This two meeting course will commence with a close reading of Maurice Marleau-Ponty’s “Chiasmus-The Intertwining”and Michael Fried’s “Art and Objecthood,” which counters (thought not directly) Marleau-Ponty’s phenomenology — as well as the latter readings.

The second session will involve a close reading (using Merleau-Ponty’s and Fried’s essays as a backdrop) of an essay by Donald Judd on phenomenology, art, and the body, Amelia Jones’s “Art History/Art Criticism: Performing Meaning,” Christina Ross’s “The Paradoxical Bodies of Contemporary Art”.

All of these texts reckon with the body (and art) and how they inform (or do not) one’s interpretation of the art and our embodiment in relation to art. Given the rise of body oriented art and art that calls upon the body (commencing in the 50s and 60s), this is the impetus of this specific reading group.

In sum, this class will explore what I am calling an “aesthetics of/and embodiment” (or “art and the body”). Though the Richard Serra artwork is not of a body, per se, it does (phenomenologically) draw attention to the body (and thus embodiment), which Jones gets into in her important essay — as does Ross’s in her essay. Inside (and outside) of the Serra artwork would be an excellent way to discuss such issues, given his artwork does call upon the body and embodiment (even if indirectly).

All readings will be uploaded, but you may also purchase the texts (respectively) Marleau-Ponty, _The Visible and the Invisible_, Harris, ed., _Art in Theory_ (Fried, “Art and Objecthood”), Jones, ed. _Performing the Body, Performing the Text_ (Jones, “Art History/Art Criticism: Performing Meaning,” pp. 39-55), and Amelia Jones, ed. _A Companion to Contemporary Art since 1945_ (Ross, “The Paradoxical Bodies of Performance,” pp. 378-400 [inclusive of endnotes and bibliography]).