Treasured & Quotidian Objects: Still Life in Chinese Art

Thursday, August 29
1:00–3:00 p.m. PT
Speaker: Heather Simmerman, Asian Arts Council Vice Chair and Docent, The San Diego Museum of Art
Virtual Event

Though Chinese art history has not included a formal genre of still life as in the Western tradition, depictions of fruit; objects of material culture or wealth, such as knick-knacks or antiquities; and flowers and plants as auspicious symbols have been portrayed with regularity. This presentation traces the aesthetic principles and examples of Chinese still life from the Song dynasty (960-1279) to the modern/contemporary period.

Speaker Bio: Heather Simmerman was born and raised in the Chicago area, frequently visiting the Art Institute of Chicago. She earned a B.A. in biology from Northwestern University and a Ph.D. in chemistry from Indiana University, then pursued a career in the biotech industry. She is a docent at the Museum, Vice Chair of the Museum’s Asian Arts Council, and has been accepted into the University of London SOAS-Alphawood program of study for the Postgraduate Certificate in Asian Art commencing Fall 2024.

Please note, this session will be conducted virtually via Zoom.

Save your spot. All participants will be sent the Zoom link via confirmation email with instructions once you secure your place.

Sponsored by the Asian Arts Council.

Featured at top right: Ding Workshop. Fruit Plate (果盤; Guo pan), ca. 1735-1750. Woodcut painted in colour on paper. The British Museum. Bequeathed by Sir Hans Sloane. © The Trustees of the British Museum. Shared under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) licence.