ARTH 2218 Christian Iconography

The study of Christian signs and images offers a crucial foundation for understanding so many of the pictorial and symbolic traditions of Western art. This course seeks to impart students with literacy in the core visual vocabularies of Christian art, enabling them to identify saintly attributes, narrative cycles, and major iconographical programs across denominations and across centuries, from the earliest art of the catacombs up to and beyond the modernizing developments of Vatican II. Students will explore the roots of Christian iconography in Greco-Roman paganism, its dialogue with aniconic Judaism and Islam, ever-evolving theologies of the image, and key divergences between the Churches of East and West. The course fully utilizes the artistic patrimony of the BC campus and includes numerous visits to Boston-area Christian sites and museums.