معرفی
Ellen Larson serves as a CAEA Postdoctoral Instructor in the Department of Art History at the University of Chicago, concurrently holding the position of Associate Director at the Center for the Art of East Asia (CAEA). Her academic and curatorial work centers on modern and contemporary art from Asia and Asian diasporic communities, with emphasis on moving image practices and institutional frameworks.
Education
- PhD in Contemporary Chinese Art, University of Pittsburgh
- MA in Global Contemporary Art History, University of Pittsburgh
- MA in Modern Chinese History, Minzu University of China, Beijing
Research Focus
Larson’s scholarship investigates temporalities in Chinese moving image art from the late 1980s through early 2000s, examining post-industrial urban aesthetics, technological mediation, and diasporic identities. Her work critically engages AI technologies, virtual economies, and online communication platforms as artistic mediums, revealing how digital infrastructures reshape cultural memory and spatial perception in contemporary Chinese visual culture.
Publication Trends
Her 2019-2024 publications demonstrate rigorous engagement with Chinese video art’s evolution, consistently analyzing artists like Cao Fei and Su Yuhsin through lenses of utopian nostalgia, industrial heritage, and planetary futurism. These works reveal a methodological shift toward interdisciplinary approaches blending art history, media studies, and urban theory, particularly in examining how virtual platforms and monetary systems transform artistic production and reception.
Awards & Recognition
- US Fulbright Program
- Getty Foundation Grant
- Asia Foundation Fellowship
- Henry Luce Foundation Support
- Dunhuang Foundation Award
- Center for Contemporary Art Research in Japan Program
- University of Chicago Provost’s Global Faculty Award
Curatorial Leadership
As Associate Director of CAEA, Larson directs major research initiatives while curating exhibitions that bridge academic scholarship and public engagement. Her grants from the Fulbright Program and Getty Foundation have enabled extensive fieldwork in China, facilitating collaborative projects with artists and institutions that document ephemeral media practices and preserve critical art historical archives for scholarly access.
Exhibition Practice
Larson’s curatorial portfolio—including Ephemeral Architectures (2023) and Materializing Memory (2019)—creates vital platforms for Chinese video art within U.S. institutions. These projects establish methodological frameworks for preserving time-based media while challenging Western-centric exhibition histories, particularly through her focus on intermediary spaces and counter-mapping strategies that reveal hidden narratives in urban landscapes.
