Curriculum IN Orvieto
An orientation towards the arts has marked the curriculum of Gordon IN Orvieto since its beginning over a decade ago. The program’s pairing of the visual arts and the verbal arts is certainly as relevant for our contemporary cultural landscape as it was in the Renaissance, when visual art almost always referenced texts, and poetry often focused on art. Hence courses in drawing, painting, sculpture, and graphic design are set alongside courses in poetry, narrative literature, and theater.
This relationship between “word and image” suffuses the entire curriculum. In one sense Gordon IN Orvieto unfolds as an extended meditation on Christ’s identity as both the Word (Logos) and the Image (Icon) of the Father. The motto of the program might be Dante’s memorable description of God’s artwork as visibile parlare, visible speech (canto 10 of Purgatorio).
All students take an introductory course that uses drawing to introduce the themes of the entire program. Students then select three among a set of courses offered in the visual arts and humanities. We take every opportunity to create connections among these courses, perhaps working towards a common collaborative project. In addition, students with no background in the Italian language will be expected to take a 2-credit tutorial-based course in Italian Language Studies.
Courses occur in a month-long intensive format, typically following the pattern of three-hour class sessions from Monday through Thursday mornings. The three-day weekends are generally available for personal travel, unless course-related excursions are planned. (Program costs typically include excursions to Florence, Rome, Siena, Arezzo and Assisi. Other excursions are arranged in relation to the needs of particular courses.)
CALENDAR
Spring 2013
Arrival: Saturday, February 23
1st month class: February 25–March 21
2nd month class: March 25–April 18
3rd month class: April 22–May 16
4th month class: May 20–June 15
Fall 2013
1st month class: Sept 2–Sept 26
2nd month class: Sept 30–Oct 24
3rd month class: Oct 28–Nov 21
4th month class: Nov 25–Dec 19
Spring 2014
1st month class: February 24–March 20
2nd month class: March 24–April 17
3rd month class: April 21–May 15
4th month class: May 19–June 12
FALL 2013 Curriculum
Throughout the semester, students without previous Italian language study will take ORV101: Italian Language Studies, a course in conversational Italian with the central purpose of assisting students' full participation in the life of the Orvieto community. [2 credits]
1st Month
ORV 270: Disegno in Orvieto (Instructor: Matthew Doll)
This drawing-based course is taken during the first month of the semester by all students, art majors and non-art majors together. The course prepares each student to engage deeply with his or her surroundings, giving the visual language of description a lead role in forming our relationship to the landscape and townscape. It sets the stage for deepening these connections made through eyes, mind and heart in each succeeding course by initiating the relationship to the texts and images and fusing the historic setting of Orvieto with our community life. [4 credits]
2nd Month
Students choose between:
ORV 350: Poetry and Ekphrasis (Instructor: Julia Kasdorf)
This creative writing class renews a lively conversation in the Renaissance concerning the relation between poetry and the pictorial arts, between word and image. Ekphrasis is the classical term for poetry written in response to works of visual art. [4 credits]
ORV 371: Painting Studio at Orvieto (Instructor to be determined)
An advanced studio in the methods and materials of oil painting, with historical attention to the narrative tradition of Renaissance painting. [4 credits]
3rd Month
Students choose between:
ORV 355: Renaissance Narrative (Instructor: John Skillen)
This course compares the ways in which stories were told in the literature and in the visual art of medieval-Renaissance Europe. A specific focus will be on the fresco cycles so famously marking the civic, religious and artistic landscape of Renaissance Italy. These murals existed as visual interpretations of influential written narratives that were known almost by heart by the communities for whom they were made, stories fundamental for European Christian culture. [4 credits]
ORV 372: Sculpture Studio at Orvieto (Instructor: Shelly Bradbury)
Sculpture in the context of Italy’s long tradition of stone carving, with attention given to mass and space relationships, volume, surface planes, textural variety and narrative organization. [4 credits]
4th Month
Students choose between:
ORV 379: (Special topics in history) Women, Religion, Family, Convent (Instructor: Agnes Howard)
For hundreds of years women in Europe entered religious orders to pray, sing, read, write, and enjoy the fellowship of others dedicated to God. Convents were set apart from the world but integral to the life of the community. Nuns composed music, patronized art and architecture, wrote poetry, served the poor. The great shifts of the early modern period brought changes in the lives of men, women, and children, as Reformation and Counter-Reformation altered opportunities for vocations and devotional expression. Catholics defended traditional forms of female sanctity (particularly behind convent walls) and developed new venues for women to teach and serve. For Protestants, women’s role as wife and mother received added emphasis. In this household context we will also investigate practices of birth and childrearing, as scientific discoveries overturned assumptions about how babies are made. Finally, recognizing that experience of religion and family in the new world mirrored and extended European practices, we shall close with a view across the Atlantic, to the missions and settlements established there. [4 credits]
ORV 374: (Special Topics in Art) Painting (Instructor: Marie-Dominique Miserez)
An advanced studio in the methods and materials of tempera painting, with historical attention to the devotional tradition of Renaissance painting. [4 credits]
SPRING 2014 Curriculum
Throughout the semester, students without previous Italian language study take ORV101: Italian Language Studies, a course in conversational Italian with the central purpose of assisting students' full participation in the life of the Orvieto community. [2 credits]
1st Month
ORV 270: Disegno in Orvieto (Instructor: Matthew Doll)
