Horizons of Knowledge: "Woodcuts from Yan'an, China, 1944"

Horizons of Knowledge
along with the Thomas T. Solley Endowment for the Pamela Buell Curator of Asian Art,
East Asian Studies Center,
Departments of East Asian Languages and Cultures and History,
Friends of Art,
the Robert and Avis Burke lecture series,
Department of the History of Art

In celebration of Arts Week , presents

PRESENTER: Ellen Johnston Laing (Center for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan)
TOPIC: “Woodcuts from Yan’an, China, 1944”
DATE: Friday, February 20, 2009
TIME: 5:30 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.
LOCATION: Radio/TV 251

Reception and Viewing of Chinese Socialist Realist Prints, 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the IU Art Museum

To reveal the importance of the revolutionary prints made in Yan’an around 1944, this lecture locates these prints within a sequence of three major classifications of woodblock prints produced in the first half of the twentieth century, explaining the artistic, social, and political significance of each print category.

The lecture will be followed by a reception in the Thomas T. Solley Atrium at the IU Art Museum from 6:30-8:00 at which time the second floor gallery, Art of Asia and the Ancient Western World, will be open so that you may enjoy an installation of Chinese Socialist Realist prints on loan to the Museum in Memory of John and Alice Colling. These ten prints were given by Zhou Enlai to U.S. Army Captain John Colling in 1944, while he was serving in Yan’an, Shaanxi Province.

Ellen J. Laing received her Ph.D. from the University of Michigan. She was Maude I. Kerns Distinguished Professor of Oriental Art, University of Oregon and is currently Research Associate at the Center for Chinese Studies at the University of Michigan. She has published numerous scholarly articles, books, and reference works on Chinese art.

For additional details, see http://www.iub.edu/~easc/programs/chinaanniversaries.shtml