1. Turning Point of a Crisis: the 2001 Collection Condition Survey in NTM

2. Updating Collection Management
(i) Collection Digitization
(ii) Museum Objects Preservation
(iii) Storage
(iv) Collection Management Systems

3. Present Issues
(I) Cultural Economy of Collection
(ii) Ownership of Collection and Discussion on Repatriation
(iii) Collecting the Present
(iv) New Meaning for Museum Collection

Speaker Bio:
Professor Li Tzu-Ning earned his Master in Anthropology at Iowa State University. He is now the Associate Curator and Department Director of Research Department, National Taiwan Museum (NTM) after he headed the museum's Collection Management Department. He has published extensively on collection management and studies on Taiwan indigenous culture. He has led in the “National Taiwan Museum Digitizing Project of Formosan Aborigines Collection” and curated exhibitions including Kulumah in! (2015) and Discovering Taiwan: Re-visiting the Age of Natural History and Naturalists of Taiwan (2017).

Dong Qichang (1555-1636) is a distinguished and influential Chinese painter who opened a refreshing chapter of literati painting in late Ming dynasty. Together with Zhao Mengfu, the two were respected as “two Literati Masters in the history of painting”. It is even commented that “you cannot understand Chinese painting if you do not understand Dong Qichang”.

Holding an important collection of Dong Qichang's works of art, Shanghai museum presented the debut exhibition in Mainland China from 7 December 2018 through 10 March 2019 together with a series of events and publications to promote the art of Dong to scholars and the public, at home and abroad.

This talk presents the background of the exhibition, its positioning, the process of object selection, establishing exhibition framework, organization of international symposium, exhibition features, highlights and so on. In the meantime, it will analyze the connections between exhibition, collection research and management and introduce the opportunities and challenges faced when curating this large-scale exhibition.

Speaker Bio:
Professor Ling is the Head of Department of Painting and Calligraphy of Shanghai Museum and a doctoral advisor at China Academy of Art. He was also a visiting scholar at Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (2006), British Museum (2007) and Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery (2013). Some of the recent exhibitions he curated include: Telling Images of China: Narrative and Figure Paintings, 15th-20th Century, from the Shanghai Museum (2010) and Collection and Connoisseurship of Painting and Calligraphy of Wu Hufan (2015). His most recent exhibition The Ferryman of Ink World: Dong Qichang's Calligraphy and Painting Art (2019) that ended just last month has been a phenomenal world-wide success.

Collection is the core of a museum and its registration record plays a critical role.

In this talk, Professor Chi will introduce several of her recent studies on the NPM's collection that made use of the imperial archives as registration records. It indicates that accuracy and consistency is important when making registration record. These records are far more than a list of property, but significant data to the future. Being a registrar, we should be aware of the fact that the academia will be relying heavily on the digital records we are making now. Given the wide accessibility of online resources, inaccurate and inconsistent registration will be a potential threat not only to property management but also to scholars doing research.

Speaker Bio:
Prof. Chi Jo-Hsin was educated in National Taiwan University, majoring in Chinese art history. She used to be the secretary of Mr. Chang Dachien, who was a famous Chinese painter. Previously she was the former Chief Curator of the Department of Antiquities, the Department of Registration and Conservation and the Department of Safety, National Palace Museum (NPM). She has been constantly engaged in the acquisition, management and research of the collections of NPM. She has curated numerous important exhibitions and published widely in the field. After retiring from NPM, Prof. Chi had taught in the Department of History of the Chinese Culture University, during which she was also appointed as the Director of Hwa Kang Museum. She was the visiting scholar of the Department of Fine Arts and Art Museum, Institute of Chinese Studies, The Chinese University of Hong Kong from 2014-2017. Now, Prof. Chi is the Adjunct Professor of the Graduate Institute of Museum Studies at Fu Jen Catholic University, Taiwan.

Teamwork is crucial for successful exhibitions. This presentation will focus on the role and responsibilities of Collections Management (CM) within the context of the Department of Asian Art at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. CM is an integral part of the exhibition operations team and participates in exhibition planning. It provides essential support for the department's active and dynamic exhibition program.

CM plays a critical role in the maintenance and management of all information concerning artworks in an exhibition, particularly loans; ensures that collection data is accessible and updates are readily available to both curatorial and support departments. CM works closely with the following departments:

Exhibitions, Registrar's, and Buildings Departments for planning, preparing, and executing both installation and de-installation.

Engineering Department to ensure that temperature and relative humidity standards are monitored and maintained, particularly for the permanent galleries and art storage areas.

Conservation Departments to meet special display and handling requirements for climate-sensitive artworks and for fabrication of display mounts.

Imaging, Digital, and Communications Departments for establishing artwork photography logistics, providing website content, and preparing checklist with labels and didactic texts for press kits.

