While the glory days of ‘pure’ or modernist painting may well be dead, the spectre of painting still haunts contemporary video art, photography, installation and conceptual art, and painting itself persists in increasingly hybrid forms; as conceptual painting, painted installations, and as photos of paintings or as paintings of photos. This course investigates some of the most influential practices of painting over the last 40 years, and highlight key debates and concepts that have shaped the reception of painting in contemporary art. It will address recent Australian and international artists as they respond to questions of commodification, technology, conceptualism, visuality, politics and aesthetics, and it will open discussion as to the future of possibilities of a complex and impure painting in the broader context of contemporary art.