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UPCOMING
Lecture
Precursors of Chinese Theater and Early Performances during the Song
This talk introduces some early developments in Chinese music, performing forms, and literature which later became important components of Chinese theater. It will also lead us to the Song Dynasty during which China’s economic system, social structure, and cultural environment directly nurtured the flourishing of early theater performances.
Xing Fan is an Assistant Professor of Chinese in the Asian Studies Program at Bates College. She holds a Ph.D. in Asian Theater from the University of Hawaii at Manoa and an M.A. in Chinese Theater Studies from the Academy of Chinese Traditional Theater in Beijing. At Bates College, Dr. Fan teaches “Drama and Theater of China,” “Art and Politics in China,” “Chinese Traditions, Great and Small” and Chinese language.
Tuesday, April 3 ~ 6:30 – 8 PM
$10 member / $15 non-member
Short Course
Classical Musical Drama of China: Laughter and Tears of a People
Blending poetry with singing, dancing, and acting, the classical Chinese musical drama fully reflects the rich emotions, laughter, and tears of the Chinese people. Although conceived during the ancient Zhou Period (1100–500 BCE) with its early and inchoate music and dance separately performed, it was not born until the Yuan dynasty in the 13th century. The following Ming (1368–1644) and Qing (1644–1911) dynasties saw the ripening of the classical musical drama, as how it was represented by Kunqu, the towering musical drama, which in turn gave birth to hundreds of local dramas in China, among which Beijing Opera shines as Kunqu’s most prominent descendant.
In this 3-session course, Ben Wang, an authority on Kunqu, will introduce the history of the classical Chinese drama, the unique poetic and visceral qualities of Kunqu and Beijing Opera. As the finale of the course, the life and art of Mei Lanfang (1894–1961), the greatest performer of the two genres, will be discussed. No previous knowledge of the Chinese language is required.
Ben Wang is China Institute’s Senior Lecturer in Language and Humanities, and an award-winning translator. He is author and translator of Laughter and Tears, a selection of Kunqu dramas, published in June 2009.
Tuesdays, April 10, 17, and 24 ~ 6:30 – 8:30 PM
$85 member / $95 non-member (three sessions)
$30 member / $35 non-member (per session)
Annual Lecture on World Cultural Heritage
Arts & Culture is pleased to announce its second annual lecture on world cultural heritage with the Global Heritage Fund. Since its founding, GHF has focused its efforts in developing countries and regions on preservation and responsible development of the most important and endangered global heritage sites. GHF projects are selected using strict criteria developed by its Board of Trustees and Senior Advisory Board, and work on each project follows a methodology termed Preservation by Design®. Jeff Morgan, Executive Director of GHF, and Kuang-Han Li, GHF’s China Project Manager, will speak about GHF’s projects in China, including the Foguang Temple, Lijiang ancient town, the tulous in Fujian province, and the city of Pingyao in Shanxi.
Jeff Morgan is a trained urban and regional planner; at GHF, he is responsible for global conservation excellence, building a leading international conservancy, and improving the lives in communities where GHF sites are located. He is a co-author of Cracking the Japanese Market: Keys to Success in the New Global Economy (Free Press, 1991) and Saving Our Global Heritage (GHF Press, 2004). He serves on the Advisory Board of the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR) and GHF’s Board of Trustees and Senior Advisory Board.
Tuesday, May 1 ~ 6:30 – 8 PM
$10 member / $15 non-member
For information please call 212-744-8181 x111 or email lchrysostome@chinainstitute.org.
Performance
A Lecture and Performance of Peking Opera
Peking Opera, arguably the most popular form of theater in modern China, embodies all major vernacular performance arts—music, dance, mime, and acrobatics. Audience will enjoy an explanatory lecture by China Institute’s Senior Lecturer Ben Wang and a performance of vignettes from the classical repertoire by New York City’s very own “Singing Delivery Man,” Yang Yu Bao, who was recently featured in the New York Daily News.
