Recent studies within and outside of both Art History and the geographical area of China that are in two areas, cross-cultural encounters and gender consideration have informed my current research interest in artistic and collecting practices in early nineteenth-century China.

Regardless of subjects and historical times involved, studies in the first area, cross-cultural encounters locate varied practice in China alongside relevant consideration, conditions and circumstances in places outside of China, thereby bringing into play changing and shifting encounters and interactions between China and others. 

Studies in the second area of gender that have informed my research interest are on historical women in China, from the seventeenth century forward that are essentially actively mediating between fictional portrayals of women in poems, novels, and plays and the agencies of historical subjects.

Studies in the two areas have enabled me to explore an understanding of artistic and collecting practices in early nineteenth-century China, an historical time that remains burdened with the specter of semi-colonialism, in a formation that is characterized by ready presence of women literate and artists, and collecting as a unifying interest among people in different societal segments, amidst heightened awareness of historicism. The formation of interpretive understanding may be linked more reasonably, to modern China, with diminished reliance (solely) on the West.

Invited visiting faculty in Art History, International Summer Session, East China Normal University, Shanghai (2012 – 2015, 2017 – 2018)

Educational Background:

Ph.D., Art History, Stanford University
M.A., Art History, University of California, Berkeley
B.A. (First Class Honours), Classical Chinese Studies, Durham University, UK