... of The San Diego Museum of Art

Asian Arts Council 2019-2020 General Meeting Lectures

Each month the Asian Arts Council presents a program featuring a distinguished scholar, curator, collector or Asian arts enthusiast of note. We meet the last Thursday of the month in the Museum’s Boardroom at 1:00 p.m. and begin with a brief business meeting before the lecture. Meetings are free for AAC members, only $10 for Museum members, $12 for non-members and $8 for students.

Archived lecture schedules

Click on a date line below for a lecture summary from the Asian Arts Council Newsletter

Jul. 25 - 1:00 p.m. Making Hinges: Developing an Exhibition of Japanese Art at BAMPFA Julia M. White, BAMPFA’s Senior Curator for Asian Art (UC Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archive)

AAC Newsletter – Aug. 2019, p 2 Lecture Flyer

Mountain Landscape Julia M. White provided a fascinating behind-the-scenes tour through the multiple steps in developing a major exhibition. The acquisition of a pair of six-fold screens from the innovative 18th century Japanese artist Sakaki Hyakusen was the impetus for the upcoming exhibition at the Berkeley Art Museum, Hinges: Sakaki Hyakusen and the Birth of Nanga Painting.A team was assembled to provide research, scholarship and expert conservation since the screens were in poor condition due to insect and rodent damage, deteriorated mountings, and broken hinges. Research trips to view paintings at other museums were a necessity before arranging loans to the exhibition, and scholarly essays were submitted for the catalog. Sakaki Hyakusen (1697-1752) founded the new style of Nanga painting based on the limited examples of Chinese literati paintings available to Japanese artists in the closed society of Edo period Japan. The subject matter was often based on Chinese landscape paintings of towering mountains in the background, water features, and tiny, reclusive figures or tranquil cottages in the foreground. Sakaki Hyakusen stood out for his abilities as an experimenter, using a wide range of styles and a variety of brush strokes. Julia M. White is Senior Curator for Asian Art at UC’s Berkeley Art Museum-Pacific Film Archive.

Aug. 29 - 1:00 p.m. Dragons: Myth and Reality Courtenay McGowen, AAC Study Group, past-Chair, Asian Arts Council

Lecture Flyer images

“Dragons, Myth and Reality” will explore the history of dragons worldwide, and challenge us to question how these creatures of great mythological strength came to be. The dragon is the prototype of all our most basic human fears, a universal archetype recognized by everyone, world wide. Variations of the basic theme reflect the beliefs of the cultures in which they functioned. Courtenay McGowen’s talk will explore this universal archetype throughout the ages. We are surrounded by dragons today, proof of their ongoing universal fascination. Courtenay is an Asian Arts Council Study group member and a long time member of AAC.

Sep. 26 - 1:00 p.m. East and West, High and Low: Art of Kondo Koichiro (1884- 1962) Michiyo Morioka, author, independent scholar of Japanese art with expertise in Nihonga and gender issues in modern Japanese art

Kondō Kōichiro is known as one of the most accomplished ink painters of modern Japan. He began his career as an oil painter and worked as a popular illustrator/cartoonist before exploring nihonga (traditional-style modern Japanese painting) and establishing his reputation for his novel ink expression. This talk presents the evolution of Kōichiro’s art and his multifaceted contribution to the Japanese art world in the early twentieth century.