Staff | Department of the History of Art & Archaeology at SOAS University of London

Dr Crispin Branfoot

Reader in the History of South Asian Art & Archaeology

Architecture, sculpture and painting in South Asia, especially in southern India; pilgrimage and sacred geography; material religion; colonialism and material culture.

Tel: 020 7898 4450
Email: crispin.branfoot@soas.ac.uk
Room: B311
Academic Support Hours: Monday 5-6pm; Wednesday 1-2pm

Modern and contemporary art; social history; art and global modernism; history of Chinese art and visual culture; travel culture and landscape aesthetic; transnational contacts between China, East Asia and Europe.

Email: pc65@soas.ac.uk
Academic Support Hours: Term 1: Fridays 11-1; Term 2: Mondays 11-1

Professor Anna Contadini

Professor of the History of Islamic Art

Arab and early Persian painting and the arts of the Islamic book in general, including the production of manuscripts of the Qur'an; art and material culture of the Islamic world; Fatimid art and architecture; the arts of Islamic Spain; artistic contacts between the Islamic World and Europe; aspects of contemporary Islamic art.

Tel: +44(0) 20 7898 4458
Email: ac24@soas.ac.uk
Room: 451
Academic Support Hours: On leave in term 1

Dr Heather Elgood, MBE

Course Director of the Diploma in Asian Art

Dr Heather Elgood is the Course Director of the Diploma in Asian Art. She is a specialist in Persian, Jain, Sultanate and Mughal manuscript painting as well as the ritual arts of Hinduism.

Email: he2@soas.ac.uk
Academic Support Hours: By email appointment

Dr Charlotte Horlyck

Reader in the History of Korean Art

Visual and material culture of the Korean peninsula; Pre-modern Korean burial practices, particularly of the Koryŏ period (AD918-1392); Arts of the Koryŏ period, especially bronze mirrors and ceramics; 20th century collecting of Korean artefacts; Heritage and museum practices; Gender and material culture.

Tel: 020 7898 4704
Email: ch10@soas.ac.uk
Room: 429
Academic Support Hours: Fridays, 9-11am

Dr Richard Hylton

Lecturer in Contemporary Art

Email: rh73@soas.ac.uk
Room: 556

Dr Christian Luczanits

David L. Snellgrove Senior Lecturer in Tibetan and Buddhist Art

History of art and architecture of the Himalayan region; Buddhist art of the western Himalayas; Gandharan art; presenting and exhibiting Buddhist art; heritage, preservation and conservation.

Tel: 020 7898 4162
Email: cl46@soas.ac.uk
Room: 585
Academic Support Hours: Term 1: Wednesdays, 9:40-10:40; Fridays, 10-12

Professor Shane McCausland

Percival David Professor of the History of Art, Head of Department

Pictorial arts of China - especially painting and calligraphy; East Asian narrative art; canons, collecting and connoisseurship; Chinese art and modernity

Tel: +44 (0)20 7898 4705
Email: HoD_SoA@soas.ac.uk
Room: 453
Academic Support Hours: Wednesdays, 3.30-5pm or by email appointment

Dr Malcolm McNeill

Director of the SOAS Postgraduate Diploma in Asian Art, Senior Lecturer in Arts Education

Object based learning; museology; curation and display; the art market; Chinese visual and material culture; Buddhist visual and material culture

Email: mm133@soas.ac.uk
Room: 468
Academic Support Hours: Wednesdays, 4-5pm or by email appointment

Dr Stephen A. Murphy

Pratapaditya Pal Senior Lecturer in Curating and Museology of Asian Art

Email: sm120@soas.ac.uk
Room: 587
Academic Support Hours: Tuesday 3-5pm

Dr Simon O'Meara

Senior Lecturer in the History of Architecture & Archaeology of the Islamic Middle East

Islamic architecture and urbanism; sociological dimensions of the art and architecture of North Africa, especially Morocco; architectural and visual theory; Islamic studies.

Tel: +44 (0)20 7898 4559
Email: so20@soas.ac.uk
Room: 558
Academic Support Hours: Term 1: On leave; Term 2-3: Fridays, 11am-1pm

Dr Stacey Pierson

Reader in the History of Chinese Ceramics

History and production of Chinese ceramics; history and theory of collecting; Museum Studies.

Tel: 020 7898 4441
Email: sp17@soas.ac.uk
Room: B308
Academic Support Hours: Wednesdays, 10-12; other times by email request

Professor Scott Redford

Nasser D Khalili Professor of Islamic Art and Archaeology

Art, archaeology, and architecture of Anatolia, the eastern Mediterranean, and SW Asia from the 11-14th centuries with a special interest in landscape, urbanism, and ceramics

Tel: 020 7898 4469
Email: sr63@soas.ac.uk
Room: B303
Academic Support Hours: Mondays & Wednesdays 11-12 or by email appointment

Dr Polly Savage

Lecturer in the Art History of Africa

History of African Art; Modern and contemporary art and curating in Africa, Brazil and the Caribbean, with particular focus on Haiti and Lusophone Africa; art and the Cold War in Africa; art education and cultural policy; post-colonial theory and trans-national exhibition practice.

Email: ps52@soas.ac.uk
Room: 554
Academic Support Hours: Thursdays, 10am-12pm

Professor Timon Screech

Professor of the History of Art

History of Japanese art; Edo painting; contacts between Japan and Europe in the 18th century; history of science in Japan; the theory of art history

Tel: +44 (0)20 7898 4453
Email: ts8@soas.ac.uk
Room: 565
Academic Support Hours: On leave (2020-2021)

Professor Ashley Thompson

Hiram W. Woodward Chair in Southeast Asian Art

Southeast Asian arts, aesthetics, literatures and cultural histories, with a focus on Cambodia, from the Angkorian to the post-Angkorian to the contemporary; Theravadin Buddhist arts, literatures and ritual; cultural heritage; sexual difference; deconstruction; memory and textuality.

Tel: +44 (0)20 7898 4130
Email: at50@soas.ac.uk
Room: 463
Academic Support Hours: On leave (2020-2021)

Professor Louise Tythacott

Professor of Curating and Museology

Chinese and Buddhist art in museums; history of Yuanmingyuan (or ‘Summer Palace’) collections; museology; colonialism and material culture; post-colonial critiques of museum representations; history and theory of collecting; art and anthropology.

Email: lt15@soas.ac.uk
Room: 505

Dr Panpan Yang

Lecturer in the Arts and Visual Cultures of Modern China

Arts and visual cultures of China and the Sinophone world; cinematic arts; animation and digital media; art theory; medium and materiality; cultural flows.

Email: py6@soas.ac.uk
Room: 408

Dr Elaine Buck