VAPA Course Descriptions

VAPA 1005

VAPA Foundations

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

This experiential interdisciplinary course asks: how can the process of developing listening skills cultivate creativity, deepen concentration skills, manifest new critical-thinking patterns, and enhance multiple intelligences? Goals: developing new language and confidence in learning and leadership.

VAPA 1020

Ethnography of Performing Arts

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

Ethnography of Performing Arts is the cross-cultural study of different expressive, artistic and cultural processes and practices (music, dance, theatre, film, ceremony, ritual, and visual art, etc.) in a variety of global settings. What is ethnography? How do people engage with performance in diverse ways? How might we create meaning for individuals or collectives through research? In this course, students learn to describe, compare, and write about performance and cultural practices. Students will use ethnography and participant-observation as methodologies for these cultural inquiries. In doing so, students will understand how performances create and shape social life, while also contesting them.

VAPA 1050

VAPA Foundation

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

An interdisciplinary foundational topics course integrating the theory and practice of a minimum of three disciplinary processes and approaches from across the arts (art history, film studies, gallery management, music, theatre, visual arts) in a thematic/conceptually-based course. Topics will vary. See course schedule for specific topics. Approved for Compass Curriculum requirement: Explore-Arts, Humanities, and Cultures; Writing Intensive.

VAPA 1100

Art in Time and Space

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

Explores time and space in the creation, perception, exhibition, and performance in contemporary art practice: audio, film, performance, and visual art. Examines experimental and traditional art forms, historical and contemporary theories, and collaborations across a variety of creative and cultural contexts.

VAPA 1200

All Arts Excursions

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

Aimed at cultivating, growing, and informing your artistic awareness and ability to express ideas regarding art. Experience a range of visual and performing arts, engage in analysis and discussion, undertake intensive writing projects. Approved for LAS Humanities area requirement. Approved for Compass Curriculum requirements: Explore-Arts, Humanities, and Cultures; Writing Intensive.

VAPA 1300

American Identity on Stage and Screen

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

This class explores the ways we understand what it means to be “American” through performance and representation. Tracing the formation of American identity and its relationship to urbanism, immigration, nationalism, as well as race, gender, and ethnicity, we will look at theatre, film, and iconography from the 1850s to the present; from Civil War theatre to Spike Lee. Approved for LAS Humanities area and Cultural Diversity requirements. Approved for Compass Curriculum requirements: Explore-Arts, Humanities, and Cultures; Inclusiveness (Global/Diversity).

VAPA 1400

Listening in Motion

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

This course merges Deep Listening© and Gaga Movement practices to build new artistic vocabularies through listening and movement. This course focuses on collaboratively creating original work while expanding critical-thinking patterns by enhancing multiple ways of knowing.

VAPA 1500

Arts Innovations: Methods and Practices

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

Arts Innovations is an interdisciplinary foundation course exploring the nature, social context and application of innovation and creativity across a variety of fields, such as art history, film, music, theatre, visual arts, sciences and entrepreneurship. Approved for Compass Curriculum requirement: Writing Intensive.

VAPA 3900

Theory and Practice in the Visual Performing Arts

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

A thematic/conceptually based advanced exploration of the integration of the visual and performing arts. The topic will develop the intersection/collaboration of a minimum of two disciplinary processes and approaches, focusing on the integration of theory, practice, or both, between the intersecting disciplines of the topic. Topics will vary depending on the semester. Prer., Any one VAPA 1000-level course, or permission of instructor.

VAPA 3910

Animating the Human

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

Animation in its various forms and practices brings together the discussions most central to the visual and performing arts in the arenas of critique, theory and application. This course will examine the issues of representation, of concepts of the human, and of the significance of animation forms and choices in the exploration of these issues through a combination of applied and critical study. Prer., One VAPA 1000-level course.

VAPA 3920

Traditional and Folk Arts, Folk Expressions & Folkscapes

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

This course investigates different cultural expressions from belief systems to folk performances, vernacular architecture, and yard art where ingenuity creates senses of place, action, and performance. Includes visits to collections and folk art sites plus folk craft workshops. Meets with AH 3920. Prer., Any one 1000-level VAPA course, or permission of instructor.

VAPA 3950

Sound Art: Creative Sonic Worlds and Practices

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

This course will explore sound art as a multidimensional “meta-genre,” situated in time in both physical and virtual space. Imbedded in many interdisciplinary practices across the arts, students will investigate these sonic landscapes and build a clear picture of creative work throughout the 20th Century and beyond. Prer., Any one 1000-level VAPA course, or permission of instructor.

VAPA 3955

Theory and Practice of Cinema and Painting

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

This class explores the relationship between cinema and paining. We create a visual vocabulary that describes what is innovative and experimental through class projects focused on the application of filmmaking, photography, poetry, etc. Both genres offer boundless horizons between the study of film and painting and the understanding as to how to adapt these approaches to student work. Prer., VAPA 1000-level courses such as VAPA 1020 or VAPA 1100, or consent of instructor.

VAPA 3960

Nationalism, Romanticism, and Melodrama

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

An in-depth look at theatre of the 19h century from the French Revolution to the Grand-Guignol. Emphasis on melodrama and related examples from visual art and music. Meets with THTR 3960. Any one 1000-level VAPA course, or permission of instructor.

VAPA 3970

The Nordic Legacy

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

An in-depth look at the art of the Scandinavian countries with a specific focus on Henrik Ibsen, August Strindberg, Edvard Munch, and Ingmar Bergman. Meets with THTR 3970. Prer., Any one 1000-level VAPA course, or permission of instructor.

VAPA 3980

The Manifestoes of the Avant-Garde

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

An in-depth look at the history, practice, and manifestoes of the major artists of the historical Avant-Garde, from 1880-1950. Meets with THTR 3980. Prer., Any one 1000-level VAPA course, or permission of instructor.

VAPA 3990

Performance Art

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

Investigates the nature, social context, and application of performance art as it pertains to the interarts, multimedia, and other forms of interdisciplinary performance practice. Students learn about and create performance art combining multiple disciplines through the practice of this field. Prer., Any one 1000-level VAPA course, or permission of instructor.

VAPA 4470

Art and Ritual of the South Pacific

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

Investigates myriad art traditions and cultural practices of Polynesia, Melanesia, and Micronesia. Students learn to critique and analyze dynamics of power, cultural continuities and change. Examines ways art acts as a vehicle or catalyst for socio-political concerns. Approved for Global Awareness. Meets with AH 4470.

VAPA 5950

Sound Art: Creative Sonic Worlds

3 Credits (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

This course will explore sound art as a multidimensional interdisciplinary genre that involves music, sound, and environment, but often spans the distance across other arts fields and disciplines.

VAPA 9400

Independent Study

1 Credit (Minimum) 6 Credits (Maximum)

Undergraduate independent study in Visual and Performing Arts with a full time professor by arrangement.

VAPA 9499

Independent Study - Research and Creative Works

1 Credit (Minimum) 3 Credits (Maximum)

Provides an opportunity to conduct research with Visual and Performing Arts faculty by one or more students on topics determined by a faculty member. Prer., Consent of instructor required.