Assistant Professor of Visual Art (Art History), Department of Visual Arts, Faculty of Media+Art+Performance, University of Regina

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Fall 2022

Critical Histories of Photography Department of Visual Arts, Open-level undergraduate course.

When was photography introduced to the world and what has been its impact on art, culture, science, politics and globalization? How has the medium adapted over the decades and what has shaped the trends in picture-making and picture-taking? In this survey course, students will learn about the technological and artistic development of photography while studying key figures and important works alongside major trends in the medium. This course treats photography as a cultural practice with emphasis on its historical, documentary, and social impact. The relationship between photography and mass media, literature, painting, and film – will be examined in light of public and private image-making. We will consider the relationship of photography to history and to the development of photographic theory and methods of studying the medium. Students will learn to implement a new vocabulary to discuss and analyze photographs within their historical and contemporary contexts and to articulate the key concepts, theories, and thinkers that have shaped the history of photography.

Introduction to Art History Department of Visual Arts, all levels required for Department of Visual Arts programs.

This course surveys the history of art and visual culture from prehistoric times to the present. Taking a global perspective, students discover key moments in the development of human creativity, which continue to shape our understanding of the material, historical, and social importance of art in the present day.

This course cannot be fully comprehensive‑it is only thirteen weeks long, after all!‑but our goal is to make connections between art-making practices from around the world. We will be exploring the history of art chronologically with the understanding that artists developed different approaches, concerns, and technologies at different times and for different reasons. These differences are fascinating and reveal how central art has been to the concerns of human societies, shaping and reflecting ideas about religion and ritual, class, race, and gender, as well as cultural identity. Fundamentally, art shows us what people have valued, both culturally and monetarily, and how ideas about aesthetics cannot be separated from the society from which they came.

Winter 2022

Art Theory and Art Criticism Department of Visual Arts, Required Course for Visual Arts Department programs

This art theory course is designed to equip students with the concepts and language necessary for contemporary discussion of art, art history, art theory, and art criticism. The special focus of this course is the diversity of theory in the discourses of art. This course examines some of the compelling ideas in art theory, cultures of display, and art history. We will consider historical ideas about art, aesthetics, power, race, gender, semiotics, materialism, and other ways to “read” art. Our ultimate aim is to apply theory to practice! This course involves a diverse range of challenging readings that span historical and contemporary periods.

Topics in Art Theory Directed-reading undergraduate course, Department of Visual Arts, advanced undergraduate course in art history.

Modern Art and the “Shock of the New,” Department of Visual Arts, all levels undergraduate Art History elective history/theory course

Explore renowned and provocative objects and ideas—from art works and concepts that challenged the official Academy, and revolutionized conventions of representation to non-objective art. Discover fascinating stories, key works, and iconic figures, from the 1880s to the 1960s

Canadian Art and Cultural Identity, Department of Visual Arts, all levels undergraduate Art History elective history/theory course

Art in Canada from the colonial period to the present. Students will be introduced to issues of culture, ethnicity and gender, in relation to the Canadian context.

Winter 2021

Art Theory and Art Criticism, Required Course for Visual Arts Department and MAP programs

This art theory course is designed to equip students with the concepts and language necessary for contemporary discussion of art, art history, art theory, and art criticism. The special focus of this course is the diversity of theory in the discourses of art. This course examines some of the compelling ideas in art theory, cultures of display, and art history. We will consider historical ideas about art, aesthetics, power, race, gender, semiotics, materialism, and other ways to “read” art. Our ultimate aim is to apply theory to practice! This course involves a diverse range of challenging readings that span historical and contemporary periods.

