Upcoming Events
STEVEN HOLL LECTURE
April 10, 2012 6:00pm
Deciccio Auditorium , Salomon Hall
2011-2012 Year of China Art History Lecture Series
This year Brown celebrates its University-wide year of China. The History of Art & Architecture Department has organized a lecture series in conjunction with the Year of China.
Monday April 9th
Hao Sheng, Wu Tung Curator of Chinese Art, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Fresh Ink: Ten Takes on Chinese Tradition
Wednesday April 18th
Craig Clunas, Professor of the History of Art, University of Oxford
Looking at Looking at Chinese Painting
Past Events
History of Art and Architecture Lectures
Tuesday, February 28th 4:15
Dr. Sheila Canby
Curator in Charge of the Islamic Art Department
at the Metropolitan Museum
The Galleries for Islamic Art at the Met: Renovation and Revival
Thursday, March 8th 6:00
Bjarke Ingels presents the J. Carter Brown Lecture
Danish architect, founder and head of Bjarke Ingels Group
Currently a visiting professor at Harvard
University Graduate School of Design
Film Screening
Wednesday March 7th
5:30 pm, List 110, "Alfred Schreyer from Drohobycz," a film by Marcin Gizycki
The Culture and Practice of Painting in Song China (960-1279)
Annual Memorial Anita Glass Lecture 2011-2012
Richard Barnhart, Professor Emeritus, Yale University
Wednesday, 16 November, 5:30 pm, List Art Center Room 120
During the 300 years China was ruled by the Song emperors the art of painting reached heights of sophistication and accomplishment that mark the period forever as a golden age. Painting became a necessary companion of the fulfilled life in nearly all spheres of activity, from palace to temple, and continued to provide enrichment into the tomb. Barnhart explores the practice of Song painting and how that practice bears on questions of dating and attribution that continue to occupy him.
Particularly interesting are the beginning and the end of Song art, junctures that demonstrate the unique character of the period. Sculpture dominates the Tang and calligraphy inspires the Yuan. The rich illusion of space so fundamental to the identity of Song, when painting dominated the other arts, is examined within both the long tradition of illusionistic spectacles that were essential to imperial and religious practices in China and the evolving nature of painting itself, as independent professional painters achieved fame in every institution of traditional China.
2011-2012 Graduate Student Symposium: "Not on View"
October 20-21, 2011
"Not on View" site
The Happiness of Others: Social Identity and the Photographic Smile
Professor Tanya Sheehan (Art History Department Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey), "The Happiness of Others: Social Identity and the Photographic Smile."
Tuesday, September 20, 2011
The Painted Pottery of Gansu Province: Prehistoric Art in Comparative Perspective
Robert W. Bagley, Professor of Art and Archaeology, Princeton University
Thursday, 15 September, 5:30 PM List Art Center Room 110
If pots resembling those from China were found on Mars, which is more probable, two separate inventions on two planets, or interplanetary travel? But the fact that certainty is unattainable does not mean that comparison is pointless. It can help us assess probabilities: the New World is not Mars, but it is a long way from China and Mesopotamia. More important, comparison has much to teach us about artistic invention. Design, we cannot doubt, is part of what it is to be human (and Martian?).
Jenny So
Professor of Fine Arts – Fellow of the Hong Kong Academy of the Humanities Chinese University of Hong Kong
Thursday, 29 September, 5:30 pm, List Art Center Room 110
Scholars, Antiquity, and Jades of 12th-17th Century
The culture of China's literati and their pursuit of antiquity have been popular subjects of art-historical research. Often these investigations center on the realms of painting, calligraphy, and ritual bronzes of the Northern Song, and Late Ming and Qing dynasties. This presentation looks at the same phenomena from the perspective of another medium, jade. Although jade has been a central icon in Chinese culture spanning several millennia, its place in the life of the Chinese literati has been neglected in most studies. We shall focus on jade during the period from the Southern Song to the early Qing dynasty (12th to 17th Centuries). Archaeologically excavated examples of securely datable jades from Song and later contexts, as well as important objects in museum collections, shall form the backbone for this exploration into the Song-Ming scholars' impressions of antiquity.
Francois Louis
Associate Professor, Bard Graduate Center: Decorative Arts, Design History, Material Culture
Thursday, 13 October, 5:30 pm, List Art Center Room 110
The Belitung Shipwreck: Medieval Chinse Treasures and Modern Culture Politics
Salvaged in 1998 in Indonesia, the Belitung shipwreck contained the oldest known Chinese ceramic cargo – over 60,000 ceramic bowls and jars from the ninth century. The wreck documents the earliest known large-scale export of ceramics from China and for the first time provides substantial data to study medieval maritime trade in Southeast Asia. Beside the ceramics, the site also yielded extraordinary Chinese gold, silver, and bronze artifacts, and enough remains of the ship’s hull to allow for a reconstruction of the vessel and for its identification as Arab. What can this spectacular find tell us about medieval maritime trade between China, Southeast Asia, and Iraq? I propose to examine it alongside historical records, which paint a picture of diplomat-merchants and a good number of self-serving officials who acted within a system of severe political factionalism, widespread corruption, and feeble imperial control. Today, after its commercial salvage and subsequent sale, the cargo continues to engender notions of profiteering and political expediency.