Thesis: The Politics of Portraiture at the Qianlong Court (r. 1735-1795)
Supervisor: Dr Stephen Whiteman
Advisor: Professor Joanna Woodall
Funded by The Courtauld Scholarship
The PhD thesis centres on the production and political uses of portraits at the Qianlong court (r. 1735-1795), seeking to explore how portraiture served the imperial Qing court as a technology of domination and articulated emerging visions of universal rulership in response to the growth of a culturally and ethnically pluralistic empire and the increasingly interconnected world of the early modern period. The thesis counters with past scholarship that read Qianlong court portraits either as aesthetically autonomous artworks or static containers of political messages without taking account of contextual peculiarities and actual function. Synthesising multilingual historical texts and looking closely the surviving portraits, the thesis reconstructs a dynamic view of the politics of portraiture and uncovers the court’s awareness of and avid participation in utilising portraiture to speak to transcultural audiences, within and without the heartland of the empire, in the contexts of commemoration, diplomacy, and ritual.
Research Interests
- Court art of the Qing empire (1645 – 1911), especially the High Qing era (ca. 1661 – 1799).
- Imperial portraiture in late imperial China (11th – 20th centuries)
- Portraiture in transcultural contexts
- Manchu studies
- Collection and reception of Chinese portraits in early twentieth century
Education
PhD student, The Courtauld Institute of Art (2020 – present)
MA in History of Art, Peking University (2016-2019)
BA in History of Art and Theory, Luxun Academy of Fine Arts (2012-2016)
Professional Experience
Associate Lecturer. BA 2 Histories Module Landscape and Environment in Early Modern China (Spring Semester, 2023-4; instructed by Dr Henning von Mirbach).
Predoctoral research fellow, National Museum of Asian Art (The Freer Gallery of Art and the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery), Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C., United States, (advised by Jan Stuart, Melvin R. Seiden Curator of Chinese Art) (2022-2023).
Co-ordinator. Workshop programme “Object Literacy II: Transdisciplinary Research and the Material Object in Chinese Art History”, CHASE Cohort Development Fund (CDF), UK (2021- July 2022).
Research Assistant to Dr. Stephen Whiteman, The Courtauld Institute of Art, London (2021-present).
Library Research Assistant for the Subject Guide of Early Modern Chinese Art, The Courtauld Institute of Art, London (2020-2021).
Co-ordinator. The 36th Hongmen International Expert Forum “Art: A Vividly Visualised History” , Peking University, Beijing, China (2018).
Teaching assistant. School of Arts, Peking University (2017-2018).
Research assistant. The Art Chronicle of Beijing Under Northern Warlords Government’s Reign (1912-1927) [北洋時期 (1912-1927) 北京地區美術年譜], Chinese National Academy of Arts, Beijing, China (2017).
Publications and Papers
‘The Scarred Faces: Smallpox and Manchu Masculinity in Portraiture of Qing China (1645 – 1912).’ Internal Talk Series, National Museum of Asian Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C., August 2023.
‘Gugong cang Qing ren hứa Hongli suizhao xingle tu ji qi kongjian yuanjing yanjiu’ 故宮藏《清人畫弘歷歲朝行樂圖》及其空間原境研究 [An Investigation on the Picture of Hongli Celebrating the New Year and Its Original Context], meishu daguan 美術大觀 (Art Panorama), no. 10 (2021): 55-64.
‘Imperial Portraits and Ritual Space in the Qing Court: A Case Study on the Picture of Qianlong Emperor’s New Year Celebration 清宮肖像與儀式空間：以《清人畫弘曆歲朝行樂圖》為例’, in International Doctoral Student Forum of Art Studies Peking University 2021, September 2021.