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Read the latest news about the Asian American Art Initiative.

A gallery view of East of The Pacific exhibition at the Cantor

‘East of the Pacific: Making Histories of Asian American Art’, 2022, installation view.
Courtesy: Cantor Arts Center, Stanford University; photograph: Johnna Arnold

The Initiative Preserving the Past and Securing the Future of Asian American Art

Marci Kwon, assistant professor of art history at Stanford University, and Aleesa Pitchamarn Alexander, associate curator of modern and contemporary art at the university’s Cantor Arts Center, are challenging conventions of both academia and the art institution as co-directors of the Asian American Art Initiative (AAAI), which is dedicated to the study of artists of Asian descent.

Together, they seek to decentralize the curatorial voice and reframe museum work as service-driven. While Alexander organizes exhibitions and works toward increasing the institution’s holdings of Asian American art at the Cantor, Kwon spearheads primary source-driven research projects, such as the open-access Martin Wong Catalogue Raisonné. frieze assistant editor Lisa Yin Zhang spoke to Alexander and Kwon about how AAAI’s future-looking initiative takes a long view of history.

Frieze

IMU UR2: Asian American Art, Intersectionality, and Collective Memory

Stanford Arts
Three women on the stage during a symposium

Ruth Asawa, Without End

 

Hyperallergic
Asawa Masks

Vittore Carpaccio, East of the Pacific

 

The Modern Art Notes Podcast
Abstract painting in beige, brown, and blue shades

The Modern Art Notes Podcast: Ruth Asawa, Katherine Bradford

 

The Modern Art Notes Podcast
Installation image from The Faes of Ruth Asawa, on view at the Cantor

The Ramifications of Oppression in the Asian American Community

 

ArtReview
Patty Chang, Que Sera Sera/Invocations, 2013–14, two-channel video. Courtesy the artist

Complete Martin Wong Catalogue Goes Online

 

Artasiapacific
A portrait of an asian american man wearing a hat and suit

When Asian-American Artists Are Unburdened by Identity

 

Hyperallergic
a wall covered in masks made of clay

Migration, incarceration among themes for Stanford’s East of the Pacific

Datebook
Gallery view of East of the Pacific exhibition at Cantor

Asian American art in focus at Stanford

Palo Alto Online
Two people laying down watching TV

Ruth Asawa made hundreds of masks of her San Francisco community—now a local museum is putting them on permanent display

The Art Newspaper
An image of artist Ruth Asawa infront of her Wall of Masks

Cantor announces Asian American Art Initiative with Ruth Asawa acquisition

SF Chronicle
An image of “Untitled,” by Koho Yamamoto, 1944

Cantor Arts Center launches Asian American Art Initiative bolstered by major Ruth Asawa acquisition, The Michael Donald Brown Collection and other works

Cantor Arts Center
An image of Ruth Asawa's "Untilted (Wall of Masks)"

Cantor Arts Center Creates Asian American Art Initiative

ARTnews
An image of Ruth Asawa with Family Masks

The Japanese-American Sculptor Who, Despite Persecution, Made Her Mark

The New York Times Style Magazine
An image of Ruth Asawa

Cantor Arts Center launches Asian American Art Initiative

Hyperallergic
An image of Ruth Asawa's "Wall of Masks"

Cantor Arts Center launches Asian American Art Initiative

Stanford Report
An image of Ruth Asawa's "Untitled (Wall Of Masks)"

 

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