Department of Art History

Congratulations to Wu Hung (Harrie A. Vanderstappen Distinguished Service Professor of Art History and the College and Adjunct Curator at the Smart Museum of Art) for being awarded two prizes in January, 2021 for his new book, First Class: Teaching Chinese Art History at Harvard University and the University of Chicago (Hunan Art Press 2020, in Chinese). China Publishing & Media Journal selected the book as one of “the most influential books on art education” and a panel of independent jurors chose it as one of the two “best books on art” at the Fifteenth Annual Awards of Chinese Books Publishers.

The book consists of twenty-four “first lectures” which Professor Wu Hung has given in different courses since 1988, including eighteen lectures written and taught at the University of Chicago. A team of college and graduate students from different departments worked with him to translate the lectures into Chinese.

Furthermore, the 2020 National College Entrance Exams in China (高考 gao kao) included his essay “Historical Materiality in Art (in Chinese) as a required component for reading comprehension and analysis. Over two million students read the article for this entrance exam, and past exams are publicly accessible so other students can study them in preparation for degrees in higher education.