Seminars
The twelve-week teaching schedule: what happens in each seminar, what to prepare, and what leaves the room.
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Two piles
Six reproductions, three securely attributed and three disputed, sorted cold before anyone says which is which.
Week 1 · 22 February 2027
Verbal versus visual
Arguing the same disputed painting twice --- once from documents alone, once from the image alone --- and comparing verdicts.
Week 2 · 1 March 2027
Materials lab
Handling period-correct paper, silk and pigment samples under Idris's supervision, and reading a real fibre-analysis report.
Week 3 · 8 March 2027
Brushwork clinic
Building a shared vocabulary for describing a stroke, then using it against your own attribution-note painting.
Week 4 · 15 March 2027
Seal clinic
Matching seal impressions against a dated reference set, then a last check on the attribution note before it's due.
Week 5 · 22 March 2027
Colophon reading
Close-reading a chain of translated colophons on one scroll, link by link, before the mid-semester break.
Week 6 · 29 March 2027
The market sourcebook
Shortlisting three disputed paintings for week 8's case study from a sourcebook of Suzhou pian production records.
Week 7 · 19 April 2027
Case study, full toolkit
The shortlisted painting, argued with every instrument the semester has built, the week the dossier is due.
Week 8 · 26 April 2027
Model audit
Running Wren's stroke-level classifier against the semester's shortlist, then trying to break it.
Week 9 · 3 May 2027
The forger's own account
Reading Zhang Daqian's interviews and later scholarship on his forgeries in his own words, and in the words of the collectors he fooled.
Week 10 · 10 May 2027
Reading the six as-ifs
A close, unhurried reading of the Diamond Sutra's closing gatha against Tang Yin's own choice of it as a name.
Week 11 · 17 May 2027
Defenses
Ten-minute live defenses of the final project's verdict, questioned by the room, and the re-sort from week 1.
Week 12 · 24 May 2027