High School AP Art History

Gallery One: Introduction to Art History

-An overview of art history and the purpose and function of the analysis of art within its cultural context

-Global and chronological themes and subthemes in art history

-An introduction to the College Board Advanced Placement Art History Framework

-Formal analysis of the art process through the principles and elements of design

-The College Board AP Art History Exam breakdown—what to expect, type of assessments on the exam, how the exam assesses the students’ application of art historical skills, and how the exam is scored

-Understanding how to read and interpret architectural plans

-Global Prehistory starting with Asia and Africa

-Paleolithic, Mesolithic, and Neolithic Periods

-Human expression of the natural world prior to written record

-Ceramics, painting, sculpture, and architecture representative of utilitarian art

Gallery Two: Indigenous Americas

-Ancient America and Native North America—Olmec, Maya, Mexica (Aztec), and Central Andes

-Art of the Indigenous Americas as a representation of the retention of pre-Hispanic traditions.

-Overarching artistic traits of Indigenous Americas—unity with the natural world, cosmic geometry, Shamanism, animal-based media, incorporation of trade materials, and spiritual utilitarianism

-Integration of terrestrial and plant imagery within architecture to represent power and hierarchy within the culture and community

-Status, power, gifts, visual memory, and revival represented within art of the Ancient America and Native North American cultures

-Trade resulting in exotic materials within artistic themes of interdependence and dualism

-Exploration of Ancient America and Native North America within the context of colonization, persecution, genocide, and marginalization

Gallery Three: Asia

Secular and non-secular art produced from West Asia’s dominant Islamic culture

-Sacred spaces of West and Central Asia as a result of cross-cultural fertilization

-Connection of West and Central Asia through Buddhist and Islamic traditions

-Architectural innovations and monuments driven by religious function and pilgrimages

-Two-dimensional design favored in West Asia, while metalwork thrived in West and Central Asia

-Visual traditions of South, East, and Southeast Asia among the oldest, identified by the interconnectedness of humans with the natural and spiritual world

-Universal search for spiritual development within Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and Sikhism, resulting in unified visual representations

-Buddhist reliquary stupas, ink paintings, pagodas, and rock gardens representing the overlap of secular and non-secular art

Gallery Four: The Pacific

-Diversity in the Pacific resulting from ecological situations, social structure, and external influences such as commerce, colonialism, and missionary activity

-The Pacific as defined by geographical location and its art as representative of materials carried and exchanged

-Three sections of the Pacific—micro, poly, and mela, each defined by individual ecologies and sociological systems

-Art of the Pacific as narrative and utilitarian expressing beliefs, social relations, essential truths, and information within the creation, performance, and the destruction of art

-Wrappings, ritual dress, and tattoos as symbols for human interaction with deities

-Architectural design and shared and rarified spaces reinforcing social order

-Sacred spaces announcing and containing legitimacy, power, and life force.

Gallery Five: Ancient Near East and Africa

-Sumerian, Akkadian, Neo-Sumerian, Babylonian, Assyrian, Neo-Babylonian, and Persian cultures

-Religious art and architecture of the Ancient Near East

-Emergence of stylistic elements such as hierarchical scale, registers, historical narratives, and formal sculpture of humans interacting with gods

-Architecture of the Ancient Near East housed places of worship and protection to represent the power and authority of the rulers

-Predynastic Egypt including the Old, Middle, and New Kingdoms

-Artistic representations of royal figures and divinities serving a funerary function and representing order, stability, and permanence

-Figural representation correlated with cultural placement, characterizing separation between the deified and lower classes

-Predynastic Egypt driven by an elaborate funerary sect represented by the incorporation of mythological and religious symbolism

-The artistic and cultural revolution of the Amarna period

-African art resulting from human beliefs and interactions motivated by behavior, containing and expressing belief, and validating social organization

-African art expressing the supernatural and used daily and ritually

-Art and cultural practices as purposeful, with cultural protocols to ensure the artistic experience (meant to be sung, danced, and presented holistically) and produce expected results

-Education, civic responsibility, and adulthood as represented by the creation, manipulation, and interpretation of art

-African art misinterpreted as primitive, anonymous, and static

-Africa’s global interaction resulting in dynamic intellectual and artistic traditions