Iftikhar Dadi

Iftikhar Dadi is the John H. Burris Professor in the Department of History of Art at Cornell University's College of Arts & Sciences. He also serves on the editorial and advisory boards of ARTMargins, South Asian Studies, Archives of Asian Art, and Bio-Scope: South Asian Screen Studies. Dadi has held significant leadership roles including Chair of Cornell's Department of Art (2010-14), Director of Cornell's South Asia Program (2015-16 and 2018-2023), and Chair of the Department of History of Art (2020-23). He is a board member of Cornell's Institute for Comparative Modernities (ICM) and serves as an advisor to the Hong Kong-based research organization Asia Art Archive.

Dadi received his PhD in the history of art at Cornell University, with studies in the Departments and programs of History of Art and Visual Studies and the Institute for Comparative Modernities. His academic journey has been deeply rooted at Cornell, where he has risen to become a distinguished professor with an endowed chair.

Dadi's research focuses on modern and contemporary art from a global and transnational perspective, with particular emphasis on South and West Asia and their diasporas. His work is informed by postcolonial theory and globalization studies, examining how emergent publics forge new avenues for civic participation through film, media, and popular cultures of South Asia. He investigates questions of memory and borders in contemporary globalization, and the productive capacities of urban informalities across the Global South, often drawing on archaeology, cinema, and art historical references. His scholarship has pioneered new methodologies for understanding art in postcolonial contexts, challenging Eurocentric narratives while developing nuanced frameworks for global art history.

His recent publications reveal consistent engagement with South Asian visual culture, particularly examining cinema, urban aesthetics, and transnational artistic practices. Dadi's work consistently bridges academic scholarship with curatorial practice, demonstrating how theoretical frameworks can be applied to real-world artistic production and exhibition contexts. His research shows a progression from examining historical modernisms to contemporary urban aesthetics, reflecting evolving scholarly interests while maintaining core methodological commitments to decolonial approaches and global perspectives.

• Book Prize from the American Institute of Pakistan Studies (2010)
• Grants from the Andy Warhol Foundation
• Grants from the Getty Foundation
• Grants from the Mellon Foundation
• Grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities

Dadi has received significant research funding that has enabled major scholarly projects, exhibitions, and conferences. He co-organized 'The Next Monsoon: Climate Change and Contemporary Cultural Production in South Asia,' a three-day event at Cornell University in October 2023. His curatorial work includes major exhibitions like 'Pop South Asia: Artistic Explorations in the Popular' (Sharjah Art Foundation 2022 and Kiran Nadar Museum of Art 2023) and 'Lines of Control' on partitions and borders. As an artist, Dadi works collaboratively with Elizabeth Dadi, with exhibitions at prestigious venues including Sharjah Biennial 15 (2023), Kunstmuseum Thun, Switzerland (2022), and Kettle's Yard, Cambridge University (2019-20).