Speaker Bio:
Ms. Hwai-ling Yeh-Lewis obtained her Master of Science in Education from Indiana University. At the Met, she has been constantly engaged in the management of collections and participated in several exhibitions, included China: Dawn of a Golden Age, 200–750 A.D. (2004), The World of Khubilai Khan: Chinese Art in the Yuan Dynasty (2010) and The Art of Dissent in 17th-Century China: Masterpieces of Ming Loyalist Art from the Chih Lo Lou Collection (2011). She oversees the storage and care of over 35,000 works in the Asian Art collection. This includes all administration procedures related to acquisitions, incoming and outgoing loans, the collection database, exhibitions, and collection inventory. She also manages internal and external requests for access to the collections, and works with the collections team to facilitate gallery installations and implement the highest standards for collection care.

The renovated Hong Kong Museum of Art (HKMA) will re-open at the end of 2019. Hong Kong art will become a key focus of the Museum. An all-encompassing strategic plan has been developed based on an examination on the museum's relationship with artists, research/education, art museums/art institutions, galleries, collectors/patrons and critics/ media. It aims to build an interactive model between the museum and those six aspects aforementioned, and to design suitable projects for a better use of resources through synergies. As a result, the exhibition, acquisition, research, education and outreach of Hong Kong art can progress in concerted efforts towards a more vigorous Hong Kong art scene.

Speaker Bio:
Dr. Tang is currently the Curator (Hong Kong Art) of Hong Kong Museum of Art. He was educated in the Department of Fine Arts of the Chinese University of Hong Kong and obtained his PhD in History of Chinese Arts from the Department in 2006. In 2002, he completed the Postgraduate Diploma in Museum Studies which was jointly organized by the University of Sydney and Hong Kong University School of Professional and Continuing Education.

This lecture presents the exhibition Age of Empires: Chinese Art of the Qin and Han Dynasties, held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York （March 27 through July 14, 2017） and its organization process. It examines the exhibition’s themes and contents as well as some common issues during its planning, production, and installation. In addition, it briefly discusses the curatorial program that is practiced in US museums.

Speaker Bio:
PhD in Chinese Art and Archaeology from Princeton University; Recipient of the 2016 1000 Talents Program; Brooke Russell Astor Curator of Chinese Art at The Metropolitan Museum of Art （the Met, since 1999）, Board member of Museum of Chinese in America; Research Fellow of the China National Academy of Painting.

At the Met, Dr. Sun curated several exhibitions, including “Nomadic Art of the Eastern Eurasian Steppes: The Eugene V. Thaw and Other New York Collections”（2002）, “The Bishop Jades”（2004）, “Colors of the Universe: Chinese Hardstone Carvings”（2012）, “Small Delights: Chinese Snuff Bottles”（2013）, “Celestial Steeds: A Celebration of the Year of the Horse”（2014）, “Innovation and Spectacle: Chinese Ritual Bronzes”（2014） and “Celebration of the year of the Ram”（2015） etc. He also participated in the exhibitions “China: Dawn of a Golden Age, 200-750 A.D.”（2004） and “The World of Khubilai Khan: Chinese Art in the Yuan Dynasty” （2010）. His most recent exhibition is “Age of Empires: Chinese Art of the Qin and Han Dynasties”, which opened in March 2017.

Sun specializes in Chinese art and has published extensively in academic journals in USA, Europe and Asia. He participated in Chinese museum professionals training as well as symposiums. In addition, he has written on the structure, operation, exhibition planning and education programs of US museums.

As an institution of academic research and public education, a museum should base its collections display and exhibition planning on solid academic research, while adopting a “make-easy” approach to allow audience to understand the exhibition and nurture their interest of further exploration. This is the basic mission of a museum. Specifically, principles and means of collections display and exhibition planning are different. Collections display requires interpretation from more aspects and of more diversification, given they are relatively constant and are favorable for being repeatedly viewed. This is to satisfy the demand of audience with different background, interests and education level. On the other hand, special exhibitions are with more immediacy, and a foregrounding of its theme and story through expressive means should be emphasized, so that the unique context of a particular exhibition can be fully utilized. Through studying the case of Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, this lecture will explain how specific principles and means for collections display and special exhibition planning are established and how they align with the museum’s vision.

Speaker Bio:
Dr. Jay Xu has served as director and CEO of the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco since 2008. He earned his MA and PhD in early Chinese Art and Archaeology at Princeton University, and has had more than thirty years of extensive international museum experiences as a research scholar, curator, and museum director, having previously held administrative and curatorial positions at the Shanghai Museum; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Seattle Art Museum; and Art Institute of Chicago. Dr. Xu was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2015.

