I had taken an art history course back in high school that was cumulative, but as the title of this class states, it is ONLY modern art with minimal references to the Renaissance and Egyptian art and so on. I thought this course would be easy with a 20% equal distribution to each of the two essays, final, midterm, and discussion, but I was greatly mistaken. The grade SOLELY DEPENDS on your TA. My TA was very knowledgable and offered insight and help into the artworks in the course, but this TA graded very harshly although this TA seemed like a really nice person. The average for all essays was a B+, even if you have given it your utmost effort and thoroughly knew the content. You do NOT need to buy any textbooks for this class as all readings are posted on CCLE. The course is interesting with all the artworks you get to learn about and the professor is very lively and passionate. But WARNING, you will never see some artworks that you may have seen before the same way again because the professor always finds something phallic or sexual about it. The readings range from ten to over thirty pages. I took notes on each one and it would take hours to comprehend the text because art is very objective, but in the class, we are more focused on the physical aspects of art and the context of each era of art. The first essay will have you compare and contrast two paintings and the second one will have you compare and contrast two sculptures. The midterm will include slide ID which makes you identify the artworks with its title, date, and artist and the other part is the compare and contrast essay. The final has slide ID and it also has more compare and contrast essays and one longer essay that wraps all the themes of the course. ALL ESSAYS THAT ARE WRITTEN IN THE CLASS (whether it be alone or in a test) MUST INCLUDE THE SUPPORT OF THE READINGS. So, take this class if you can write well and make art your beach. I tried my best, but it wasn't enough for an A (HA!).

The class is very interesting and Baker is surely a character. However, a lot of the textbooks weren't necessary, especially the one he himself wrote.

Baker has a no-electronics policy for lectures. He also pressures people to attend lectures, although there are no consequences if you dip. Your grade in the class WILL depend on which TA you get, so pray that you get a good one, because your TA determines your grade. Find a lenient TA and you'll be chilling.

There are two papers to submit on your own, one midterm, and one final. Each paper is 20% of your grade, the midterm is 20%, the final is 20%, and participation in discussion is 20%. Midterms and finals have a "slide ID" portion of the exam, where you're required to ---MEMORIZE--- the name, date, and artist of a piece of art. There are more than 60 pieces of art to identify. Not fun, but there are tons of quizlets out there to help you out. The essay prompts were not too bad, as long as you pay attention and somewhat skim the readings, you'll be fine.

Baker's lectures were more or less entertaining and funny. Of course, the subject matter can be dull sometimes, but he always cracks us up with a funny (borderline inappropriate) joke. But all in all, he's a great prof.

His lectures were interesting from someone who has never taken an Art History before

There were two papers, a midterm, and a final exam (both midterm and final were in class written and we had to memorize a couple dozen paintings, artists, and dates). Participation was required and there was probably an hour of reading per week.

its a lot of work but manageable if you put the time in
Doable to get an A, but not the easiest GE

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When he starts with introducing modern art as modern French art, I had a feeling this class was not worth it. I don't know how the class or professor has such high ratings, but as a non humanities major with no background in art aesthetics, I would never recommend this course.
You would get a lot of useless reading materials. While you may take some notes from those fancy words (basically intended to be like a snob), you can have the same amount of digestions from any online art forums within minutes. His lectures are boring, always paralleling the same concepts. Some people might disagree, but I had fewer than 10 pages of lecture&reading notes and learned everything I need online and did fine with the exams and essays. Despite zero engagement from the professor, he would still try to intimidate students with the difficulties of understanding the insights of art (I had assumed that his job was to make the process easier).
I still walked away with a lot from this course, but what I learned about art was mostly not taught by him. It is not simply that our tastes differ, rather that I do not recommend his approaches at all, as a mere student of course.

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Fun class but prof was behind on syllabus a lot because he would spend too much time on one topic. Sometimes was hard to follow what his main points were because he goes off on tangents a lot.

Professor Baker is the best. He is so engaging when lecturing and he makes the material so much more interesting to learn. The midterm and final are relatively easy, as long as you memorize the pieces he gives you and have a general understanding of the readings. The TA section is mandatory and is also very helpful. Such a good class, I absolutely loved this GE.

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