Landscape and Environment in Art, Department of Visual Arts, all levels undergraduate elective history/theory course

This course will consider how land has been represented in various media, including painting, sculpture, architecture, photography, performance, cinema, and street art, and survey the cultural and aesthetic concepts that have shaped our representation, reception, and thinking on the landscape and environmental art from the nineteenth century to today. Artistic and cultural engagement with the land has been shaped by the changing understandings of our surrounding environment, influenced by instrumentalist, ecological, and philosophical ideas about humanity’s place in nature. First glimpsed in the background of portraits, landscape later emerged as a genre in its own right. Today, the landscape in contemporary art and visual culture often takes the form of physical interventions in space that criticize the human impact on the land, emphasizing the environmental aspects of art-making. At the same time, as climate change, the extraction and transportation of energy resources, and global-scale pollution have become major political, social, and economic concerns around the world; the mediated response to the environment has echoed a deepening sense of nature-at-risk.

PhD Directed Reading on Collecting Asian Art in Canadian Museums, Interdisciplinary Studies Program, Faculty of Media, Art, and Performance

Parental Leave – January 2020-2021

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Fall 2019

Landscape and Environment in Art, Department of Visual Arts, all levels undergraduate elective history/theory course

This course will consider how land has been represented in various media, including painting, sculpture, architecture, photography, performance, cinema, and street art, and survey the cultural and aesthetic concepts that have shaped our representation, reception, and thinking on the landscape and environmental art from the nineteenth century to today. Artistic and cultural engagement with the land has been shaped by the changing understandings of our surrounding environment, influenced by instrumentalist, ecological, and philosophical ideas about humanity’s place in nature. First glimpsed in the background of portraits, landscape later emerged as a genre in its own right. Today, the landscape in contemporary art and visual culture often takes the form of physical interventions in space that criticize the human impact on the land, emphasizing the environmental aspects of art-making. At the same time, as climate change, the extraction and transportation of energy resources, and global-scale pollution have become major political, social, and economic concerns around the world; the mediated response to the environment has echoed a deepening sense of nature-at-risk.

BFA Directed Reading Course on Landscape and Environment in Art, Department of Visual Art, Faculty of Media, Art, and Performance

MFA Directed Study Course on Landscape and Environment in Art, Department of Visual Art, Faculty of Media, Art, and Performance.

2017-2019. Assistant Professor (Limited Term), School of Image Arts, Faculty of Communication and Design, Ryerson University, Toronto, Ontario

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Winter 2019

Contemporary Photography in Canada, Faculty of Communication and Design, Open Elective

What is Canadian photography? Is it photography made by Canadians or photography made in Canada? Does it represent a nationalist perspective in subject, aesthetic, and/or tone? Or is it primarily defined by the institutions, collectors, and funding bodies in Canada that decide what should be part of the national narrative? In this course, we will explore the way that nationhood has played an important role in the development of Canadian cultural policy as a whole, as well as the impact of transnational, national, regional, and local influences on the practice of photography. With a particular focus on the role of the museum, the gallery, the artist-run centre, the publication, and the exhibition, students will learn about the cultural arguments, the political debates, and the aesthetic influences that have shaped the history of photography in Canada to today.

Graduate Research Methods, Film and Photography Preservation and Collection Management Graduate Program, M1 course

This course aims to improve research skills in the histories of photography and film.  In this class, you will learn the methods required to organize and execute historical research. With appropriate exercises, you will learn how to determine a research subject, how to build a bibliography, how to summarize scholarly research, how to make oral presentations, and how to write a historical essay.

History of Photography II, Photography Studies Program, 3rd year course

How has photography changed in the last 50 years? Some might argue, it has changed very little since the 1960s as we continue to make images informed by contemporary society and the concerns of identity, gender, sexuality, environmental issues, economic injustice, global and local politics, and mass media. Others have argued that the shift in technology, from the rise of colour photography to digital photography and video, has radically altered our way of making and perceiving photographs. This course will discuss important historical developments, from the rise of conceptual and performance art, to the dominance of photography in the art museum and on social media. By considering photography’s artistic, commercial, and economic impact, we will ask ourselves: where has photography come from and where is it going in the 21st century?