Tuesday, November 16 ~ 6:30 – 8:30 PM
$20 member / $25 non-member
Windows to a Culture—The Fascinating Chinese Proverbs
Rich and colorful, the Chinese language blends music and painting: a language nonpareil in its unique visceral quality. The Chinese proverbs, mostly four-character phrases, concise but deep in their meanings, take a special place in Chinese culture, illustrating moral and emotional expressions. The philosophical and often incisive messages the proverbs carry are alternately somber, didactic, amusing, hilarious or ironic. Used properly in writings or speeches, they can achieve what cannot be achieved by other ways of articulating the same thoughts. This three-session course in English will cover some of the most poignant and evocative among the thousands of Chinese proverbs. Previous knowledge of Chinese is not required.
Ben Wang is Senior Lecturer in Humanities and Chinese Language at China Institute and an award-winning translator.
Tuesdays, October 26, November 2 and 9 ~ 6:30 – 8:30 PM
$85 member / $95 non-member (3 sessions)
$30 member / $35 non-member (per session)
Short Course
Windows to a Culture —The Fascinating Chinese Proverbs II
By popular demand, join us for another session of fascinating lectures by Ben Wang on a specially selected collection of Chinese proverbs.
Rich and colorful, the Chinese language blends music and painting — a language nonpareil in its unique visceral quality. The Chinese proverbs, mostly four-character phrases, concise but deep in their meanings, take a special place in Chinese culture, illustrating moral and emotional expressions. The philosophical and often incisive messages the proverbs carry are alternately somber, didactic, amusing, hilarious, or ironic. Used properly in writings or speeches, they can achieve what cannot be achieved by other ways of articulating the same thoughts. This five- session course, held in English, will cover some of the most poignant and evocative among the thousands of Chinese proverbs. Previous knowledge of Chinese is not required.
Ben Wang is Senior Lecturer in Humanities and Chinese Language at China Institute and an award-winning translator.
Tuesdays, November 1, 8, 15, 22, and 29 ~ 6:30 – 8:30 PM
$135 member / $158 non-member (full course)
$30 member / $35 non-member (per session)
Curator’s Lecture
Kuiyi Shen and Julia Andrews, guest co-curators of the exhibition, will speak about their work on Blooming in the Shadows: Unofficial Chinese Art, 1974–1985. Kuiyi Shen is Director of Chinese Studies Program and Professor of Asian Art History, Theory, and Criticism at the University of California, San Diego. His teaching and writings have focused on Chinese and Japanese art with an emphasis on modern and contemporary Chinese art and Sino-Japanese art exchanges in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Julia Andrews is Professor of Art History at the Ohio State University and a specialist in Chinese painting and modern Chinese art. Her first book, Painters and Politics in the People’s Republic of China (1994), won the Joseph Levenson Prize of the Association for Asian Studies for the best book of the year on modern China.
Thursday, September 15 ~ 6:30 – 8 PM
$10 member / $15 non-member
Symposium
Blooming in the Shadows: Art and Culture at the Dawn of the Post-Mao Era
Renowned scholars and artists will speak on history and law, art history, literature, and performance to contextualize this ground-breaking exhibition. Distinguished senior expert on East Asian law, Professor Jerome A. Cohen, who helped pioneer the introduction of East Asian legal systems and perspectives into American legal curricula, will give the opening remarks. Dr. Jane DeBevoise of Asia Art Archive, former Deputy Director of the Guggenheim Museum, will moderate.
Saturday, September 17 ~ 9 AM – 4:30 PM
$30 member / $35 non-member
Art Salon
The No Names Group
Please join us for a rare opportunity to meet three of the artists of the No Names Group to discuss their works in the exhibition. Presentation and discussion will be conducted in Mandarin and translated into English.
