Courtauld Trans-Asias

Description

Courtauld Trans-Asias brings together one of the largest groups of specialists in Asian art and architecture outside Asia, with specialists and postgraduate researchers across a wide range of geographic areas and time periods, working in art history, curating and conservation. Its trans-Asias approach places Asia at the centre of its own art histories.

At the time of its founding, The Courtauld was intended as a centre for art history reaching across the whole of world art. During its first decade the curriculum reflected this and included programmes in Chinese, Japanese, Indian and Mesopotamian art and archaeology. Following the disruption of the Second World War, The Courtauld ceded responsibility for teaching in the arts of the “non-western” world to the School of Oriental and African Studies, leaving The Courtauld to concentrate solely on the Western tradition. The past decade has seen a revival of the Institute’s founding vision: a fundamental belief in the urgency of a broader perspective of art history. The Courtauld has actively re-engaged with a wide range of aspects of premodern Asian art and cultural heritage, as well as with global contemporary art more generally. Courtauld Trans-Asias sees Asia as contiguous, but not continuous, recognising the multiple distinct cultural, linguistic, and religious worlds that constitute Asia in overlapping, transculturally interconnected ways. The cluster envisions a field of study that is integral to the Courtauld’s ongoing conception and articulation of an inclusive, global history of art built on disciplinary, cultural, and linguistic expertise.

Research and teaching in Asian art history at The Courtauld extends across the continent and throughout a range of chronological, cultural, and methodological sub-fields, with research and teaching in the arts of Iran and the Persianate Islamic world, interactions between the Islamic and Byzantine worlds, premodern South Asia, early modern China and its global contexts, and modern and contemporary Asia, Iran and the Middle East, particularly India, China, and the Sinophone world.

Asian art plays a similarly large role across conservation studies at The Courtauld, including an MA in Art History and Conservation of Buddhist Heritage, supported by the Robert H.N. Ho Family Foundation Centre for Buddhist Art and Conservation; projects led by the Department of Conservation of Wall Painting in Jordan, Georgia, India, Bhutan, and China; the Leon Levy Centre for Conservation Studies at Nagaur, India, established in partnership with the Mehrangarh Museum Trust; and a long-standing collaboration in oil painting conservation with the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya in Mumbai, India.

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Offers funding

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University affiliation(s)

Courtauld Institute of Art
London

Partner Infrastructures

The Robert H.N. Ho Family Foundation Centre for Buddhist Art and Conservation

The Robert H.N. Ho Family Foundation Centre for Buddhist Art and Conservation at The Courtauld was established in 2012 with an endowment from the Robert H.N. Ho Family Foundation. It is dedicated to i… read more about The Robert H.N. Ho Family Foundation Centre for Buddhist Art and Conservation

London

Asymmetry Art Foundation

Asymmetry is an independent non-profit organisation based in London, launched in 2020 and registered as a charity under the name Asymmetry Art Foundation. It supports curators and researchers with Chi… read more about Asymmetry Art Foundation

London

Partner Universities

School of Oriental and African Studies

Additional Partnerships

Royal Academy of Arts; esea contemporary, Manchester; Mehrangarh Museum Trust, India; Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya, India