Assistant Professor for Chinese Art History / Academic advisor  Dr. Monica Klasing Chen

Research 

My current research project addresses the formation of habits in China, with a focus on art and crafts. I analyze normative texts that prescribe behavior directed toward matter and how people were meant to engage crafts in their daily lives during the late Qing and Republican periods. Discussions on what conceptually defined “mistakes” and “bad habits” are at the core of my research, as well as trends related to recycling and frugality. 

My previous project analyzed changing attitudes toward remembering practical knowledge from the Ming through the late Qing dynasty, discussing the use and different formats of mnemonic aids. Issues addressed by the project include the codification of knowledge in the field of arts and how non-elite knowledge was disseminated through print. 

Curriculum Vitae (excerpt) 

Since 2021 Assistant Professor for Chinese Art History, Institute of East Asian Art History, Heidelberg University / Academic Advisor 
2020 Ph.D. in Chinese Studies, Leiden Institute for Area Studies, Leiden University, the Netherlands 
2018 Doctoral Research Fellow at Waseda University, Japan. 
2014  MA in East Asian Art History / Sinology, Institute of East Asian Art History, Heidelberg University 

2011  BA in Fine Arts and Art Education, School of Communication and Arts, São Paulo 

University, Brazil. 

Selected Publications 

Klasing Chen, Monica. 2023. "Between remembrance and commerce: Writing a painting treatise in nineteenth-century Shanghai." Memory Studies 16, 5: 1313-1327. https://doi.org/10.1177/17506980231155556 

Klasing Chen, Monica. 2020. “Memorable Arts: The Mnemonics of Painting and Calligraphy in Late Imperial China.” PhD thesis, Leiden University. Open Access: https://hdl.handle.net/1887/138671

Klasing Chen, Monica. 2017. “Translating Practical Knowledge: Three Theories of Portraiture from the Mid-Qing Dynasty.” In Faces of China – Portrait Painting of the Ming and Qing Dynasties (1368-1912), edited by Klaas Ruitenbeek, 75-84. Berlin: Berlin State Museums and Michael Imhof Verlag.

Awards & Grants 

“PhDs in the Humanities” grant from the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) for the project “Memorable Arts: The Mnemonics of Painting and Calligraphy in Late Imperial China.” (August 2016- July 2020). 

“Institutional Program for Scientific Research” scholarship (PIBIC), Brazilian Centre for Technological and Scientific Development (CNPq) (August 2007- June 2009)

Memberships and other Functions 

Since 2023  Working group member “Common Knowledge and and Its Sources in the Sinosphere, 14th to 20th Centuries,” Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin.  

Since 2021  Member of organizing committee for the “Forum Ostasiatische Kunstgeschichte im deutschsprachigen Raum.”   

2020–2023  Editor of the Journal of the History of Knowledge Blog. 

Recent Teaching 

Vorlesung „Encounters of Chinese Ceramic and Islamic Ceramic" (with Professor Zhai Yi), summer term 2024 

Grundkurs “Propädeutikum IV: Methoden und Theorien” (with Katharina Rode-Kaya), summer term 2024 

Übung “Bildanalyse” (with Prof. Sarah Fraser, Margó Krewinkel), summer term 2024 

Hilfsmittelkurs „Research Tools and Methods for Chinese Art History: Textiles in China” winter term 2023/24 

Grundkurs “Propädeutikum III: Gattungen und Techniken” (together with Katharina Rode-Kaya), winter term 2023/2024 

Outreach 

Contributor to exhibition “Faces of China,” 12.10.2016–7.01.2017. Museum for Asian Art, Berlin State Museums.  

Academic support for exhibition “Comics from China: Entertainment – ​​Realities – Propaganda?,” 27.03.–07.05.2023. CATS library and Ethnographic Museum vPST (Heidelberg)