A wide shot of a ceramics studio, featuring students working with pottery wheels and other tools.
Headshot of Pauline Yao, an adult person with a medium-fair skin tone and short gray hair.

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Pauline J Yao

Lecturer

Contact

Bio

Pauline J. Yao (she/her) is an independent curator, writer, and educator based in Hong Kong and Chicago. From 2017 to 2024 she was Lead Curator, Visual Art, at M+, the new museum for twentieth and twenty-first century visual culture established in Hong Kong. Since joining the M+ curatorial team in 2012, Yao played an integral role in building the museum’s collection of visual art and acquiring works of art from East Asia, Southeast Asia and internationally. She curated the inaugural display of the visual art collection exhibition Individuals, Networks, Expressions and Antony Gormley: Asian Field, both on view at the grand opening of M+ in 2021. From 2008-2019, Yao helped run Arrow Factory, an independent art space in Beijing. Prior to relocating to Beijing, Yao served as Assistant Curator of Chinese Art at the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco from 2002 to 2006. She is a regular contributor to Artforum International and her writings on contemporary Asian art have appeared in various catalogues, online publications, and edited volumes. Yao received her MA in East Asian Language and Civilizations from the University of Chicago and her BA from Pitzer College in Claremont, CA. 

Awards

Leverhume Visiting Professorship, University of Leeds, winter 2017; Contemporary Chinese Art Awards Art Critic Prize, Beijing, 2007–08; US Department of State Fulbright Grant to Beijing, China, 2006–07

 

Publications

M+ Collection: Highlights, Thames & Hudson, 2022; In Production Mode: Contemporary Art in China, Timezone 8 Books, 2008

Courses

Title Department Catalog Term

Description

This class surveys the development of contemporary Chinese art from the late 1970s to 2010s through the lens of space. In China, contemporary art forms such as abstract painting, video, installation, and performance have long existed in the margins, outside the mainstream system. We will examine the spatial politics of production, display and consumption of this art over several decades, tracking how art in China interacts with political spaces (state run institutions and venues), the private domain (ad-hoc and independent spaces) and finally purpose-built and commercial outlets (galleries, and museums).
Studying the history and evolution of contemporary Chinese art, also referred to as `avant-garde¿ or `experimental¿ art, is to study its interactions with space, be it public or private, physical or discursive. Lectures and discussions will focus on key events such as the Stars Painting Group¿s 1979 exhibition, the ¿China/Avant-Garde¿ 1989 exhibition, and the 2000 Shanghai Biennale as well as peripheral events and select activities outside of China. Readings will include texts by Wu Hung, Peggy Wang, Rosalyn Deutsche and Miwon Kwon.
Various exercises and writing assignment during the semester, in-class presentations, one research paper.

Class Number

2490

Credits

3