USC.edu

Sonya Lee

Professor of Art History, East Asian Languages and Cultures and Religion
Sonya Lee
Email sonyasle@usc.edu Office THH 355 Office Phone (213) 821-2582

Research & Practice Areas

Buddhist art and architecture of China and Central Asia, material culture of the ancient Silk Road, art and ecology, Asian art collecting, heritage conservation

Biography

Dr. Sonya Lee is Professor of Art History, East Asian Languages and Cultures, and Religion at the University of Southern California. She is currently Department Chair of East Asian Languages and Cultures. Dr. Lee is a specialist in religious art and architecture of China and Central Asia, having published widely on the subject. Her reserach interests also include material culture of the ancient Silk Road, art and ecology, Asian art collecting, and heritage conservation. 

Dr. Lee’s first book, Surviving Nirvana: Death of the Buddha in Chinese Visual Culture (Hong...

Education

  • Ph.D. Art History, University of Chicago, 6/2004

  • Research Specialties

    Buddhist art and architecture of China and Central Asia, material culture of the ancient Silk Road, art and ecology, Asian art collecting, heritage conservation

  • Book

    • Lee, S. S. (2021). Temples in the Cliffside: Buddhist Art in Sichuan. Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press. Temples in the Cliffside
    • Lee, Sonya S. (Ed.). (2016). Ideas of Asia in the Museum. (Vol. 28, Oxford: Journal of the History of Collections, Oxford University Press.
    • Lee, S. S. (2010). Surviving Nirvana: Death of the Buddha in Chinese Visual Culture. Hong Kong University Press.

    Encyclopedia Article

    • Lee, S. S. (2023). Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Religion. New York: Oxford University Press. Oxford Research Encyclopedias
    • Lee, S. S. (2020). Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Asian History. (David Ludden, Ed.). Oxford University Press.

    Journal Article

    • Lee, S. S. (2018). Recent Publications on the Art and Archaeology of Kucha: A Review Article. Archives of Asian Art. Vol. 68 (Fall)
    • Lee, S. S. (2016). Central Asia Coming to the Museum: The Display of Kucha Mural Fragments in Interwar Germany and the United States. Journal of the History of Collections. Vol. 26 (3), pp. 417-436.
    • Lee, S. S. (2012). Repository of Ingenuity: Cave 61 and Artistic Appropriation in Tenth-Century Dunhuang. The Art Bulletin. Vol. 94 (2), pp. 199-225.
    • Lee, S. S. (2010). Transmitting Buddhism to a Future Age: The Leiyin Cave at Fangshan and Cave Temples with Stone Scriptures in Sixth-Century China. Archives of Asian Art. Vol. 60, pp. 43-78.
    • Lee, S. S. (2009). The Buddha’s Words at Cave Temples: Inscribed Scriptures in the Design of Wofoyuan. Ars Orientalis. Vol. 36, pp. 36-76.
    • Scalar Exhibition: The Silk Roads: Connecting Communities, Markets, and Minds since Antiquity, 04/01/2021 – 05/30/2022
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