Shuxia Chen
Curator, China Gallery
BBA (Hons) MVA (Hons) MA PhD ANU
Shuxia has worked in museums and art spaces for over a decade. She joined the Chau Chak Wing Museum as its inaugural curator for the China Gallery in 2019. She holds a PhD from the Australian National University, an MA in Art History from the University of Sydney, and an MA in Studio Art (Honours) from Sydney College of the Arts.
She has been curating, publishing and teaching Asian art nationally and internationally. Her current curatorial projects include: “Chinese Toggles: Culture in Miniature” (Sydney, 2023-2024), “Sentient Paper” (Sydney, 2021-2022), “Wayfaring: Photography in 1970s and 80s Taiwan” (Canberra, 2021), and “Auspicious: Motifs in Chinese Art” (Sydney, 2020-2021).
Shuxia is currently working on three book projects: Wayfaring: Photography in 1970s and 80s Taiwan (co-edited volume, Canberra: ANU Press, 2024), Chinese Toggles: Culture in Miniature (co-edited volume, Sydney: Power Publications, 2023), A Home for Photography Learning: the Friday Salon, 1977-1980 (edited volume, Shanghai Fine Art Publishing House, 2023).
She is the recipient of The Robert H. N. Ho Greater China Research Grant (2014-2015) and China Professional Placements, Australia Council for the Arts (2020). Currently, she is the David Scott Mitchell Memorial Fellow (2022-2023), investigating the role women played in Sino-Australian relations during the Sino-Japanese war.
Shuxia is also lecturer, curating and cultural leadership, at UNSW’s Art&Design.
- Cultural networks in Asian art
- Chinese photography
- Artist groups in Asia
- Socialist and post-socialist visual culture
- Curatorial practice in Asia
- Exhibition history
- Humanities Travelling Fellowship, Australian Academy of the Humanities, 2020
- China Professional Placement, Australia Council for the Arts, 2020
- Visiting Scholar, Institute of History and Philology, Academia Sinica, Taiwan, 2017
- PhD Scholarship, Australian Centre on China in the World, 2014
- Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation Greater China Research 2014
- Travel Grant, Asian Art Archive, Hong Kong, 2013
- Community Grant for exhibition Make Yourself At Home, City of Sydney, 2012
- Travel sponsorship, China Studies Centre, the University of Sydney, 2011
2021
- Curator, Sentient Paper, Chau Chak Wing Museum, The University of Sydney.
2020
- Curator, Auspicious: Motifs in Chinese Art, Chau Chak Wing Museum, the University of Sydney.
2018
- Curator, A Home for Photography Learning: the Friday Salon, 1977-1980, Taikang Space, Beijing, China (touring to University Museum and Art Gallery, the University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, 2021)
2012
- Curator, Make Yourself at Home, ChinaLink Gallery, Sydney
- Curator, Shen Jiawei: Brothers and Sisters, China Study Centre/ Seymour Centre, University of Sydney, Sydney
2008
- Exhibition Manager, Song Dong, Zendai Museum of Modern Art (now Himalayas Art Centre), Shanghai
2007
- Exhibition Manager, Soft Power: Asian Attitude, Zendai Museum of Modern Art (now Himalayas Art Centre), Shanghai
- Assistant Curator, Refresh: Emerging Chinese Artist, Zendai Museum of Modern Art (now Himalayas Art Centre), Shanghai
- Exhibition Manager, Ribbenrtop’s Living Room: Stephan Kaluza Solo Exhibition, Zendai Museum of Modern Art (now Himalayas Art Centre), Shanghai
- Exhibition Manager, Julian Schnabel, Zendai Museum of Modern Art (now Himalayas Art Centre), Shanghai
- Exhibition Manager, The No Name: A History of a Self-Exiled Avant-Garde, Zendai Museum of Modern Art (now Himalayas Art Centre), Shanghai
Co-authored Books
- Chen, Shuxia. (2020). A Home for Photography Learning: the Friday Salon, 1977-1980. Shuxia Chen (ed.), Shanghai: Shanghai Literature and Art Publication House.
Chapters
- Chen, Shuxia. (2020). ‘Photographs of the Stars’. In Wu Hung and Holly Roussell (eds.) 40 Years Ago: The Stars in 1979. Hong Kong: The Chinese University of Hong Kong Press.
- Chen, Shuxia. (2018). ‘Ren Hang: Bodies Without Redemption’. Made In China Year Book 2017. Canberra: ANU Press.
- Chen, Shuxia. (2016). ‘Authentically Socialist: a window on a Communist utopia’. In PLA Picture Pub: Long Live the Glorious ‘May Seventh Directive. New York: Errata Editions.
- Chen, Shuxia. (2016). ‘Looking Backward: Chinese Art in 2014’. China Story Year Book 2014. Canberra: ANU Press.
Peer-reviewed Journal essays
- Chen, Shuxia. (2019). ‘A Home for Photography Learning: the Friday Salon, 1977-1980’. Yishu: Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art, No. 3: 79-92.
- Chen, Shuxia (co-author with Shi Zhimin and Zhou Dengyan). (2019). ‘Photographic Praxis in China, 1930s-1980s: A conversation with Chen Shuxia, Shi Zhimin, and Zhou Dengyan about Shi Shaohua and the Friday Salon’. Trans Asia Photography Review, No.2.
- Chen, Shuxia. (2017). ‘Departing from Socialist Realism: the April Photo Society, 1979-1981’. Trans Asia Photography Review, Vol. 8, No.1.
- Chen, Shuxia. (2015). ‘Manipulation as Art: Photographs by Xu Zhuo, 1979–1981’. Trans Asia Photography Review, Vol. 6, No.1.
- Chen, Shuxia. ‘Shaping a photographic art image’, translation from Wu Yinxian’s book Methods on photographic art expression (Beijing: Beijing Film Press, 1961, pp.11-16). Trans Asia Photography Review, Vol. 4, No.2.
Selected Magazine, Online and Catalogue essays
- Chen, Shuxia. (2010). ‘Wang Jianwei: the Great Politics of Human Interaction’. Realtime, Sydney.
- Chen, Shuxia. (2010). ‘The 17th Biennale of Sydney’. ArtForum.com.cn.
- Chen, Shuxia. (2010). ‘Edge of Elsewhere’. ArtForum.com.cn.
- Chen, Shuxia. (2008). ‘Roland Fischer’. ArtForum.com.cn.
- Chen, Shuxia. (2008). ‘Julian Schnabel’. ArtForum.com.cn.
- Chen, Shuxia. (2007). ‘One dialogue, one platform’. In Soft Power: Asian Attitude. Hunan: Hunan Fine Art Publishing House.