Educators in museums should not confine to docents and volunteers who execute the outreach programmes on site. Exhibition designers, souvenirs designers and digital engineers , just to name a few, can also be museum educators in a broad sense. Curators then have the obligation not only to instruct these educators on exhibition planning, objectives and objects comprehensively, but also literally participate and assist them in program design, digitalization and souvenirs production etc.

The lecture will study the case of "Miles upon Miles: World Heritage along the Silk Road", the just-ended exhibition at Hong Kong History Museum, depicting the achievement of the conversation between curators and educators. 

"Miles upon Miles: World Heritage along the Silk Road"
Exhibition Period: 29th November, 2017 (Wed) to 5th March, 2018 (Mon)

Speaker Bio:
Retired Chief Curator of the Department of Antiquities, the Department of Registration and Conservation and the Department of Safety of the National Palace Museum, Taiwan (NPM). She has been constantly engaged in the acquisition, management and research of the collections of NPM. She has curated numerous important exhibitions and published widely in the field. She used to be the personal secretary of Mr. Chang Da Qian, a famous Chinese painter. After retiring from NPM, Prof. Chi had taught in the Department of History of the Chinese Culture University, during which she was also appointed as the Director of Hwa Kang Museum. She was the visiting scholar of the Department of Fine Arts and Art Museum, Institute of Chinese Studies, the Chinese University of Hong Kong from 2014-2017. Prof. Chi was educated in the National Taiwan University, majoring in Chinese art history.

Development of Mobile Museum
Mobile museum is nothing new. As early as in 1947, a trailer coach was modified into a mobile gallery in Cleveland, USA. Similar mobile gallery trucks started to grow in numbers in Europe and America afterwards, bringing small-scale exhibitions into different communities and schools, particularly those in remote areas. In 2010, Sichuan Museum created the first caravan mobile museum in China serving the far-off regions. Also, Chinese Museums Association established a mobile museum professional committee, which allows sharing and exchanging among the museum professionals, thus raising the quality of mobile museum and their serving scope.

Mobile museum in Hong Kong
Mobile museums primarily serve remote areas. Why is it needed for a small city like Hong Kong? Actually, Hong Kong Museum of Art starts the project aiming at utilizing the risk arisen from its renovation project. Since the museum has to be closed for three years starting from 2015, there is a need to engage the audience continuously.



By eagerly exploring new ways of exhibition and education, the team expects “Museum of Art on Wheels” can create a new image for Hong Kong Museum of Art and prepare for its re-openning.

Challenges and opportunities
The team is moving steadily, learning from experiences and adjusting to circumstances. The project is a really tough challenge, among which the technical difficulties, tight schedules, complicated workflow and the gap between idea and execution are all exceptional experiences that deserve sharing and discussion with fellow museum practitioners.


Speaker Bio:
Currently the Curator （Hong Kong Art） of Hong Kong Museum of Art. He was educated in the Department of Fine Arts of the Chinese University of Hong Kong and obtained his PhD in History of Chinese Arts from the Department in 2006. In 2002, he completed the Postgraduate Diploma in Museum Studies which was jointly organized by the University of Sydney and Hong Kong University School of Professional and Continuing Education.

In the 21st century, museums are facing unprecedented challenges in both curating and activity planning. Living in the era of information explosion, smartphones allow people to access entertainment and information anytime and anywhere. Shopping malls market their museum-like exhibitions and brand themselves “Art Mall”. Do the new generations still need to visit museums? How do the 21st century museums solve the new challenges brought by the change of generation? This lecture will try to depict the relationship between audience and museum from different aspects, by using the theories of Relational Aesthetics and Connective Aesthetics. Considering that the audience needs an empathizing experience, museum should review its direction by observing human emotions and examining everyday life. This lecture will illustrate the breakthrough under the old framework by using Art Promotion Office and Oi! as examples. Museums in the 21st century should keep looking for new ways and move closer to daily life experiences. Only by doing so can museums maintain their influence and lead their audiences to move with the time.

Speaker Bio:
Dr Lau obtained her PhD in Chinese art history from the Chinese University of Hong Kong(CUHK) and Graduate Diploma in Museum Studies from the University of Sydney. She has worked for the Hong Kong Museum of Art, Hong Kong Heritage Museum, Hong Kong Visual Arts Centre(vA!) and the Heritage & Museums Division of the Leisure and Cultural Services Department. She is the founding curator of the Art Promotion Office(APO) and Oi!(Oil Street Art Space) and currently is the Head of the APO. Her M.Phil thesis was awarded the Outstanding Thesis from the Graduate Division of Fine Arts, CUHK. She was selected in the International Partnership Among Museums Program of the American Association of Museums in 1994. She has worked as research fellow in the British Museum in 2011 under the J. S. Lee Memorial Fellowship Programme and the Philips Library of the Peabody Essex Museum in 2009.

