No artistic tendency of the early twentieth century had greater international impact than Cubism, which affected the practice of artists of the most diverse orientation throughout Europe and Russia. It is equally true that no twentieth-century movement has generated a comparable mass of critical and scholarly literature. Indeed, a study of the historiography of Cubism can, arguably more than that of any other twentieth-century tendency, serve as a microcosm of the evolving concerns of art-historical discourse, from the formalism of the early to mid-twentieth century to more recent concerns with sexuality, semiotics, "primitivism," the market, and social history. This seminar will closely re-examine the objects of classic Cubism themselves (primarily Picasso, Braque, Gris) as well as the developing historiographic interpretations of this art. Requirements: students will be responsible for leading class discussion on one set of readings, an oral report, to be presented in revised, written form at semester's end, and a ten-minute critical commentary on another student's oral report.