Society Upper Category members are invited to join a Society Conversation with Swosti Rajbhandari Kayastha, a Fullbright Visiting Scholar currently associated with the Asian Art Museum. She specializes in Nepali art and culture and has worked as a curator for the Nepal Art Council in addition to having been a lecturer at the Lumbini Buddhist University in Nepal.
Upper Category Member Events
Upper Category Member Events
Each year, the Upper Category Member Events Committee brings together a roster of special events for SAA members in the Contributor, Donor and Sponsor levels.
In 2024, we organized a variety of special events, including a Sponsor and Donor member event on Japanese inro with collector Steve Koppich; a Society Conversation with Akiko Walley, the Maude I. Kerns Associate Professor of Japanese Art at the University of Oregon, on the legendary Katsura Villa in Kyoto; a Society Conversation with Sarah Wenner, a Curatorial Fellow in Ancient Mediterranean and Middle Eastern Art at the Cincinnati Museum of Art, on Petra and other Nabataean sites; a Society Conversation with Suzanne Lecht, the founder and owner of Art Vietnam Gallery in Hanoi, on favorite works and upcoming exhibitions; and a Sponsor member event with Forrest McGill, former Asian Art Museum Wattis Curator of South and Southeast Asian Art on a Thai ceramic object in the museum's collection, Invisible Trade: What One Subject Suggest about the Flow of Ideas.
For 2025, the Upper Category Member Events Committee is hard at work on another stellar schedule of programs.
If you are not yet an Upper Category member, we invite your participation. Please contact the SAA Office Manager to upgrade your membership, or join as an Upper Category member.
Upcoming Upper Category Member Events
Check back soon for other upcoming Upper Category member events that are being planned. Thank you.
Society Conversation with Mark Blum
Sunday, April 13, 2025
2:00 p.m.
Place: Private Residence in San Francisco
Fee: $20 per person Society Upper Category members and guests. Advance registration must be received by SAA by April 6, 2025.
Society Upper Category members are invited to join a Society Conversation with Mark Blum, the Shinjo Ito Distinguished Chair in Japanese Studies at UC Berkeley. Prof. Blum is an authority on Pure Land Buddhism in Asia, which he will be speaking about as part of the Spring 2025 Arts of Asia lecture series.
Prof. Blum's topic for this Conversation with Upper Category members will be performative chanting in Japanese Buddhism. This subject will be examined in the book he is currently working on called "Think Buddha, Say Buddha", which will feature a wide-ranging look at the common ritual practice of nianfo or nenbutsu in China and Japan. This promises to be a "not to be missed" presentation for any Upper Category member who has a special interest in East Asian Buddhism or who has traveled in Japan.
This event is limited to a maximum of 20 people, so please sign up immediately.
Light refreshments will be served.
The exact address will be provided to registered attendees approximately one week before the event.
