Pressly Forum: Karin Oen-Lee, "Global/Chinese/Modern: Amateurs, Professionals, Circulations, and Systemic Glitches"
Pressly Forum: Karin Oen-Lee, "Global/Chinese/Modern: Amateurs, Professionals, Circulations, and Systemic Glitches"
Please join us Wednesday, November 4th at noon, when Karin Oen-Lee shares some of her latest research in a talk titled, "Global/Chinese/Modern: Amateurs, Professionals, Circulations, and Systemic Glitches."
Exploring the interconnected histories of modern Chinese art, experimental practices, and the institutions of art pedagogy and exhibition in China and abroad, Dr. Oen-Lee's talk starts in the late 1980s and early 1990s of China’s Reform Era. Using this period of both institutionalization and experimentation as an anchor for a protean concept of the global both outside and within China, her talk then explores a historically diverse cast of characters including foreign supporters of Chinese art and artists from the early- and mid-twentieth century.
Looking at the production of artists including Pang Tao and Zhang Peili, and the art historian Tao Yongbai, Oen-Lee explores how these figures utilized their positions within mainland Chinese state infrastructure not to overthrow the system, but to introduce glitches and systemic noise that rendered the state’s pedagogical machinery less legible. Simultaneously, these strategies allowed for the internal broadening of perspective while purposely placing art in China in relation with modern art practices around the world. This project also traces a material lineage from literati ink painting through state-sanctioned oil painting of the 20th-century academies in both the Republic of China and People’s Republic periods, to Reform Era “new” media work (video, installation) by artists who were themselves academy-trained oil painters. By analyzing intellectual trends such as "Science Fever" and cultural touchstones like the Towards the Future book series (1984-1989) and the River Elegy television documentary series (1988), this project examines an intentionally global strategy for maintaining creative agency within authoritarian and other politically-charged structures.
Karin Oen-Lee is a curator and art historian who last year was appointed Assistant Professor in the Department of Art History and Museum Studies at University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC).
The Pressly Forum offers members of Department faculty and selected speakers to give a talk to members of the Department (faculty, staff, students) in an effort to create bonds of intellectual and collegial community. The forum is the brainchild of Professor Emeritus William L. Pressly, after whom the forum now is named. A light lunch will be served at 11:30.
Please join us Wednesday, November 4th at noon, when Karin Oen-Lee shares some of her latest research in a talk titled, "Global/Chinese/Modern: Amateurs, Professionals, Circulations, and Systemic Glitches."
Exploring the interconnected histories of modern Chinese art, experimental practices, and the institutions of art pedagogy and exhibition in China and abroad, Dr. Oen-Lee's talk starts in the late 1980s and early 1990s of China’s Reform Era. Using this period of both institutionalization and experimentation as an anchor for a protean concept of the global both outside and within China, her talk then explores a historically diverse cast of characters including foreign supporters of Chinese art and artists from the early- and mid-twentieth century.
Looking at the production of artists including Pang Tao and Zhang Peili, and the art historian Tao Yongbai, Oen-Lee explores how these figures utilized their positions within mainland Chinese state infrastructure not to overthrow the system, but to introduce glitches and systemic noise that rendered the state’s pedagogical machinery less legible. Simultaneously, these strategies allowed for the internal broadening of perspective while purposely placing art in China in relation with modern art practices around the world. This project also traces a material lineage from literati ink painting through state-sanctioned oil painting of the 20th-century academies in both the Republic of China and People’s Republic periods, to Reform Era “new” media work (video, installation) by artists who were themselves academy-trained oil painters. By analyzing intellectual trends such as "Science Fever" and cultural touchstones like the Towards the Future book series (1984-1989) and the River Elegy television documentary series (1988), this project examines an intentionally global strategy for maintaining creative agency within authoritarian and other politically-charged structures.
Karin Oen-Lee is a curator and art historian who last year was appointed Assistant Professor in the Department of Art History and Museum Studies at University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC).
The Pressly Forum offers members of Department faculty and selected speakers to give a talk to members of the Department (faculty, staff, students) in an effort to create bonds of intellectual and collegial community. The forum is the brainchild of Professor Emeritus William L. Pressly, after whom the forum now is named. A light lunch will be served at 11:30.
Parren J. Mitchell Art/Sociology Building false