The talk will be on the nuts and bolts, knowledge and aesthetics of exhibition design and the role of curator and designer working together. It will be divided into four main parts:

1. The Process and Behind the Scenes Tools
Process: assess, schedule and budget
- Tools: color palette, lighting, the computer, mockups, graphics, schedule and budget and the expertise of others
- Beauty as presented by curator and designer
- Local safety codes and compliance with the needs of visitors
- Subtle drama and how to hide one's work to let the art speak for itself

2. Selected Case Studies: Successes and Stresses
Treasures of Tutankhamun, Roman Art from the Louvre, Picasso: Masterpieces from the Musee National Picasso Paris, Luminous: The Art of Asia from the Seattle Art Museum and Gauguin Polynesia

3. The Planning, Design, Installation and Evolution of a Museum.
- A look at the future: new interests, new donors
- From the point of view of visitors and workers
- The gathering of architects, curators and designers to assess the spatial needs for collections. And what collections ought to be near each other
- One style of presentation, but give each collection an individual identity

4. The Design and Installation of a Sculpture Park
- A varied topography versus gallery rooms; but the same
- Walks and pathways, trees, conservation, plinths, lighting, The unpredictable public!

Speaker Bio
Michael McCafferty’s career in the art world began with an Egyptian Pharaoh. In 1976 Michael McCafferty took the position of Exhibition Designer just as the high profile exhibit Treasures of Tutankhamun came to the museum. Since then he has overseen the installation and design of over 450 exhibitions. Michael was also the exhibition design lead for the Seattle Asian Art Museum renovation, the building of the Seattle Art Museum’s downtown location, the building of the Olympic Sculpture Park, and the expansion of the downtown museum. In all instances he sat on key planning and programming committees, monitoring schedules and budgets and reviewing all pertinent drawings and contracts. He has considerable experience working with architects, museum staff and artists. He is very hands-on when it comes to the practical needs of an art building’s functionality. In addition to his work at the Seattle Art Museum, Michael is a practicing artist. He has been invited as a speaker throughout the northwest arts community; he taught “clinics” in the design process to University of Washington Museology classes. Also, he performs consultation work for lighting and design to private and public collections. He has been featured in multiple art and community publications, and has won several awards for his design work.

It is often said that to understand the present one must understand the past; Less often does one hear the converse. There are many real and perceived discontinuities in the present, and as many in the shifting boundary between present and past. What (and how) do exhibitions of traditional Asian art teach the museum visitors about contemporary Asian cultures? Does a greater clarity of vision manifest in the merging of past and present? What are the risks? What are the opportunities? What is being communicated? 

The talk will begin by introducing the interpretive approaches developed in two exhibitions that presented alternate Asian cosmologies （Taoism and the Arts of China at the Art Institute of Chicago in 2000, and The Dragon’s Gift: The Sacred Arts of Bhutan at the Honolulu Academy of Arts in 2008）. It will then discuss the planning and execution of the 2014 LACMA exhibition, Chinese Paintings from Japanese Collections, and the forthcoming exhibition, The Art of Qiu Ying （仇英）, which opens at LACMA in 2020, and will conclude with a discussion of the planning and execution of a recent exhibition in which traditional and contemporary Asian art works or concepts were juxtaposed.

Speaker Bio
Dr. Stephen Little is Florence and Harry Sloan Curator of Chinese Art and Department Head, Chinese and Korean Art Departments at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art （LACMA）. Previously, he had served as the director of the Honolulu Academy of Arts, curator of Asian art at the Art Institute of Chicago, associate curator of Chinese art at the Cleveland Museum of Art, and curator of Chinese art at the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco. Specializing in Chinese and Japanese painting, Chinese calligraphy, Chinese ceramics and the classical arts of Southeast Asia, Dr. Little has curated important exhibitions including Taoism and the Arts of China （2000）, The Dragon’s Gift: The Sacred Arts of Bhutan （2008）, Chinese Paintings from Japanese Collections （2014）, and 17th-Century Chinese Paintings from the Tsao Family Collection （2016）. He has also taught the history of Chinese art at several institutions, including the University of Chicago and Harvard University.

The dazzling collections and magnificent architectural structure of the Palace Museum has earned it the prestige as one of the world’s top museums. But they have also posed unique challenges to exhibition planning. Turning these limitations into advantages is a part of the daily work of the exhibition designers, from which valuable insights can be generated.

Mr. Yu joined Palace Museum, Beijing in 2004, when it has just begun a major hardware upgrade project. During his ten years in the museum, Mr. Yu has witnessed a substantial development of exhibition display not only in terms of equipment, but also of execution techniques and attention to details.

