Studio Art in Athens
Studio Art in Athens
Language Requirement: None
Academic Standing by Program Start: Sophomore or above
Location: Europe, Greece
GPA: 2.5
Program Overview
The unique landscape of the Greek islands and the multilayered city of Athens provide the setting for this intensive three-week studio art course. Through a series of lectures, fieldwork, daily excursions to archaeological sites and museums, contemporary galleries and engagement with land and sea, students will have the opportunity to weave their experience of place and consideration of history and art into the practice of making art. Our methods will be interdisciplinary and open to various modes of expression, which might include but are not limited to, drawing and painting, text, performance, photography, sound and video. The emphasis is less on a technique or process and more on developing a methodology that creatively articulates your response to your surroundings and experience of travel.
In addition to the daily practice of making art, an important component of the course will be the study of artists who engage in practices that involve traveling to or otherwise focusing on specific geographic locations. We will look toward these practices to give shape to student’s artistic production during this course. We will examine conventional examples of art dealing with how place forms social, historical and cultural values as well as artists who complicate traditional ways of representing geographic sites, or their activity at those sites.
Program Scholarship: Applicants to this program have the option to apply for a program-specific scholarship. Award recipients are chosen based on academic merit, financial need, and overall quality of their essay. Individual awards range from $500 - $2,500. To be considered, the Scholarship Essay must be completed by March 15th. Please refer to the Scholarship Essay instructions in the program application or speak with your GEO advisor for more details.
Dates and Deadlines
| Term | Year | Deadline | Arrival Date | Departure Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Summer | 2024 | 3/15/2024 | 8/10/2024 | 8/31/2024 |
Academic Details
ART 488: Studio Art in Athens. 6 quarter credits or 4 semester credits. Upper-division studio coursework.
In Studio Art in Athens, you will apply media, techniques and strategies to create art that interprets objects, images and gestures from the natural world and culture of Greece. Through exploring the notion of travel as a creative activity while gaining an understanding of the traveler’s cultural position, you will fully engage with the environment at hand as well as the process of travelling through creative practice. You will gain a basic understanding of Greek history, culture and art over the course of the program through exposure to museums and contemporary art in Athens from commercial galleries, performance and design studios to alternate creative hubs.
Course Equivalencies
UO students: please refer to the UO Course Equivalency Process and the UO Office of the Registrar Course Equivalency Database.
Non-UO students: Actual credit awarded is determined by the relevant department at your university in consultation with the study abroad office. Check with your study abroad advisor for more information.
Faculty and Staff
Amanda Wojick is a Professor and co-chair of the sculpture area at the University of Oregon, where she has been teaching since 2001. She is a studio-based artist, working at intersections of sculpture, collage, and painting. Her work exists within the lineage of abstract sculpture produced by women, especially as it is oriented towards process and materials. She is interested in the friction between public and private space, as well as the politics and potentials of materiality. Her recent projects have engaged landscape, history, commemoration, and the cultural space of the home. Wojick has served as the Director of Graduate Studies, the Department of Art chair, and has worked with UO study abroad programs in Siena, Italy and Greece.
Housing Description
While in Athens, you will live in a shared apartment with a small kitchenette within walking distance of the Athens Centre. Generally, there will be two to four students in each apartment, although some houses will accommodate up to six people. You have the choice of cooking meals in the apartment or eating at one of the inexpensive cafés and restaurants near the Athens Centre.
While traveling during the program, you will share a room with two or three classmates at local hotels in the region. During this time, breakfast is generally included, but students will be responsible for their lunch and dinner.
Given the close-knit travel nature, it's important to approach this journey with an "expedition mentality"—prioritizing decisions that benefit the group as a whole over individual preferences.