The Power Institute in partnership with the Art Gallery of New South
Wales, is proud to present "Tilting the World: Histories of Modern and
Contemporary Asian Art". "Tilting the World" is an ambitious two-day
symposium, which will bring to Sydney international experts and
emerging scholars to discuss the past, present and future of Asian
art. Collectively, this symposium asks: what is at stake in the study
of modern and contemporary Asian art cultures today, particularly as
we head into what is being styled “the Asian Century”?

This significant event has been organised to honour the career of
Professor John Clark, who retires this year from the Department of Art
History and Film Studies at the University of Sydney.

Reflecting an understanding of the cultural richness and complexity of
Asian modernities, the symposium features an array of speakers that
represent a cross-disciplinary approach to Asian art, encompassing art
history, sociology, anthropology, media and visual cultural studies.
Keynote speakers Professor Werner Kraus, Passau University Germany,
and Professor Mizusawa Tsutomu, Museum of Modern Art Hayama, Japan,
who have worked with Professor Clark have also been invited to
represent the breadth of his research legacy.

PROGRAM

DAY ONE: FRIDAY, 29 NOVEMBER
Venue: University of Sydney, New Law School Auditorium 101

8:45–9:15 REGISTRATION

9:15–9:30 WELCOME – Prof. Mark Ledbury, Director of the Power
Institute

9:30–10:50 Session 1 – Negotiations
Sarena Abdullah | Universiti Sains Malaysia
Contesting the narrative: modern Malaysian art in the early 20th
century

Clare Veal | University of Sydney
Relativisation in Asian Photographies: the Siamese case

Yvonne Low | University of Sydney
Circumventing gender: women artists in the early art academies of
modern Indonesia

10:50–11:15 MORNING TEA

11:15–12:55 Session 2 – Formations
Nozomi Naoi | Harvard University
Beyond the ‘bijin’: Takehisa Yumeji at the intersection of the popular
and avant-garde

Cai Heng | National Art Gallery, Singapore
Modern and contemporary transformations of Chinese ink painting

Michelle Wong | Asia Art Archive, Hong Kong
Riding the new waves: ‘Meishu Sichao’ (1984-1987) as platform of
self-definition and self-instruction

Natalie Seiz | Art Gallery of NSW
Artistic types across generations: descriptors of difference amongst
contemporary women artists in Taiwan

12:55–14:15 LUNCH

14:15–16:05 Session 3 – Visions
Simon Soon | University of Sydney
Along other historical sightlines: landscapes as condition of being

Kedar Vishvanathan | University of Sydney
Indian nationalism: the Bengal School and Chittoprasad Bhattacharya

William Ray Langenbach | Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman, Malaysia;
Finnish Academy of Fine Arts
Standing still is advancing forward: nationalist teleology and
self-reliance in Singaporean and North Korean art and performance

Sophie McIntyre | Australian National University
The rise of China and cross-Strait relations in art from Taiwan

16:05–16:30 AFTERNOON TEA

16:30–17:15 KEYNOTE SPEAKER
Mizusawa Tsutomu | Museum of Modern Art Hayama, Kamakura, Japan
Depicting the City: Fragmented Memory, Reality and Future - the example
of modern Japanese art

17:30 RECEPTION

DAY 2: SATURDAY, 30 NOVEMBER
Venue morning: Old Law School Assembly Hall, Sydney CBD
Venue afternoon: Art Gallery of New South Wales main lecture theatre

9:15–11:00 Session 4 – Challenging Traditions
Rhiannon Paget | University of Sydney
Being old fashioned in modern Japan: the making of a platform and an
audience for literati painting (‘nanga’) in the early 20th century

Dr. Hsieh Shih-ying | National Museum of History, Taipei
The negotiation with modernity: Taiwanese temple painter Pan Chunyuan
of the Japanese period

Phoebe Scott | National Art Gallery, Singapore
Representing worlds in transition: on two early examples of modern
Vietnamese art

Changkyu Lee | State University of New York
Sacred possession and eternal consumption: the spiritual reconciliation
of Islamic painting in Southeast Asia

11:00–11:15 MORNING TEA

11:15–12:15 Special Session – Asia-Australia artistic engagement in
practice
John Young, visual artist, Melbourne
Kim Machan, curator and director of Media Art Asia Pacific, Brisbane

12:15–13:30 LUNCH

13.30 Move to Art Gallery of New South Wales, main lecture theatre

13:30–13:40

13:40–15:30 Session 5 – Contemporaries
Reiko Tomii | Independent scholar, New York
When Martians came to Tokyo: an origin of Gutai

Anne Kirker | Queensland College of Art and Griffith University
Counterpointing the ‘hanga’ (prints) of Noda Tetsuya and Shimada
Yoshiko

Juliane Noth | Freie Universität Berlin
Schizophrenic convergence: art, science and biography in Shi Lu’s works
of 1969/70

Eva Bentcheva | School of Oriental and African Studies, University of
London
Escaping the na(rra)tive in 1960s’ Britain: David Medalla’s fusion of
Asian iconography and performance art

15:30–15:45 Afternoon Tea

15:45–16:30 KEYNOTE SPEAKER
Werner Kraus | Professor, Passau University; director, Centre for
Southeast Asian Art, Germany
Aesthetic colonisation: how Western images entered Javanese minds -
tracing the evidence

16:30 SUMMA

Prof. John Clark remarks

17:30 RECEPTION

REGISTRATION AND FURTHER INFORMATION

Tilting the World is a FREE event. Abstracts, further information and
links to online registration for both days can be found on the
official symposiums page on the Power Institute website here:
http://sydney.edu.au/arts/power/about/symposiums.shtml