In this talk, Mr. Yu will share with the participants some of his observations and experiences illustrated with specific case studies. The sharing is intended to be a reminder that exhibition design should always start from taking care of the exhibit’s safety and on this basis,  the designer could search for means to bring forth the beauty in the exhibits. In the process, the prime focus should always be solving practical issues and fancy design that dilute or conceal the beauty of the exhibits should be avoided.

Speaker Bio
Mr. Yu Tong has joined Palace Museum, Beijing as an exhibition designer since 2004 and has overseen the design and installation of numerous permanent and special exhibitions since then. He designed and executed exhibitions of various subjects and materials, examples include: The World Rejoices As One: Celebrating Imperial Birthday in the Qing Dynasty （2015）, Ink Serendipity of the Ou Studio: The Rubbing Collection of the Epigraphist Zhu Yi‘an （2014）, Imperial Porcelain with Royal Designs: Exhibition of Porcelain and Designs Dating to the Qing Dynasty Tongzhi and Guangxu Periods in the Collection of the Palace Museum （2007） and Qing Dynasty Political Documents and Materials from the Grand Council of State （permanent exhibition）. In 2016, Mr. Yu was invited to Art Museum, the Chinese University of Hong Kong as a visiting fellow and has been leading the exhibition design and installation team of the museum. From there, he has gained understanding of the different ways of exhibition planning and design in Hong Kong and in the mainland of China. Mr. Yu received his design training in the Academy of Arts & Design, Tsinghua University.

The Museum of Oriental Ceramics, Osaka was opened in 1982 as an institution to store, study and exhibit the ancient oriental ceramics of the world-renowned Ataka Collection. Its Japanese name contains the word bijutsukan – meaning “art museum” – suggesting that the oriental ceramics in this museum are appreciated in the same way as paintings and sculptures are viewed in art museums. Various aspects of the museum, including the display cases, lighting and arrangement of the exhibits, are elaborated and treated with special care in order to pursue the ideal manner of exhibiting ceramics. These efforts are made as we believe our museum should be a venue for the appreciation of ancient ceramics as art pieces in an artistic atmosphere. With the well-designed setting, our visitors will be drawn by the intrinsic artistic quality of the ceramics, and feel the beauty and charm in their color and texture instead of simply learning the facts about them. It is well acknowledged that display method and exhibition environment matter tremendously for an art museum. Masterpieces must be matched with good display techniques. Our museum’s experience and rationale in this regard will be shared in this talk.

Speaker Bio
Mr. Kobayashi is a curator of the Museum of Oriental Ceramics, Osaka. As a specialist of Chinese and Japanese ceramics, he has received a scholarship from the Chinese government and studied in the Archaeology Department of the Peking University as a senior visiting fellow. In 2014, he was awarded the prestigious Koyama Fujio Memorial Prize for his research in the field of ancient ceramics. His recent exhibitions include: Ding Ware: The World of White Elegance-Recent Archaeological Findings （2013）, IMARI – Japanese Porcelain for European Palaces （2014） and Northern Song Ru Ware Narcissus Basins – Treasured Masterpieces from the National Palace Museum, Taipei （2016）. He is the author of Chinese Tomb Figurines from the Northern and Southern Dynasties to the Sui and Tang Dynasties and other publications.

Mr. Szeto is now the Xubaizhai curator of the Hong Kong Museum of Art responsible for the Chinese Painting and Calligraphy Department. He is the J. S. Lee Memorial Senior Fellow and researcher of the Beijing Art Academy. Important exhibitions on Chinese paintings and calligraphy organized by him include The Pride of China: Masterpieces from the Palace Museum and Collection from the Osaka Museum. He also organized numerous solo exhibitions of 20th century masters including Qi Baishi, Li Keran, Lin Fengmian, , Huang Yongyu, Pan Tianshou & Wu Guanzhong. He has also broadcasted a series of talks on Chinese art appreciation at the Radio Hong Kong. His major field of research is Ming & Qing paintings and also on subjects related to Chinese art education. He has published many academic articles in Hong Kong, Guangzhou and Taiwan and also delivered lectures in universities and educational institutes.

Speaker Bio
Mr. Szeto is now the Xubaizhai curator of the Hong Kong Museum of Art responsible for the Chinese Painting and Calligraphy Department. He is the J. S. Lee Memorial Senior Fellow and researcher of the Beijing Art Academy. Important exhibitions on Chinese paintings and calligraphy organized by him include The Pride of China: Masterpieces from the Palace Museum and Collection from the Osaka Museum. He also organized numerous solo exhibitions of 20th century masters including Qi Baishi, Li Keran, Lin Fengmian, , Huang Yongyu, Pan Tianshou & Wu Guanzhong. He has also broadcasted a series of talks on Chinese art appreciation at the Radio Hong Kong. His major field of research is Ming & Qing paintings and also on subjects related to Chinese art education. He has published many academic articles in Hong Kong, Guangzhou and Taiwan and also delivered lectures in universities and educational institutes.