Fall 2018

Analogue as Meaning, Faculty of Communication and Design, Open Elective

As physical, media-specific art practices are reshaped by multi-platform modes of virtual production, artists have been forced to confront the true nature of their medium whether it is analogue, digital or some hybrid form. The recent changes to technology, as well as new formations of social relationships, have led to a redefinition and reinvention of traditional media such as film and photography in the 21st century. The objective of this course is to explore and better understand the nature of lens-based media in a time of radical change and transformation. Through an examination of texts by major theorists as well as the work of significant historical and contemporary artists the class will explore three themes: “the medium as message,” “photography’s expanded field,” and “networked photographies.” All students will be required to produce three creative projects in response to the readings and discussions in class. In addition, groups of 3-4 students will be responsible for leading a seminar on one of the selected readings and will curate a selection of works for display at the end of the term.

History of Photography I, Photography Studies Program, 2nd year course

This course provides a chronological overview of developments in analogue photography from 1839 through to 1970. The medium of photography will be situated in its various contexts, including social conditions, political shifts, aesthetic concerns, and technological developments. Key figures and important works will be shown and discussed alongside major trends. Matters of influence – the relationship between photography and mass media, or photography and film – will be examined in light of public and private image-making. The course treats photography broadly as a cultural activity with emphasis on its historical, documentary, and social value as well as its own aesthetic developments during this period. Attention is given to the relationship of photography to other media and to the development of photographic theory

History of Photography II, Film and Photography Preservation and Collection Management Graduate Program, M2 course

This course aims to teach students about aspects of the history and theory of photography through the material and visual analysis of photographic objects. Based on access to the Art Gallery of Ontario’s collection of photography, we will consider the photographic object in terms of their history of production, use, value, and collect-ability. Through in depth engagement with weekly readings, this seminar will teach students to consider diverse theoretical and methodological approaches to writing and researching the history of photography.

Winter 2018

Theories of Photography – Contemporary Topics, Faculty of Communication and Design, Open Elective

Contemporary photography is steeped in the philosophical, theoretical, ethical, and aesthetic concerns of image making. Through the reading and analysis of key primary texts, this course will examine the influences of various theoretical frameworks on photographic production and the inter-relationship of theory and practice. By examining the practice of contemporary photography along with the ideas that influence its production, this course will bring new understanding to contemporary photography by questioning the roles of authorship, subjectivity, and power alongside their relationship to consumption, circulation and display. Likewise, we will look at the implications of new technologies and how image making and image viewing are being transformed by the ever-changing medium.

Collaboration: Photography, History, Curation, Exhibition, Seminar course open to all

Building around the exhibition Collaboration at the Ryerson Image Centre, this course will consider the gallery space as an active site to explore issues about the history and theory of exhibiting photography. “Collaboration” ‑on display at the RIC from 24 January to 8 April, 2018 ‑ is an alternative pedagogical and curatorial research project led by Wendy Ewald, Susan Meiselas, Ariella Azoulay, Laura Wexler, Leigh Raiford and others. As a group of prominent photographers, curators, and theorists who are engaged with feminist, pro-labour, and anti-oppression struggles in their work, these thinkers are using the exhibition as a space to challenge  the traditional approach to organizing, telling, and exhibiting the history of photography. This will be a dynamic class that challenges students to think about how history, curation, and exhibition shapes the viewer’s experience of photography. Taking advantage of our privileged access to the gallery space, classes will focus on the study of ideas that this group of scholars and artists have put forward in their “discursive” exhibition to ask: how can the history of photography be more inclusive? Students will work in groups throughout the term, using conversations with gallery-goers and visiting experts as tools to create their own alternative histories of photography modeled on the exhibition form.

History of Photography II, Photography Studies Program, 3rd year course

How has photography changed in the last 50 years? Some might argue, it has changed very little since the 1960s as we continue to make images informed by contemporary society and the concerns of identity, gender, sexuality, environmental issues, economic injustice, global and local politics, and mass media. Others have argued that the shift in technology, from the rise of colour photography to digital photography and video, has radically altered our way of making and perceiving photographs. This course will discuss important historical developments, from the rise of conceptual and performance art, to the dominance of photography in the art museum and on social media. By considering photography’s artistic, commercial, and economic impact, we will ask ourselves: where has photography come from and where is it going in the 21st century?

