Matthew McKelway

Takeo and Itsuko Atsumi Associate Professor of Japanese Art History

Japanese Art
Ph.D., Columbia Universty, 1999

Contact Information

Phone: (212) 854-3182

Office: 919 Schermerhorn Hall
Office Hours: Tuesdays, 10-12

Biography

Matthew P. McKelway, Atsumi Associate Professor at Columbia University, specializes in the history of Japanese painting of the 16th-18th century. His research has focused on urban representation in rakuchū rakugai zu (screen paintings of Kyoto), the development of genre painting in early modern Japan, Kano school painting, and individualist painters in 18th century Kyoto. Interests in the materiality and techniques of Japanese painting and the early Kano workshop have led to recent articles and a current book project on fan paintings as media for social intercourse and pictorial experimentation. In addition to his research on fan paintings, he is conducting ongoing studies of the painters Nagasawa Rosetsu and Sakai Hōitsu.

The courses McKelway offers include surveys of Japanese art and more specialized undergraduate courses on painting and Buddhist art. Topics of graduate seminars and lectures have ranged from narrative handscrolls and Muromachi ink painting to the Kano school, Rimpa, and Edo-period painting. To graduate students in Japanese art history and other disciplines he also offers regular informal instruction in reading early Japanese scripts (hentaigana / kuzushiji).

Professor McKelway has held visiting positions at the Kunsthistorisches Institut, Freie Universität Berlin, Gakushūin University and Waseda University.

Selected Publications

「室町時代狩野派扇面画の"オリジナル"——宋画との関連」(The "Original" in Muromachi Period Kano-School Fan Paintings: The Relationship to Song Dynasty Paintings)『オリジナルの行方——文化財を伝えるために』(Heibonsha, 2010).

「北野経王堂と諏訪の神事——室町時代扇面図の場と記憶」 (Kitano Sutra Hall and Archery at Suwa Shrine: Muromachi Fan Paintings and Shogunal Memory)『風俗絵画の文化学——都市をうつすメディア』(Shibunkaku, 2009).

Chinese Romance from a Japanese Brush: Kano Sansetsu's Chōgonka Scrolls in the Chester Beatty Library. London: Editions Scala, 2009. Co-authored with Shane McCausland.

Capitalscapes: Folding Screens and Political Imagination in Late Medieval Kyoto (University of Hawaii, 2006).

Traditions Unbound: Groundbreaking Painters from Eighteenth-Century Kyoto (San Francisco: Asian Art Museum, 2005).

"Screens for a Young Warrior." Impressions v. 30 (2008-2009): 42-51.

"Autumn Moon and Lingering Snow: Kano Sansetsu's West Lake Screens." Artibus Asiae LXII: 1 (Spring, 2003): 33-80.

 

For Prospective Graduate Students in Japanese Art: Prior to entry into the program, prospective students should have completed at least three years of study in Japanese, preferably with at least one year spent in Japan. Further requirements are detailed in the Ph.D. student handbook.