China’s Qing court produced the largest group of surviving paintings of Chinese empresses, many of which were once used for ancestor worship in the private imperial collection. Join us as Daisy Yiyou Wang, who co-curated the 2019 Empresses exhibit at the Smithsonian Museum, explores an extraordinary portrait of Empress Xiaoxian, whose early death broke the heart of the Qianlong emperor. Wang will examine details of the portrait, discuss its remarkable conservation journey, and even share new discoveries about where it used to hang. Wang, who is Deputy Director of the Hong Kong Palace Museum, will also discuss how her institution will look at artifacts from Beijing’s Forbidden City through a modern lens when it opens later this year.
Dr. Daisy Yiyou Wang is the Deputy Director of the Hong Kong Palace Museum. A specialist of the history of collecting, lacquer, Qing court portraiture, and the history of photography in China, Wang has served as the Robert N. Shapiro Curator of Chinese and East Asian Art at the Peabody Essex Museum and the Chinese Art Specialist at the Smithsonian’s Freer|Sackler. With Jan Stuart, she co-curated the groundbreaking exhibition “Empresses of China’s Forbidden City.” Wang is the recipient of numerous prestigious grants and awards, and founded the American Alliance of Museums’ China Program, the largest annual US-China museum professional exchange initiative.
