Prof. Lee is a Professor of the Department of Painting and Calligraphy at the National Taiwan University of Arts (NTUA), the former Director of the Youzhang Museum of Art and the former Head of the Department of Painting and Calligraphy at NTUA.He has produced a wealth of academic research and artistic publications and has won a number of awards for his work, including the first prize in the Chinese painting category at the 12th National Art Exhibition, the Golden Dragon Award, the first prize in the Chinese painting category at Lu Guangmei Exhibition, the Nanying Award at the 8th Nanying Art Exhibition, the 38th Literary Creation Award of the Zhongshan Academic Literature and Art Foundation, and the Art and Cultural Medal of the Chinese Literature and Art Association. Prof. Lee specialises in the study of Oriental and Western art as well as contemporary oriental ink painting creation.
During the lecture, Prof. Lee introduced the concept of “Creative Awareness”, which consists of three components: traditional foundation, contemporary thinking, and subjective consciousness. Contemporary ink paintings are based on traditional ink brush painting, combined with a touch of personal traits in response to contemporary thinking and culture. Using「玉山圓柏」ink painting series from his own artwork exhibition《聖域—神姿逸態》as example, Prof. Lee said that the original intention was to illustrate the natural beauty of Juniper trees in Taiwan, however, his family members fell ill during the creation process. Using the feelings and insight he experienced throughout the challenging times, Prof. Lee drew a series of Juniper trees that stand in the midst of the breeze and rain, reflecting the emotions that he and his family felt. The subjective consciousness is blended into the natural landscape to create an art piece that elevates oneself.
Prof. Xuelei Huang – Scents of China: A Modern History of Smell
Prof. Xuelei Huang is a Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in Chinese Studies at the University of Edinburgh. She is visiting The Chinese University of Hong Kong for three months under the ICS Visiting Fellowship Programme. The Institute was honoured to invite Prof. Huang to deliver a public lecture on the topic “Scents of China: A Modern History of Smell” on 2 May 2023 afternoon at 2/F, Activity Room, Art Museum East Wing. The lecture was conducted in English, and a total of 30 participants attended the lecture.
The lecture explores the relationship between past environments, objects, and people’s smell, and what aromas and stenches can tell about history and culture from Qing Dynasty to the Maoist period. Professor Huang utilised interdisciplinary methodology to show how this period of tumultuous change in China was experienced through the body and the senses. During this lecture, Prof. Huang also introduced her forthcoming book,
Scents of China: A Modern History of Smell. Drawing on unexplored archival materials, the book documents the eclectic array of smells that permeated Chinese life from the High Qing through to the Mao period.
Prof. Xuelei Huang and Prof. Pang Lai Kwan, as well as Prof. Xuelei Huang's forthcoming book, Scents of China: A Modern History of SmellProf. Christopher Lupke – The “Field” of Filiality and Ambiguous Kinship Relations in Mo Yan’s Red Sorghum Family
Prof. Christopher Lupke (Ph. D. Cornell University) is a Professor of Chinese Cultural Studies at the University of Alberta, specialising in modern and contemporary Chinese literature and cinema. Prof. Lupke is visiting The Chinese University of Hong Kong for three months under the Modern China Visiting Scholar Scheme from mid-April to mid-July 2023. The Institute was honoured to invite Prof. Lupke to deliver a public lecture on the topic “The ‘Field’ of Filiality and Ambiguous Kinship Relations in Mo Yan’s
Red Sorghum Family” on 30 May afternoon at 2/F, Activity Room, Art Museum East Wing. The lecture was conducted in English, and a total of 30 participants attended the lecture.
Filiality is one of the cardinal Confucian virtues, ubiquitous in Chinese discourse and social practice for the past 3000 years. During the lecture, Prof. Lupke focused on illustrating the concept of “filiality” in Mo Yan’s novel
Red Sorghum Family. He discussed the characters and the plot of the novel with a central statement that “filiality has never fully retreated from the stage of Chinese social practice, ethical behaviour, or the representation of human interaction in Chinese literature and cinema.” Prof. Lupke also quoted other examples from May-Fourth literature to reconfirm this point.
Prof. Lai Chi Tim and Prof. Christopher Lupke