Tuesday, September 20 ~ 6:30 – 8 PM
$10 member / $15 non-member
Sinomathèque Film Screening
Sunflower, directed by ZHANG Yang, 2005
In conjunction with China Institute’s exhibition, Blooming in the Shadows: Unofficial Chinese Art, 1974–1985, Sinomathèque is proud to present Sunflower, the moving tale of a family after the father’s return from a re-education camp during the Cultural Revolution. The father, an artist, is no longer able to work in his previous profession due to his injured hands and instead he places all of his hopes on cultivating the artistic talents of his son. While the son eventually follows in his father’s footsteps becoming an artist himself, he carries a great deal of resentment towards him, creating a tense relationship between the two. The film broken into three parts, depicts the interaction between the family members, as the son transitions into adulthood.
Seating is limited, pre-registration required.
Tuesday, October 11, 2011 ~ 6:30 – 8:45PM
FREE
Reservations are on a first-come, first-served basis.
Lecture
Chinese Archaeology & World Cultural Heritage
Dr. Magnus Fiskesjö, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Cornell University, will speak about Chinese archaeology in the context of global heritage issues, including the tensions between the values of national history and global perspectives on heritage and preservation. He will also address the threats to archaeological heritage sites in China, including from looting driven by both international and growing domestic markets for collectibles, and the progress of cultural heritage work under way in China.
Thursday, May 19 ~ 6:30 – 8 PM
$10 member / $15 non-member
Lecture
Music of a Disordered Age:
Chuci in the Music of the Ancient Chinese Qin Zither
Dr. Mingmei Yip, Ph.D., is a noted qin musician, author, and artist. During this special program, Dr. Yip will first discuss Songs of the South (Chuci) as reflected in the qin repertoire and follow with a performance of compositions inspired by this poetic canon on the qin, accompanied with singing.
Tuesday, May 3 ~ 6:30 – 8 PM
$10 member / $15 non-member
Lecture
Bronze Age Cultures in the North
Dr. Li Feng, Associate Director of Center for Archaeology and Assistant Professor of Early Chinese Cultural History, Columbia University, is a leading specialist of China’s Bronze Age. Dr. Li will discuss the traditional bronze cultures in the Central Plain region and cross-regional communications.
Tuesday, March 15 ~ 6:30-8 PM
$10 member / $15 non-member
Short Course
Paul Chih Meng Memorial Short Course:
Timeless Poetry of the South
This unique course will be taught by the Institute’s own Senior Lecturer in Chinese Language and Humanities, Ben Wang, a distinguished scholar and award-winning translator of Chinese drama and poetry. This course will begin with Songs of the South (Chuci) and cover a pair of examples of Song-dynasty poetry (Songci) in the style of Songs of the South. No previous knowledge of Chinese is required.
Tuesdays, April 5, 12, and 26 ~ 6:30 – 8:30 PM
$85 member / $95 non-member (3 sessions)
$30 member / $35 non-member (per session)
Lecture
The Axial Age — How Philosophy and Medicine Began
Dr. Geoffrey Redmond, M.D., Center for Health Research, will introduce the ancient text Yijing (Book of Changes) and manuscripts from the Yangzi River region that formed the basis of Chiense thought and medicine. The audience is invited to participate in an educational demo of the Yijing.
Tuesday, March 8 ~ 6:30-8 PM
$10 member / $15 non-member
Curator’s Lecture
Ancient Bronzes in Hunan: A Survey
The middle bank of the Yangzi River is one of the most significant cradles of Chinese civilization and a historical area for the study of China’s Bronze Age. Several important excavations in the past few decades have enabled us to examine the little known aspects of this culture through exquisite bronze vessels. Guest co-curator, Dr. Jay Xu, will speak about the fascinating story of this regional culture in three ways: the development and characteristics of Hunan bronzes, their function and patronage, and their cultural connection to central China.
Along the Yangzi River: Regional Culture of the Bronze Age from Hunan is an original exhibition organized by China Institute Gallery in collaboration with the Hunan Provincial Museum.