This drawing-based course is taken during the first month of the semester by all students, art majors and non-art majors together. The course prepares each student to engage deeply with his or her surroundings, giving the visual language of description a lead role in forming our relationship to the landscape and townscape. It sets the stage for deepening these connections made through eyes, mind and heart in each succeeding course by initiating the relationship to the texts and images and fusing the historic setting of Orvieto with our community life. [4 credits]
2nd Month
Students choose between:
ORV 355: Renaissance Narrative (Instructor: John Skillen)
This course compares the ways in which stories were told in the literature and in the visual art of medieval-Renaissance Europe. A specific focus will be on the fresco cycles so famously marking the civic, religious and artistic landscape of Renaissance Italy. These murals existed as visual interpretations of influential written narratives that were known almost by heart by the communities for whom they were made, stories fundamental for European Christian culture. [4 credits]
ORV 374: (Special Topics in Art) Painting (Instructor: Marie-Dominique Miserez)
An advanced studio in the methods and materials of tempera painting, with historical attention to the devotional tradition of Renaissance painting. [4 credits]
3rd Month
Students choose between:
ORV 350: Poetry and Ekphrasis (Instructor: Karen Halvorsen Schreck)
This creative writing class renews a lively conversation in the Renaissance concerning the relation between literature and the pictorial arts, between word and image. Interest was reborn in the classical tradition of ekphrasis in which literary writers responded to works of visual art, and, in a sort of reverse ekphrasis, visual artists gave visual form to literary texts. [4 credits]
ORV 378: (Special Topics in Art) Digital Photography (Instructor: Greg Schreck) [4 credits]
4th Month
Students choose between:
ORV 379: (Special topics in history) Theology of Art in Christian historical tradition (Instructor: Rebekah Smick)
The class explores influential ways in which Christians have theologized the arts, artistry and art culture in Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox Christendom. Focusing particularly on the period from the early church to the Reformation, the course concludes with a glance at several efforts by contemporary Catholic and Protestant theologians to renew an apologetic for the arts. The study will involve looking at paintings, icons, altarpieces, and socially and culturally engaged works of art as well as pertinent theological writings. [4 credits]
ORV 376: (Special Topics in Art) Text & Image (Instructor: Jeremy Botts) [4 credits]
SPRING 2013 Curriculum
Throughout the semester, students without previous Italian language study take ORV101: Italian Language Studies, a course in conversational Italian with the central purpose of assisting students' full participation in the life of the Orvieto community. [2 credits]
1st Month
ORV 270: Disegno in Orvieto (Instructor: Matthew Doll)
This drawing-based course is taken during the first month of the semester by all students, art majors and non-art majors together. The course prepares each student to engage deeply with his or her surroundings, giving the visual language of description a lead role in forming our relationship to the landscape and townscape. It sets the stage for deepening these connections made through eyes, mind and heart in each succeeding course by initiating the relationship to the texts and images and fusing the historic setting of Orvieto with our community life. [4 credits] View syllabus
2nd Month
Students choose between:
ORV 374: (Special Topics in Art) Painting (Instructor: Marie-Dominique Miserez)
An advanced studio in the methods and materials of tempera painting, with historical attention to the devotional tradition of Renaissance painting. [4 credits] View sample syllabus
ORV 355: Renaissance Narrative (Instructor: John Skillen)
This course compares the ways in which stories were told in the literature and in the visual art of medieval-Renaissance Europe. A specific focus will be on the fresco cycles so famously marking the civic, religious and artistic landscape of Renaissance Italy. These murals existed as visual interpretations of influential written narratives that were known almost by heart by the communities for whom they were made, stories fundamental for European Christian culture such as Gregory's Life of St. Benedict, St. Augustine's Confessions, St. Bonaventure's Life of St. Francis, and Dante's Divine Comedy. [4 credits] View syllabus
3rd Month
Students choose between:
ORV 360: Dante's Divine Comedy (Instructor: Brett Foster)
A study of Dante's Divine Comedy (in a dual-language edition) will focus on plot, underlying theological and philosophical concepts, and historical and political background, with attention to the visual culture that informs Dante’s encyclopedic epic and explains its relation to visual epics such as Signorelli’s Last Judgment in the Orvieto cathedral. [4 credits]
ORV 371: Painting Studio at Orvieto (Instructor: Philippe Fretz)
An advanced studio in the methods and materials of oil painting, with historical attention to the narrative tradition of Renaissance painting. [4 credits]
4th Month
Students choose between:
ORV 350: Poetry and Ekphrasis (Instructor: Mark Stevick)
This creative writing class renews a lively conversation in the Renaissance concerning the relation between poetry and the pictorial arts, between word and image. Interest was reborn in the classical tradition of ekphrasis in which poets responded to works of visual art. [4 credits]
ORV 376: (Special Topics in Art) Text & Image (Instructor: Tim Ferguson-Sauder)
In this course we will explore the use of letterforms and their interaction with—and integration into—imagery in a way that links the current use of typography to Orvieto's rich architectural and visual history. Participants will conduct a careful visual study of Orvieto's architectural and decorative elements by collecting their own images of the place and using those images in collage to create letterforms by hand from local elements. Work will then move to the screen as students use local elements pulled from their image collections to make edits to existing letterforms. These edits will be refined and simplified into a visual language to be applied to a whole set of letters. Finally, initial illuminated letters will be produced by each student based on what they have learned, and informed by the local aesthetics, to accompany a text (chosen in collaboration with the poetry class). Those letters will be set along with the rest of the assigned text into a format ready for exhibition.