[Job] Assistant/Associate Curator for Southeast Asian and South Asian Art and Culture

The Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art is seeking an Assistant/Associate Curator for Southeast Asian and South Asian Art and Culture. The position, based in Washington, DC, involves curating, researching, and promoting the museum’s extensive collections, and fostering international collaboration. Closing date is July 5.

The Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art is committed to preserving, exhibiting, researching, and interpreting art in ways that deepen the public and scholarly understandings of Asia and the world. Currently responsible for some 46,000 objects, the museum stewards one of the world’s most important collections of Asian art, with works dating from antiquity to the present. The collections include works from China, Japan, Korea, South Asia, Southeast Asia, the pre-Islamic Near East, and the Islamic world (inclusive of Central Asia, the Middle East, and North Africa). The museum also stewards an important collection of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century American art. Its rich holdings bring the arts of Asia into direct dialogue with a focused American collection, providing a compelling platform for creative collaboration and cultural exchange.

Beginning with a 1906 gift that paved the way for the museum’s opening in 1923 as the Freer Gallery of Art—the United States’ first national art museum—the National Museum of Asian Art has long been a national and international resource for visitors, students, and scholars. Located on the National Mall in Washington, DC, its collections, galleries, laboratories, archives, and library form part of the world’s largest museum complex, which attracts tens of millions of visitors annually. The museum is free and open to the public 364 days a year. Its exhibitions, programs, learning opportunities, and digital initiatives are accessible to local, national, and global audiences. Each year, hundreds of students, fellows, interns, scholars, and researchers access the museum’s resources and expertise.

Comprising over two thousand objects, both secular and religious, the National Museum of Asian Art’s Southeast Asian and South Asian collections include sculpture, jewelry, paintings, and ceramics from Indonesia, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Laos, Myanmar (Burma), India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, and Tibet. This exquisite group of works highlights unparalleled artistry and offers a rich means to explore the history and culture of the region.

NMAA celebrates the culture and art of Southeast Asia and South Asia through exhibitions, scholarly and public programming. As the museum enters its second century, it is growing and transforming. The candidate will join the museum at this moment of transition as it expands its engagement with Southeast Asian communities in the US and abroad and as it seeks to be a leader in ethical collecting practices.

The Assistant/Associate Curator for Southeast Asian and South Asian Art and Culture will be a member of the curatorial department, shaping the care, identification, acquisition, preservation, cataloging, exhibition, and interpretation of works of art. The candidate will be a national and international leader in the study and presentation of Southeast Asian art and culture and will support the South Asian collection at the museum. The candidate will perform scholarly research in preparation for publication and will furnish authoritative information on works in their field of specialization. They will develop original exhibitions and collaborate with curators on cross-departmental projects and research initiatives. The curator will also shape and implement engaging scholarly and public programs.

Source: Assistant/Associate Curator for Southeast Asian and South Asian Art and Culture (IS-1015-11/12) – Washington, DC | National Museum of Asian Art Careers