Dr. Jay Xu is a widely published scholar, particularly on ancient Chinese bronzes and archaeology—his area of expertise. His prolific writings or translations cover diverse areas, including ancient Chinese jades, Chinese ceramics, Chinese calligraphy, and museum practice. The book Art of the Houma Foundry (Princeton University Press, 1996), to which he contributed, was awarded the prestigious Shimada Prize of 1997 for the Outstanding Publication on the History of Eastern Asian art. His publications have appeared in books and in such journals as Orientations, Natural History, Artibus Asiae, and Journal of East Asian Archaeology. He is much in demand as a speaker on topics related to Chinese art or museum practice, circumnavigating the globe from numerous cities across the United States to mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Korea.
Monday, February 28 ~ 6:30–8 PM
$10 member / $15 non-member
Lecture
Bronze Age Cultures in the South
Dr. John Major, Senior Lectuer at China Institute and a former professor, at Dartmouth College, will speak about thte cultures that flourished along the Yangzi River during the Bronze Age and his recent publication The Huainanzi: A Guide to the Theory and Practice of Government in Early Han China
Tuesday, March 1 ~ 6:30-8 PM
$10 member / $15 non-member
Short Course on the Arts and History of China, Part I
Join Dr. Hsin-Mei Agnes Hsu, Resident Scholar and Consulting Archaeologist to UNESCO World Heritage Centre and Discovery Channel’s Ancient Manmade Marvels series, for an introductory virtual tour of China’s great museums. This multimedia course to the arts and history of China from the earliest cultures to the Song dynasties will help students better understand China Institute’s new exhibition, Theater, Life, and the Afterlife: Tomb Décor of the Jin Dynasty from Shanxi (February 9 – June 17, 2012). No prior coursework on Chinese culture is required.
Prior to joining China Institute in 2008, Dr. Hsu served on the faculty of Brown University (2004–2007) and was a Mellon research scholar in Classics at Stanford University (2007–2008). First trained in Classical Archaeology, Dr. Hsu’s research and publications have focused on cross-cultural studies of early empires, and include “The Exceptional Universal Value of the Road Systems in Ancient Empires: A Comparative Study of the Chinese Oasis Route of the Early Silk Road and the Qhapag Ñan,” a chapter in Geography, Ethnography, and Perceptions of the World from Antiquity to the Renaissance, and “An Emic Perspective of the Ancient Mapmaker’s Art,” which was published by Cambridge University Press and considered for the Barwis-Holliday Award for Far Eastern Studies by the Royal Asiatic Society. Dr. Hsu was the Special Assistant to a former U.S. Ambassador to China and Korea and has served on two UNESCO international committees. She will lead her second UNESCO-American Museum of Natural History study expedition to Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan in April 2012.
Tuesdays, January 24, 31, February 14, and 28 ~ 6:30 – 8:30 PM
$200 member / $250 non-member (4 sessions)
$55 member / $70 non-member (per session)
Lecture
The Afterlife, Architecture, and Drama: Jin-Yuan Tombs in Southern Shanxi
Renowned scholar and leading architectural historian, Dr. Nancy Shatzman Steinhardt is Professor of East Asian Art in the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations at the University of Pennsylvania and Curator of Chinese Art at the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. She is author of Chinese Traditional Architecture (1984), Chinese Imperial City Planning (1990), and Liao Architecture (1997), editor and adaptor of A History of Chinese Architecture (2002), co-editor of Hawaii Reader in Traditional Chinese Culture (2005), and has written more than 60 scholarly articles and more than 30 book reviews. She has given more than 120 public lectures and conference talks. Dr. Steinhardt has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, National Endowment for the Humanities, American Council of Learned Societies, American Philosophical Society, Graham Foundation for Advanced Study in the Fine Arts, Social Science Research Foundation, and Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation.
Thursday, February 9 ~ 6:30 – 8 PM
$10 member / $15 non-member
For information please call 212-744-8181 x111 or email lchrysostome@chinainstitute.org.