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The National Museum of History (NMH), Jilin Province Museum and Sichuan Museum are three important institutions on either side of the Strait with remarkable collections of Chang Dai-chien’s art. While the collection of the former two consists of Chang’s works before 1949 and his works of emulation done in Dunhuang grottoes respectively, NMH owns a collection of more than 100 pieces, including those completed in Europe that show Chang’s transition from the expressionist style into splash ink and splash color experimentations. The year 2013 marked the thirtieth anniversary of Chang Dai-chien’s passing. In memory of Chang’s achievement, the museums across the Strait cooperate to present this exhibition, showing 105 pieces of paintings by Chang Dai-chien selected from the collections of the three museums. This exhibition goes on tour in Shenzhen Museum, Sichuan Museum, Jilin Province Museum, and NMH, which not only presents a comprehensive picture of Chang Dai-chien’s art to audiences but also created a platform for academic and exhibition exchange among museums in Taiwan and mainland China.
In this talk, Prof. Chang will share his experience on curating this exhibition with the workshop participants.

Speaker Bio
Prof. Chang is the Director of the National Museum of History, Taipei, Taiwan, President of Chinese Association of Museums and board member of ICOM-INTERCOM. A renowned museum studies scholar, he taught in the Graduate Institute of Museology in the Tainan National University of the Arts, and served as its Director and Dean of the College of Letters and Culture Heritage. He was the Vice Minister of the Council for Cultural Affairs, Executive Yuan of Taiwan and has participated in the making of the Taiwan Museum Act. Specializing in cultural policy and museology, Prof. Chang has endeavored to foster international academic interactions and exhibition collaboration between Taiwan and mainland China. Apart from being an enthusiastic translator of new ideas in international museum studies, Prof. Chang is also a keen promoter of cultural creativity and digitalization in the museum field of Taiwan.

To curate a successful large-scale exhibition, the curator should seek to engage both the specialists and the general public at the same time. There are several ways to organize an exhibition: chronological order, motifs, production means, regions of production etc.. While permanent exhibitions usually demonstrate the evolution history of a certain type of object, large-scale special exhibitions tend to have a much larger variety of theme. The talk would explain the exhibition rationale of two large-scale exhibitions curated by the speaker and discuss two related exhibitions that follow them but were not curated by the speaker.
1. The Mongol-Yuan Exhibitions
Experience：Age of the Great Khan: Pluralism in Chinese Art and Culture under the Mongols （2001）
Commentary：Elegant Gathering of the Princess: The Culture of Appreciating and Collecting Art at the Mongol Yuan Court （2016）
2. The Emperor Qianlong Exhibitions
Experience：Emperor Ch'ien-lung's Cultural Enterprise （2002）
Commentary：The All Complete Qianlong: a Special Exhibition on the Aesthetic Tastes of the Qing Emperor Gaozong （2013）

Speaker Bio
Professor Chi is the visiting scholar of the Department of Fine Arts and Art Museum, Institute of Chinese Studies, the Chinese University of Hong Kong. A seasoned specialist in Chinese decorative art, Prof. Chi worked as the Chief Curator of the Department of Antiquities, the Department of Registration and Conservation and the Department of Safety of the National Palace Museum, Taiwan（NPM）. She has been constantly engaged in the acquisition, management and research of the collections of NPM. She has curated numerous important exhibitions and published widely in the field. She used to be the personal secretary of Mr. Chang Da Qian, a famous Chinese painter and after retiring from NPM, Prof. Chi had taught in the Department of History of the Chinese Culture University, during which she was also appointed as the Director of Hwa Kang Museum. Prof. Chi was educated in the National Taiwan University, majoring in Chinese art history.

The world’s museums take the safe-guarding, preservation, cataloguing and research, and display of their collections as a critical mission. Educating and pleasurably engaging the public is also a priority. Towards this end, museums build a staff with diverse skills to cover these many areas. The success of an institution depends on staff collaboration, mutual respect, and the careful crafting of job roles to cover all the details, even including allowing for some planned duplication that re-enforces the safety of the collection and maximizes the ease with which it can be studied and catalogued. 

Institutions typically assign to the Department of Registration the assigning of an accession number to each object and creating a record (preferably in a computer base, but otherwise on paper) for keeping critical information about an object, including a photograph, brief description, dimensions, materials, date, physical condition, special handling notes, provenance, location within the museum, a record for tracking its movement and other information such as insurance value or price. 

This record is the same place for the curator, usually the most knowledgeable about the objects in his or her field in a museum collection and who wants to access and study the objects, to add notes when doing research and from conversations in showing the object to other visiting scholars. 

This seminar will explore the scenario in which both curators and registrars are allowed direct access to collection objects in storage, and shows how they can collaborate to create top quality museum records that can be used to monitor location, condition, safe handling instructions, and hold information for use in online or published catalogues. 

