and meetings |
| Guided independent study | 70 | Seminar preparation (individual) |
| Guided independent study | 158 | Reading, research and essay preparation |
Summative assessment (% of credit)
| Coursework | Written exams | Practical exams |
|---|---|---|
| 100 | 0 | 0 |
Details of summative assessment
| Form of assessment | % of credit | Size of the assessment (eg length / duration) | ILOs assessed | Feedback method |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Group project | 25 | 1500 word equivalent | 1-9 | Feedback sheet with opportunity for tutorial follow-up |
| Catalogue entry | 25 | 1500 words | 1-9 | Feedback sheet with opportunity for tutorial follow-up |
| Essay | 50 | 3500 words | 1-9 | Feedback sheet with opportunity for tutorial follow-up |
Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)
| Original form of assessment | Form of re-assessment | ILOs re-assessed | Timescale for re-assessment |
|---|---|---|---|
| Group project | Individual project | 1-9 | Referral/Deferral period |
| Catalogue entry | Catalogue entry | 1-9 | Referral/Deferral period |
| Essay | Essay | 1-9 | Referral/Deferral period |
Re-assessment notes
Deferral – if you miss an assessment for certificated reasons judged acceptable by the Mitigation Committee, you will normally be either deferred in the assessment or an extension may be granted. The mark given for a re-assessment taken as a result of deferral will not be capped and will be treated as it would be if it were your first attempt at the assessment.
Referral – if you have failed the module overall (i.e. a final overall module mark of less than 40%) you will be required to submit a further assessment as necessary. If you are successful on referral, your overall module mark will be capped at 40%.
Indicative learning resources - Basic reading
Extracts will be available on the ELE website comprising relevant reading for seminars. Key primary texts will include:
- Amy Levy, The Romance of a Shop (1888; Broadview, 2006)
- Oscar Wilde, Salome [with illustrations by Aubrey Beardsley] (1894)
- Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “The Lady of Shalott” (1842 version)
- Robert Browning, “Fra Lippo Lippi” from Men and Women (1855)
- John Ruskin, ‘On the Nature of Gothic’ from The Stones of Venice (1853)
Secondary reading:
- Armstrong, Isobel. Victorian Glassworlds: Glass and Imagination, 1830-1880. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2008.
- Armstrong, Nancy. Fiction in the Age of Photography: The Legacy of British Realism . Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1999.
- Auerbach, Jeffrey. The Great Exhibition of 1851: A Nation on Display . New Haven, CT: Yale UP, 1999.
- Beaumont, Matthew, ed. Adventures in Realism. Oxford: Blackwell, 2007
- Byerly, Alison. Realism, Representation, and the Arts in Nineteenth-Century Literature . Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1997
- Crary, Jonathan. Techniques of the Observer: On Vision and Modernity in the 19th Century . MIT Press, 1992.
- Kriegel, Lara. Grand Designs: Labor, Empire, and the Museum in Victorian Culture . Durham, N.C.: Duke UP, 2007.
- Novak, Daniel. Realism, Photography, and Nineteenth-century Fiction . Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2008.
- Siegel, Jonah. Desire and Excess: The Nineteenth-Century Culture of Art . Princeton: Princeton UP, 2000.
| Credit value | 30 |
|---|---|
| Module ECTS | 15 |
| Module pre-requisites | None |
| Module co-requisites | None |
| NQF level (module) | 6 |
| Available as distance learning? | No |
| Origin date | 13/03/2015 |
