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Home 2016-2017 Undergraduate College Catalog Course Offerings Castle Scholars Courses CSCH 3002: Decoding Davinci (4 cr.)

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CSCH 3002: Decoding Davinci (4 cr.)

This interdisciplinary seminar will take as its

point of departure Dan Brown's contemporary

fictional thriller, The DaVinci Code. Students

are expected to read the book over semester break,

before the course begins. After discussing the

book in detail, we will view the Hollywood movie

based on the book, in order to come to a better

understanding of how the book was translated onto

the big screen. The class will then move away

from modern popular culture, and will turn to the

analysis of primary texts as a way of coming to a

deeper understanding of some of the more

controversial historical "facts" alleged by Dan

Brown. Students will first read biblical,

exegetical, and Gnostic literature to come to a

better understanding of the historical identity of

Saint Mary Magdalene. In this process, students

will come to a deeper understanding of how Mary

Magdalene's image has been invented and reinvented

over the centuries. The class with then be

introduced to the discipline of art history and

will begin an in-depth analysis of the life and

work of one of the best known, but perhaps

least-understood, artists of the Italian

Renaissance, Leonardo da Vinci. Together we will

examine the artist's oeuvre, training, stylistic

development, and importance to the development of

the High Renaissance style in Italy. We will also

read Leonardo's own words about the making of art.

We will also read the work of several authors, who

in one way or another invent or reinvent Leonardo,

contributing to the myths and legends surrounding

the life and work of the artist, and blurring the

line between fact and fiction. Students will be

asked to read a sixteenth century biography of

Leonardo, written by Giorgio Vasari, as well as

Sigmund Freud's famous psychobiography of 1910

"Leonardo da Vinci and a Memory of His Childhood."

There will also be a field trip to the

Metropolitan Museum of Art Drawings Study Room to

view the drawings of Leonardo da Vinci. Approved

for Art History credit.

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