​Chinese "Paintings of Beautiful Women" and their Global Circulation in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries 
Dawn Odell, PhD
5 April, 2025     9:30 - 11 am 
The category of meiren hua (paintings of beautiful women) has a long tradition in Chinese art. Join First Saturday PDX in this presentation as Dr Dawn Odell discusses some of the origins (literary and visual) of the genre and then explain the ways that these images circulated beyond Asia.  As "global" objects, paintings of beautiful women often took on surprising forms and were created in innovative media, including paintings on mirrored glass. This talk aims to explain the role of "beautiful women paintings" within the homosocial worlds of port cities such as Guangzhou and Macao. 
*REGISTER HERE by 4 April
About the speaker:  
Dawn Odell received her BA from Carleton College, her MA in East Asian studies from Harvard University, and her PhD in art history from the University of Chicago. She teaches courses on early modern European and Asian art at Lewis & Clark College. She is currently writing a book about an eighteenth-century merchant (A.E. van Braam Houckgeest), the global port cities in which he lived, and the extraordinary collection of Chinese art he amassed and dispersed during his lifetime. ​
​​​For those interested in continuing the conversation, there will be a no host lunch family style with the speaker at a Chinese restaurant afterwards.   Please let us know if you are joining when you register for the program so that we can make the proper arrangements.
Check-in begins promptly at 9:15am
​Please meet at the SOUTH SIDE entrance doors
(north side doors are to the Physics side of the building)
N.B. Building entrance doors will be locked at 9:30am
*Registration required   

​**This is an on-site presentation. 
Reed College, Biology Building, B19 Auditorium
3203 SE Woodstock Blvd, Portland, OR 97202

The large East Parking Lot (free) is conveniently located nearby to the Biology Building, adjacent to the neighboring ETC (Educational Technology Center), see campus map here

Public transportation is available, plan your TriMet trip HERE.  (The #19 bus stops right on SE Woodstock East Parking entrance to the campus.

​We recommend that attendees be vaccinated and boosted, and follow CDC guidelines regarding masking.
Our program series is supported by Reed College, Northwest China Council, Lan Su Chinese Garden,  Portland Chinatown Museum and Portland State University's Institute for Asian Studies.   ​
​All our programs are free and open to the public.   ​