Established in Spring 2003, the Center for the Art of East Asia is designed to better serve the growing interest in East Asian art and visual culture in a variety of ways. The art of East Asia is recognized as an important part of an expanding group of intersecting disciplines in overlapping geographical areas.

The center draws inspiration from various trends in traditional history and in contemporary culture. East Asian art traditions have emerged and been redefined throughout history by cultural interactions. New archeological finds provide evidence of this cross-fertilization over several millennia. In the contemporary world, East Asian societies of Korea, Japan, and China are interacting to an ever-greater extent with other nations and are playing larger roles in contemporary culture and international affairs. Scholars and artists from these areas have a growing impact in the areas of art, culture and international studies. This concentration of interest in Asian art and visual culture is redefining the parameters of East Asian art history. In response to these developments, we are adopting a global outlook and encourage new perspectives on East Asian art and visual culture to provide an arena for greater understanding not only for the academic community but also for a wider audience.

Department of Art History

We are developing and coordinating programs in East Asian art and visual culture, supporting individual scholarship, collecting and presenting data for teaching and research, and organizing conferences and creating other opportunities for scholarly and student exchange. In this way we provide an institutional basis to improve educational programs and encourage further international and interdisciplinary collaborative work inside and outside the university. We offer courses in Chinese and Japanese art and visual culture from traditional to contemporary periods for undergraduate and graduate students, and encourage graduate students to pursue their research in new areas and with innovative methodologies. Their course work is supplemented by interaction with visiting scholars, faculty and students in regular workshops and other informal meetings.

The center welcomes visiting scholars to conduct research at the University of Chicago and make use of the excellent library facilities and to share ideas and information with our academic community. In addition, we frequently invite scholars from other institutions to workshops, symposia, and other events. The Center has also had a postdoctoral fellowship for the last three years that offers scholars in the early stage of their professional careers the opportunity to teach and conduct research in a chosen field.

Annual conferences and symposia bring scholars from various disciplines, regional areas of research, institutions, and countries together at the University of Chicago. Recent symposia have addressed the topics of "Art and Commerce," "Looking Modern," and "From Prints to Photography," and we are preparing to publish a series of conference volumes. As researchers and educators in the humanities and social sciences increasingly recognize the importance of using visual images, the Center is developing a variety of ways to research, present and make available resources in East Asian art:

1) The East Asian Art Reading Room has built a substantial collection of art books, photographs, and digital resources over the last decade to better serve students and faculty.

2) A digital database of East Asian art scrolling paintings, which will include important works of art in major museums that are largely inaccessible to the students and the general public. [http://scrolls.uchicago.edu]

3) A collaborative research project on sixth century culture of the Northern Qi dynasty and the cave temples of Xiangtangshan. This includes a technical component for 3D digital scanning of sculptures, which were taken away from the cave sites and are now in museum collections, and a digital reconstruction of the caves. [http://xts.uchicago.edu]

The success of these activities has so far depended on the assistance and encouragement of the University, in particular the Humanities Division and the Department of Art History, the Office of the Provost, the Center for East Asian Studies, and the Office of Foundation Relations. Moreover, various granting institutions have recognized and supported our efforts. These include:

• The Luce Foundation
• The Tang Research Foundation
• The Acorn Foundation
• The Adelyn Russell Bogert Fund of the Franke Institute for the Humanities
• The Norman Waite Harris Fund in the Center for International Studies.
• The Provost's Academic Technology Innovation Grant initially made possible the Digital Scrolling Project
• Grants from the Carpenter Foundation and the J. Paul Getty Foundation are supporting the Xiangtangshan Caves Project

We look forward to future productive collaborations and support for new initiatives and continuing projects.