Speaker Bio:
Jan Stuart is the Melvin R. Seiden Curator of Chinese Art at the Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, the Smithsonian Institution’s museums of Asian art, in Washington, DC. Curatorial responsibility focuses on Chinese art from the Tang dynasty to the present, with special emphasis on ceramics and decorative arts. From 2006 to 2014, Stuart was Keeper of Asia (Head of Department) at The British Museum (The BM). Her degrees are from Yale and Princeton Universities. At the BM, she led projects for new galleries, notably the Sir Joseph Hotung Centre for Ceramic Studies and a gallery for display of the Admonitions scroll and Chinese paintings. Active in lecturing, publishing, acquisitions, and exhibitions, her forthcoming exhibition is Red: Rothko and Ming.

Senior Curator for Asian Art Julia White will present an illustrated talk regarding the inspiration, planning, organization, and presentation of her recent Chinese painting exhibition Beauty Revealed: Images of Women in Qing Dynasty Chinese Painting, presented at UC Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAMPFA) in 2013. In her talk she will discuss the way in which the concept for the exhibition arose through the writings of the late Professor James Cahill, who collaborated on all aspects of the exhibition, and how that concept was brought to fruition in the exhibition. The mechanics of planning an international loan exhibition will be fully explored from initial stages through the many processes leading to a successful exhibition including; research, fund raising, catalog preparation, installation design, interpretive materials, press, and tour guide training.

Speaker Bio:
Julia White has organized exhibitions on a variety of areas in Asian art including Chinese historical painting, Neolithic ceramics, and early gold jewelry, as well as Japanese woodblock prints and paintings and esoteric Buddhist art from Japan and the Himalayan region. Recent projects at BAMPFA include Beauty Revealed: Images of Women in Qing Dynasty Chinese Painting, organized with James Cahill; Flowers of the Four Seasons: Ten Centuries of Art from the Clark Center for Japanese Art and Culture; and Taking Refuge: Buddhist Art from the Land of White Clouds. Her upcoming exhibitions at Berkeley planned for summer of 2016 include Summer Trees Casting Shade: Chinese Painting at Berkeley, the First Fifty Years, from July 6 to September 25, 2016 and Buddhist Art from the Roof of the World, from July 27 to November 13, 2016 which will be presented in the new Berkeley Art Museum galleries.

White is currently researching the work of Chinese painter Chen Hongshou (1599–1652) in preparation for a major loan exhibition in 2017/2018. Repentant Monk: Illusion and Disillusion in the Art of Chen Hongshou will be the first major American museum exhibition to explore exclusively the work of this major versatile 17th century painter. Prior to coming to BAMPFA in 2006, White was associate curator of Asian art at the Denver Art Museum and curator of Asian art at the Honolulu Academy of Arts. She earned her BA in China regional studies from the University of Washington and her MA in art history from the University of California, Berkeley. Her graduate studies included language training at Taiwan National Normal University in Taipei and graduate research at Beijing University.

The roles of art archives have been dramatically changing in the past 2 decades, driven fundamentally by the rapidly evolving Information industries. The Asia Art Archive (AAA) was established in 2000 and since then it has been growing and transforming in an uncompromising knowledge-dissemination battlefield. AAA reacted to the challenges of change through ‘doing’ rather than by abstract thoughts; nevertheless our successes have been occasioned by some failures. Inspired by the ‘Note from the Editors’ (http://www.aaa.org.hk/FieldNotes/Details/1201) in AAA’s published journal, Field Notes, issue 02 ARCHIVE AS METHOD, I would like to discuss a few changing roles of archives as reflected by some 15 plus years of operation in AAA.

Archive, generally associated with collecting historical remnants, is especially good at preserving evidences, which await for users to discover; yet, archive collections are rarely used although frequented by historians. However, AAA does not fit into any of these depictions of an archive. AAA's collection is highly selective, interpreted by collective efforts, and it is created for sharing and dissemination rather than for passive preservation in a vault. We encourage diversity and multiplicity in narrations rather than authoritative conclusions; our biases revealed, not concealed. And most importantly, we know that AAA is not alone in the communities of archiving.

Speaker Bio:
Lydia Ngai, Head Librarian of Asia Art Archive, is committed to the development of digital archives and library collections management systems since she joined AAA in 2008. She was a cultural researcher for Hong Kong art history and Hong Kong design history before engaging in library management works. Lydia obtained a Master of Information Management (MIM, Information and Library Management specialization) from the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in 2003 and had worked for academic libraries in Australia. She was the Content Team Leader in the Services Development Unit of the UNSW University Library before returning to Hong Kong. Besides MIM, Lydia also acquired the Master of Arts in Literary and Cultural Criticism from the University of Hong Kong, Bachelor of Arts (Design) from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. She is an associate member of the Australian Library and Information Association (ALIA).

