The School of Architecture and Allied Arts will present the school’s highest alumni honor—the Ellis F. Lawrence Medal— to Jerome Silbergeld during the school’s commencement ceremony Monday, June 13. Silbergeld is the P.Y. and Kinmay W. Tang Professor of Chinese Art History at Princeton University.

Above: Jerome Silbergeld, the 2016 Ellis F. Lawrence Medalist, pictured at Princeton University Art Museum with a rare, painted lion-faced tomb guardian figure from the Tang dynasty, 8th century. Photo by Denise Applewhite.

A reception for Silbergeld and graduating students will take place from noon to 2 p.m. in the Lawrence Hall courtyard, 1190 Franklin Boulevard. All are welcome.

Commencement and presentation of the Lawrence Medal, with remarks by Silbergeld, will begin at 3 p.m. on the South Lawn of Knight Library, 1501 Kincaid Street. The student speaker will be Vincent Mai from the Department of Architecture. No reservations are needed to attend, but nearly 500 students are graduating from A&AA this year so seating for family and friends is limited and on a first-come first-served basis.

Those needing accommodation may call (541) 346-3631 or email roxannea@uoregon.edu with their requests. Visit the commencement information webpage for information on shuttles, ADA accommodation, and more.

Silbergeld is one of the foremost authorities on traditional and contemporary Chinese art. Since 2001, he has been the P. Y. and Kinmay W. Tang Professor of Chinese Art History at Princeton’s Department of Art and Archaeology and the first director of Princeton's Tang Center for East Asian Art. The Tang Center has become a leading academic center, acquiring art for Princeton's museum, sponsoring exhibitions, and establishing itself as a leading publisher in the field of Chinese art.

The 2016 Lawrence Medal notes that Silbergeld is being honored “In recognition of your exemplary scholarship in art history and your intellectual curiosity and insight that forged groundbreaking research on Chinese modern and contemporary art and cinema.”

The bulk of Silbergeld’s academic scholarship has been divided between traditional arts in the Song and Yuan dynasties (10th through 14th centuries) and modern to contemporary Chinese art. His more than ninety authored and edited publications include the Encyclopaedia Britannica entry on Chinese art, the earliest book-length study of any 20th-century Chinese artist, the first full study of an artist from the People's Republic of China, and the only books on Chinese cinema by an art historian.

Silbergeld has also curated and co-curated nine exhibitions on contemporary Chinese art, including the earliest major American museum solo exhibition by a contemporary Chinese artist, C.C. Wang, and the only American exhibition of documentary works by Chinese photographers. He has served for many years as gallery and collections committees member and chair at the Asia Society and the China Institute in New York and as an editorial board member for Archives of Asian Art.

Undergraduate speaker and architecture student Jiawei (Vincent) Mai won first prize in the Lyceum Fellowship annual competition for a project he designed in Associate Professor Nancy Cheng’s fall 2014 studio. He was invited to attend the summer 2014 Danish Institute of Study Abroad program in Copenhagen, where he won the academic excellence award.

He was co-winner (with fellow student Kyle Willis) of the sustainable design practice award in the 2015 Royal Society of Arts Student Design Competition. Mai, from Guangzhou, China, is also involved in KTISMA, the UO architecture student journal, serving this year as co-editor in chief; the annual Holistic Options for Planet Earth Sustainability (HOPES conference; and other A&AA interdisciplinary student projects.

Above: Silbergeld as a UO undergraduate. Image courtesy Jerome Silbergeld.

Above: Hei Ming, Iron Rice Bowl, 2000, gelatin silver print, Guandong Museum of Art. From curated exhibition, "Humanism in China," China Institute in America, New York, 2009, first exhibition in America by Chinese documentary photographers. Image courtesy Jerome Silbergeld.

Above: The A&AA Commencement Ceremony will take place on the South Lawn behind the Knight Library on Monday, June 13, 2016 at 3:00 pm. Pictured here are the graduates from the Class of 2015.

Above: Decking out her Duck spirit on her mortarboard, A&AA alumna from Class of 2015 celebrates in style.