
April Liu is currently the Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Curatorial Fellow for Asia at the Museum of Anthropology in Vancouver, BC, Canada, with research interests in Chinese print culture, contemporary Asian art and visual cultures, and critical heritage studies. Since 2011, she has taught visual culture and art history at the Emily Carr University of Art and Design in Vancouver. Liu also worked as an independent curator and event organizer in the United States, Canada, China, and Austria. In 2014, she served as a core event organizer for His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama’s visit to UBC, Vancouver.
Liu completed her PhD in East Asian Art History in 2012 from the University of British Columbia. Her PhD dissertation, titled “Living Auspiciousness: the Resurgence of Mianzhu’s New Year Picture (Nianhua) Industry,” critiqued the transformation of Mianzhu, an ancient and rural woodblock-printing center, into a site of "national heritage" for global circulation and tourism. This interdisciplinary study involved extensive field research in rural China and is situated at the intersection of anthropology and art history.
Her publications include the following:
“Mianzhu’s Global Travels.” In Collected Works of Mianzhu Nianhua, ed. Hou Rong. Chengdu: Sichuan Fine Arts Publishing, 2012.
“The Living Word: Xu Bing and the Art of Chan Wordplay.” In Xu Bing and Contemporary Chinese Art: Cultural and Philosophical Reflections, eds. Hsingyuan Tsao and Roger Ames. Albany: SUNY press, July 2011, 117-146.
“Karaoke Hyperspace: Gu Xiong’s Red River as a Study of Place-making.” Yishu Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art 7.6 (2008): 78-87.
Sessions in which Dr. April Liu participates
9:00
9:00
- 10.00 To Theme a Village: The Race for China’s Intangible Cultural Heritage in Mianzhu, Sichuan
- Participant Dr. April Liu (UBC Museum of Anthropology) |
- 9:00 - 9:30 | 30 minutes Part of: Heritage Shifts in East Asia: Communication between Global Policies and Local Practices
- In 2004, China officially signed UNESCO’s Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) and dedicated over 800 million R...
- Paper
Sessions in which Dr. April Liu attends
13:00
13:00
- What is Critical Heritage Studies: Open Forum
- Signup required UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS-R520
- 13:00 - 15:00 | 2 hours
- This forum will explore the current directions of critical heritage studies and what makes ACHS distinctive. Panel members will discuss what the...
- Workshop
17:00
17:00
- Opening Ceremony and Cocktail
- Signup required Concordia, Grey Nuns Motherhouse (GN) - Former Chapel
- 17:00 - 19:30 | 2 hours 30 minutes
- Welcome addresses and cocktail, followed by the Concordia Signature Event "The Garden of the Grey Nuns". As the opening ceremony and cocktail...
- Cocktail
9:00
9:00
- Keynote : What does heritage change? Le patrimoine, ça change quoi? (Lucie K. Morisset)
- Signup required UQAM, pavillon Judith-Jasmin (J) - Salle Alfred-Laliberté
- 9:00 - 10:00 | 1 hour
- What if we changed our views on heritage? And if heritage has already changed? While, on the global scene, s...
- Keynote with simultaneous translation / Conférence avec traduction simultanée

18:30
18:30
- Keynote: Is Tangible to Intangible as Formal is to Informal ? (Michael Herzfeld)
- Signup required UQAM, pavillon Judith-Jasmin (J) - Salle Alfred-Laliberté
- 18:30 - 20:00 | 1 hour 30 minutes
- Most of what we experience as heritage emerges into conscious recognition through a complex mixture of political and ideological filters, including...
- Keynote with simultaneous translation / Conférence avec traduction simultanée

7:00
7:00
- Around the Université du Québec à Montréal: visit of Chinatown | Autour de l’Université du Québec à Montréal : visite du Quartier chinois
- Signup required UQAM, pavillon J.-A. De Sève (DS) - DS Registration table (meeting point)
- 7:00 - 8:45 | 1 hour 45 minutes
- (In English) Chinatown, born in the second half of the 19th century, is a hub of commercial and sociocultural activities which showcases Chinese cu...
- Tour
14:00
14:00
- Keynote: Renaming, Removal, Recontextualization of Heritage: Purging History, Claiming the Present, Imagining the Future? (What Change-Role for Heritage Professionals?) (James Count Early)
- Signup required Musée des Beaux-Ars de Montréal - Cummings Auditorium
- 14:00 - 15:30 | 1 hour 30 minutes
- "What does heritage change?" is a multifaceted question to which the answer(s) are in primary respects related to real-life negotiations among dif...
- Keynote with simultaneous translation / Conférence avec traduction simultanée

15:30
15:30
- Keynote: Il n'est de patrimoine qu'au futur...| Only in the future will it be heritage... (Xavier Greffe)
- Signup required Concordia, John Molson School of Business Building (MB) - MB 1.210
- 15:30 - 17:00 | 1 hour 30 minutes
- Le patrimoine fait aujourd’hui l’objet d’attentions autant que d’agressions et de destructions. Cela peut s’expliquer par les difficultés de son id...
- Keynote with simultaneous translation / Conférence avec traduction simultanée

18:00
18:00
- Film Series Celebration : Sugar Shack Event
- Signup required Concordia, LB Building - LB 123
- 18:00 - 19:00 | 1 hour
- To celebrate our film series dedicated to heritage, sponsored by the Department of American Studies at the University of Maryland and the United St...
- Cocktail