Courses

AADM 111 Introduction to Arts Administration

This course will engage the primary critical areas that arts administrators manage regardless of the art medium represented or the size of the arts entity. Topics include the rise of the arts as an economic engine and social force, concept development and analysis, stakeholder analysis, business plans, the creative class, shifting community demographics, and mission statements. Class guests from various arts entities provide opportunities for real world case studies and dialogue on current issues in the arts. Cross Listing: BUS 111; E. Metz; J. Spittell

AADM 211 Strategic Principles of Arts Administration

This course will build upon the theory, concepts, and skills initiated in AADM 111 through the study of the strategic administrative level of responsibilities. Arts organizations require highly knowledgeable and skilled individuals with a keen aesthetic sensibility, incisive business acumen, and an insightful understanding of current issues and trends that are relevant to the creative health, fiscal prosperity, and human capital of those organizations and the demographics they serve. Strategic topics include, entity organizational structures, leadership strategies, and economic theory as applied in the non-profit sector, budgeting, fundraising, governance, labor relations, marketing, and arts advocacy. Prerequisite(s): AADM/BUS 111; Cross Listing: BUS 215; E. Metz; staff

AADM 221 Art Work: Culture, Power, and Meaning in Aesthetic Practice

What is art? Who decides? What distinguishes ordinary objects from art and everyday activity from artistic practice? In this course, we conceive of art as a social construction: a product of situated social action rather than an essential thing-in-itself. Tracing the historical and cultural variation of the objects and practices now considered art, we analyze how artistic boundaries are maintained, contested, and subverted in everyday aesthetic practice. Students apply cultural theory and sociological research to analyze their own qualitative data, collected via semi-structured interviews with two artists of students' choosing. HSS; W; G. Raley