The curricular unit aims to develop the following competences:

• the domain of conceptual and methodological tools in the fields of cultural and artistic studies;
• the capacity to elaborate on topics while using the required conceptual tools;
• the capacity to build a critical a rational approach of the object;
• the capacity to ponder on the speculative dimension of the chosen object;
• the capacity to problematize the epistemological dimension inherent to the state of the arts on the chosen object.

1. Building a singular aesthetic

1.1.The remains of Medieval aesthetic and religious memories;
1.2.The specificity of an English renaissance aesthetic;
1.3.Building a British imaginary – from William Hogarth to Thomas Gainsborough.

2. In the tension between past and present

2.1.Recovering a perception of the Transcendent – William Blake;
2.2.A new aesthetic dialogue with the space – from John Constable to J. M. W. Turner;
2.3.The synthesis of the interarts dialogues – the pre-Raphaelites.

3. From Modernism to Post-Modernism

3.1.Conceiving a perception of modernity – from Walter Richard Sickert to Stanley Spencer;
3.2.Avant-Garde and tradition – from Paul Nash to Francis Bacon;
3.3.On the dialogues with other aesthetic horizons – from Edward Hopper to Lucien Freud.

Avelar, Mário. Ekphrasis – O poeta no atelier do artista (Chamusca: Cosmos, 2006)
Barringer, Tim et al. Pre-Raphaelites – Victorian Avant-Garde (London: Tate, 2012)
Faria, Luísa Leal de. Sociedade e Cultura Inglesas (Lisboa: Universidade Aberta, 1996)
Graham-Dixon, Andrew. A History of British Art (London: BBC Worldwide Ldt, 1999 [1996])
Wilton, Andrew. Five Centuries of British Painting – From Holbein to Hodgkin (London: Thames & Hudson, 2001)

Continuous assessment is privileged: 2 digital written documents (e-folios) during the semester (40%) and a final digital test, Global e-folio (e-folio G) at the end of the semester (60%). In due time, students can alternatively choose to perform one final exam (100%).