History of Art Technology and Materials II

Objectives

The course programs, of HTPA I and II, are restricted to Western art, with some occasional incursions in previous times and civilizations. HTPA, although taught in two semestres, is conceived as a single curriclar unit; it is a MCR curricular unit where knowledge from areas such as Art History and Chemistry is crossed, aiming at an interdisciplinary observation, useful to the area of ​​Conservation and Restoration.
The conceptual framework (formal and aesthetic), built in History of Art, related to the representation systems, as well as knowledge related to the inherent ideological and social circumstances, namely what refers to the social status of the artists, dialogues with the materials of  the Work. This crossing, and how to do it, is one of the goals of HTPA know-how.
The artistic literature and the contemporary criticism of the written sources used to study the artistic techniques is the fertile ground that allows, among others, to quickly awake in the student the idea that the construction of the history and the material of which the Work is made is a complex thing. Treaties and other written sources are critically analyzed, and the result used in the historical reconstruction of materials and artistic techniques of the past.
In practical classes, the work developed is responsibility of the student. In other words, the experimental protocol is largely conceived by the students, after discussion with the professors.