I will use the three special exhibitions I curated at the Cincinnati Art Museum (CAM) to discuss issues about ‘exhibition and collection management.’ The three exhibitions are:

 1. Roaring Tiger Leaping Carp (October 9, 2008 - January 3, 2009)
 2. Realm of the Immortals (October 12, 2013 – January 5, 2014)
 3. Masterpieces of Japanese Art in the Cincinnati Art Museum (February 14, 2014- January 3, 2015)

1. Roaring Tigers and Leaping Carp was a special exhibition of approximately one hundred Chinese paintings and objects depicting animals, including eagles, cranes, wild geese, pheasants, doves, phoenixes, dragons, fish, tigers, and horses. Organized by CAM, this exhibition features works selected from three major Asian museums (National Palace Museum, Taipei, the Palace Museum, Beijing, and the Shanghai Museum) and thirteen US museums. Based on a series of my research projects, this exhibition showed the evolution of the sophisticated symbolic language of Chinese animal paintings and why Chinese animal images often have distinct attitudes and attributed symbolic values. Throughout the exhibition, viewers learned how a complex visual language evolved out of each animal symbol, and how this language could be decoded to reveal rich information about Chinese history, and cultural traditions.

2. Realm of the Immortals was a relatively small show and did not include a catalogue. It was designed to introduce the important concepts of Chinese Daoism as both a philosophy and as a folk religion. Using CAM’s Chinese and Japanese art collections, the exhibit illustrates how Daoism played a major role in Asian culture and arts. The show, despite its small budget, was very well received.

3. Masterpieces of Japanese Art in the CAM features approximately one hundred works from the Museum’s important yet little explored permanent collection. The exhibition is designed to provide viewers a better understanding of Japanese art and its aesthetics as well as explore the unique regional perspective through the history of the collection. Also highlighted in the exhibit is the historical significance and the growth of the collection in the in the context of Cincinnati’s local wave of Japanese mania in the 19th century and Cincinnati’s early connections and on-going relationship with Japan and Japanese art.

Speaker Bio:
Dr. Hou-mei Sung has served as Curator of Asian Art at the Cincinnati Art Museum since 2002. She received both her B.A. and M.A. from the National Taiwan University and her Ph.D. in Museum Studies from Case Western Reserve University. Prior to coming to Cincinnati, Dr. Sung served as Research Associate at the Cleveland Museum of Art and held a variety of research and teaching positions in Asia and the United States, including the National Palace Museum in Taipei, Taiwan; Colorado College; Cleveland State University; and Case Western Reserve University. Her research on Ming court painting received a Fulbright scholarship in 2000. Dr. Sung has 49 publications, including her recent books, Decoded Messages: The Symbolic Language of Chinese Animal Painting (Yale University Press, 2009) and Masterpieces of Japanese Art of the Cincinnati Art Museum (Giles, 2014).

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Using past and upcoming special exhibitions and gallery rotations at The Met to illustrate the full range of administrative and legal documentation that accompanies shows and how the information is used to facilitate exhibition planning. Types of documentation included are exhibition checklist, exhibition loan agreements, shipping reports, Indemnity, and Immunity from Seizure applications.

Speaker Bio:
Hwai-ling Yeh-Lewis specializes in museum collections management. She received her Master’s Degree from Indianan University and continuing education coursework in Arts Administration at New York University. As the Senior Collections Manager, Hwai-ling manages the Department’s Collections Management team and its functions, including acquisitions, incoming and outgoing loans, exhibitions, photography, collections inventory, deaccessions, and provenance research. Hwai-ling oversees the cataloguing and documentation of objects in the collection management database for their publication on The Met's website. She manages internal and external requests for access to the collections, coordinates activities with Departmental Technicians and Conservation Departments, facilitates gallery installations, and implements the recommended standards for collection care. 

The major exhibitions Hwai-ling has participated in:
1. Lost Kingdoms: Hindu-Buddhist Sculpture of Early Southeast Asia, 5th to 8th Century, April 14, 2014-July 27, 2014 (150 objects from 31 international lenders)
2. The World of Kublai Khan: Chinese Art in the Yuan Dynasty, September 28, 2010-January 2, 2011 (over 200 objects from 31 lenders)
3. Story Telling in Japanese Art, November 19, 2011-May 6, 2012 (over 100 objects from 12 lenders)
4. The Art of Dissent in 17th-Century China: Masterpieces of Ming Loyalist Art from the Chih Lo Lou Collection, September 7, 2011-January 2, 2012 (90 objects from one private collection)
5. China: Dawn of a Golden Age, 200–750 AD, October 12, 2004-January 23, 2005 (260 objects from 47 lenders)

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