Art Histories
2013/ 2014

Li Zhang

Bronze Age China and the Early Globalization of Art

Li Zhang received her PhD from the Department of Archaeology and Museology, Peking University, in 2012. From 2012 to 2013 she was appointed as a post-doc fellow of the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World, New York University. Her research interests include: inter-cultural interaction across Eurasia and its reflections in visual art; human-environment interaction; and the social complexity of East Asia, focusing on the Neolithic and Bronze Age in China. In her doctoral dissertation, Social Transformation from the Longshan Period to the Erlitou Period: Songshan and Beyond, she examines different strategies employed by various societies in north China in dealing with the 4000 BP climatic crisis, as well as the diverse impacts of those strategies on societies. The dissertation also analyzes evidence of unique ritual ceremonies and interactions between the central plains and the Northern Zone, all of which were highly intertwined with social complexity in China. Her research in ISAW was aimed at summarizing and systematically analyzing the relevant and very complex archaeological materials that have been found all across the vast area of China that are related to interactions with other cultures in Eurasia.

Bronze Age China and the Early Globalization of Art

Li Zhang’s research project, Bronze Age China and the Early Globalization of Art, for Art Histories and Aesthetic Practices, aims at providing the first synthetic research on the contribution of eastern Eurasia to the early globalization of art. The project will examine the artifacts from museum collections and archaeological discoveries all across China that are related to the early globalization of art. In addition, it will explore the mechanisms of the artistic interactions between different societies of early China with the cultures of the Eurasian Steppe and how those interactions varied from region to region and changed over time. Inter-regional interactions in visual art across different cultures in Eurasia were not confined to the period of the Chinese Bronze Age, but are also well documented in the historical period of China, for example the medieval period. What might be the common ground for this early globalization of art? Case studies from the medieval period will also be incorporated in order to promote a diachronic understanding and the development of theory.