Fall 2017

History of Photography I, Photography Studies Program, 2nd year course

This course provides a chronological overview of developments in analogue photography from 1839 through to 1970. The medium of photography will be situated in its various contexts, including social conditions, political shifts, aesthetic concerns, and technological developments. Key figures and important works will be shown and discussed alongside major trends. Matters of influence – the relationship between photography and mass media, or photography and film – will be examined in light of public and private image-making. The course treats photography broadly as a cultural activity with emphasis on its historical, documentary, and social value as well as its own aesthetic developments during this period. Attention is given to the relationship of photography to other media and to the development of photographic theory.

History of Photography II, Film and Photography Preservation and Collection Management Graduate Program, M2 course

This course aims to teach students about aspects of the history and theory of photography through the material and visual analysis of photographic objects. Based on access to the Art Gallery of Ontario’s collection of photography, we will consider the photographic object in terms of their history of production, use, value, and collect-ability. Through in depth engagement with weekly readings, this seminar will teach students to consider diverse theoretical and methodological approaches to writing and researching the history of photography.

Advanced Topics in the History of Documentary, Documentary Media Graduate Program, M2 course

How has environmental documentary media, both in still or moving image, responded to the challenges of communicating political, social, and cultural concerns in the 21st century? The aim of this course is to help student practitioners to develop a strong theoretical grounding in contemporary environmental documentary, which will allow them to critically and practically engage with one of the most prominent forms of documentary media today. Through in depth engagement with a wide variety of interdisciplinary course readings, artworks, discussions and presentations, students will gain a wide sense of the discourse around documentary media praxis through the subject of the environment. We will interrogate how aesthetics, politics, form, presentation, and circulation play an important role in shaping the understanding of documentary media.

2015-2017. SSRHC Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Art History and Art Conservation, Winter Term, Queen’s University

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Department of Art History and Art Conservation, Winter Term, 2016

Landscape/Environment in Art and Visual Culture

First glimpsed in the background of portraits, landscape later emerged as a genre in its own right. Artistic and cultural engagement with the land has been shaped by the changing understandings of our surrounding environment, influenced by instrumentalist, ecological, and philosophical ideas about humanity’s place in nature. By looking at the major developments in the history of landscape, and by reading the important writings of scholars that have shaped and reflected these changes, we will approach the challenge of ‘landscape/environment in art and visual culture’ with critical reappraisal.

2011-2013. PhD Student and Candidate Sessional Instructor, Department of Art History, Concordia University

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Department of Art History, Winter Term, 2013

Studies in Contemporary Photographic Arts: Theory and Practice

Through the reading of key primary texts influential to the development of contemporary photography, this course examines the inter-relationship of theory and practice in the medium.  In class discussions and lectures, students were encouraged to debate and reflect on the shifts in photographic meaning, production, and intention during the 20th and into the 21st century and to develop their own understand of the ethical, aesthetic, and conceptual role of the medium in our contemporary world.

Department of Art History, Winter Term, 2012

Studies in Contemporary Photographic Arts, Co-instructors Karla McManus and Elizabeth Cavaliere

Through readings of key primary texts in the development of photography and the viewing of contemporary photographs, this course examines the influence of various theoretical frameworks on photographic production and the inter-relationship of theory and practice.

Department of Art History, Fall Term, 2011

Aspects of the History of Photography

In a series of thematic lectures that draw on the history of photography from its invention in the mid-nineteenth century to the present day, this course tells the larger story of photography’s development, highlighting the impact of technological, theoretical, aesthetic, and vernacular developments in the medium.

Department of Art History, Winter Term, 2011

Landscape and Environment in Art

This course traces the trajectory of landscape art in the Western art tradition as a cultural and aesthetic practice, with a particular focus on the theoretical and conceptual interpretations of landscape as both a subject and a medium through which humans have expressed their relationship to space and place. In the second half of the course, emphasis is placed on the cultural and scientific development of environmental and ecological ideas and their impact on art-making.