OLLI@DU / 2023 FALL / COURSE DESCRIPTIONS

From Realism to Abstraction: Kollwitz and Kandinsky: Their Life and Times

VIPA 1014

Wednesday

Dates: 9/20 to 11/8 (8 weeks)

Time: 9:30–11:30 AM

Facilitator: Linda Susak

Location: Online

Class Limit: 35 Participants

Sponsoring Site: On Campus

Käthe Kollwitz, arguably the greatest German woman artist, was born in 1867 in East Prussia and died as the War was ending in 1945. Wassily Kandinsky, born in Moscow in 1866, died in 1944 in Paris. Although they were contemporaries, their art was completely different and cannot be compared. Although the movement toward what is now called Modernism (including Impressionism, Cubism, Fauvism, Surrealism) was well underway in Kollwitz’ lifetime, she deliberately chose to represent her subjects and their lives through realism. Wassily Kandinsky, whose work was never random, was experimenting with new forms, ideas, and color and he ran the gamut from semi-realistic to a hint of the representational object to total abstraction. In his two books on art: Concerning the Spiritual in Art and Point to Line to Plane, he philosophically and theoretically grounded his way to abstraction and, arguably, became the first artist to create a totally abstract painting. In this course, we will look in detail at both artists and investigate their individual approaches and look at what abstraction, in Kandinsky’s own words, is based upon. The first four weeks we will discuss Käthe Kollwitz; the last four Kandinsky.

Get Smarter about your Smartphone VIPA 1019

Thursday

Dates: 9/21 to 10/26 (6 weeks)

Time: 9:30–11 AM

Facilitator: Sharon Sherman

Location: Online

Class Limit: 25 Participants

Sponsoring Site: Regis

Most of us cannot seem to live without our iPhone or Android smart devices – but we are often not taking advantage of their capabilities or are frustrated with them. This class will explore the revolutionary technologies, connectivity and components involved in our devices. Learn essential settings, apps, features, and operations that enable their tremendous versatility and usefulness. Explore what we need to know about carriers and purchasing equipment. Learn about voice control and more: managing, maintaining, handling security, email accounts, wi-fi use and texting. Come get a little smarter about your tech and learn more about these life sustaining tools.

Great Film Directors

VIPA 1021

Thursday

Dates: 9/21 to 11/9 (8 weeks)

Time: 9:30–11:30 AM

Facilitator: Bob Magnani, Platinum Facilitator Location: Online

Class Limit: Unlimited

Sponsoring Site: West

Some Directors have an identifiable brash style that we can all appreciate; some strive to be invisible – if you can see their efforts, they feel they have usurped the story. Whichever way, the great directors with long, successful lists of films to their credit are supreme artists of film that can pull at your heart and drive you (sometimes) out of your seat with excitement. How do they do that? What subtle tricks, what film grammar do they know and use on you to tell their stories in compelling ways? Take this course and see how they do it – Quentin Tarantino, Francis Ford Coppola, Sidney Lumet, Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, Stanley Kubrick, Joel and Ethan Coen, Sidney Pollack. We’ll see excerpts of their work, biographic info and Interviews with them, and detailed commentaries on their techniques via YouTube videos.

Japanese Prints from Meiji to Modern VIPA 1005

Tuesday

Dates: 9/19 to 10/31 (7 weeks)

Time: 9:30–11:30 AM

Facilitator: Jerry Mercure

Location: 1st Universalist

Class Limit: 20 Participants

Sponsoring Site: Central

And now for something completely different… for all the art lovers out there. For those of you who are tired of being bombarded by bad news on a daily basis, this class is intended to lighten and brighten your world. I’ll be showing and discussing some of the most beautiful Japanese prints made over the last 150 years. Their impact is felt around the world.

When the United States ended Japan’s isolationist foreign policy around 1854, Japan entered a new period marked by rapid modernization, industrialization, and cultural change. This class will delve into Japanese print art resulting from Japanese societal changes beginning in the Meiji period (18681912). Out of necessity, it will show contrasts and similarities with prior Edo period prints. I will discuss the evolution of Japanese society and print artists, their lives and their work over approximately a 150-year period (to the present). This includes the shin-hanga (new prints), sosaku-hanga (creative prints), and kindai-hanga (modern and contemporary prints) movements. Japanese prints have had a huge impact on Western art over the last 350 years. Prepare to be awed by this art form that is infused with Western influences yet remains essentially Japanese and is still popular today. No extracurricular reading is required.