“Through its refreshing, innovative approach to its subject, its short, thoughtful essays, and its selective case studies, Irina Costache’s The Art of Understanding Art gives students and educators of art history a valuable new resource.”
– Clare Kunny, The J. Paul Getty Museum
“The Art of Understanding Art offers the readers multi-layered approaches to the visual history of being human, and to interpreting these visual representations; and it has very engaging creative assignments and writing projects for each chapter.”
– Laura Ruby, University of Hawai’i–Manoa
“Costache goes far beyond any other introductory text in its range of inquiry and examples, and the extent to which she maps out the art world, including the academic world the students who will be using the book find themselves in. Instead of talking about only works by Monet and Van Gogh, in museums that none will visit, she connects the dots between the odd and perplexing stuff students are likely to see being made around them by fellow art students or faculty, and the art hanging in museums.”
– Bruce Robertson, Professor, History of Art and Architecture, and Acting Director, Art, Design & Architecture Museum, UC Santa Barbara
From the Inside Flap
The Art of Understanding Art is a truly innovative textbook that presents and explains “behind the scene” activities, methods and tools involved in the creation, dissemination, analysis and interpretation of art. Addressing topics not usually covered in traditional introductory texts—provenance, art conservation, art classification, primary and secondary textual research sources, museums and the web, copyrights—the book is a comprehensive guide to deciphering and appreciating the riotous visual world that is now backdrop to our daily lives.
Rather than offering an inventory of masterpieces and artists, The Art of Understanding Art reveals a novel pedagogical vision designed to educate readers to develop a global visual literacy, and an understanding of art that is distinctly related to, and transformative of, the way they view the world. Ample pedagogical material—useful introductions, text boxes, a glossary of institutions and individuals, innovative class assignments, projects useful for developing lesson plans, and an accompanying companion website enables The Art of Understanding Art to expose new possibilities for teaching, learning, and reflecting about art.
From the Back Cover
The Art of Understanding Art is a truly innovative textbook that presents and explains “behind the scene” activities, methods and tools involved in the creation, dissemination, analysis and interpretation of art. Addressing topics not usually covered in traditional introductory texts―provenance, art conservation, art classification, primary and secondary textual research sources, museums and the web, copyrights―the book is a comprehensive guide to deciphering and appreciating the riotous visual world that is now backdrop to our daily lives.
Rather than offering an inventory of masterpieces and artists,
The Art of Understanding Art reveals a novel pedagogical vision designed to educate readers to develop a global visual literacy, and an understanding of art that is distinctly related to, and transformative of, the way they view the world. Ample pedagogical material―useful introductions, text boxes, a glossary of institutions and individuals, innovative class assignments, projects useful for developing lesson plans, and an accompanying companion website enables The Art of Understanding Art to expose new possibilities for teaching, learning, and reflecting about art.
About the Author
Irina D. Costache, Ph.D., is an art historian and Professor of Art History at California State University Channel Islands. Her innovative teaching methodologies have been recognized with awards and grants. She has curated several exhibitions, including Postmodern Calligraphies, Nature and/or Technology and Line and Color. Her presentations and publications include This is Not a Painting: Art History and the Internet, Visual Culture/ Virtual Art, Italian Futurism and the Decorative Arts, and Futurist Film: an Incomplete Project.
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