Kanwal
Syed, Ph.D.    


Assistant Professor of Art History,
American University in Dubai

Art Herstorian and Artist


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Kanwal Syed is an assistant professor of Art History at the American University in Dubai. 

Her passions lie in examining decolonial methodologies in art history, focusing on gender and sexuality in South Asian art. 

Syed got her Ph.D. in Art History at Concordia University in Montreal, Canada. Her dissertion was titled, “ورتیں گنہاگار ھم (We Sinful Women): Urban Feminist Visuality in Contemporary Art and Feminist Movements in Pakistan After 9/11.” It was accepted with a ranking of “outstanding/excellent.” She was the Graduate Valedictorian for the Faculty of Fine Arts.

Syed got her M.A. in Art History at the University Sains Malaysia, in Penang, Malaysia, where she was nomiated for Best Thesis Award. She earned her B.A. in Studio Practice at the National College of Arts in Lahore, Pakistan.

She is fluent in English, Urdu, Punjabi, and Hindi (speaking). She is conservational in French. Below are examples of her more recent work.

Publications


  • Syed, Kanwal and Varda Nisar. “A Conversation with Ruby Chishti: Reflections on Gender, Trauma, Displacement, and the Futurity of Art in a Post-Pandemic World,” Asian Diasporic Visual Cultures and the Americas, Vol. 6 (Dec 2021) : 275-286.

  • Syed, Kanwal and Sarena Abdullah. “Chronicling Pakistan’s Art Movements from Traditional to Contemporary: 1960–2011,” Wacana Seni: Journal of Arts Discourse 14 (2015):31–56.

  • Syed, Kanwal and Sarena Abdullah. “The Usage of Morbid Themes and Imageries in Contemporary Art: A Case Study of ‘12: A Group Exhibition in Anticipation of the 2012 Apocalypse,’” Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences 4 (2013):128–36.


Honours & Awards


  • 2024 - CAA-Getty International Program Grant Recipient

  • 2023 - Noiminated by Concordia University for Northeastern Association of Graduate Schools (NAGS) Doctoral Dissertation Award (in process)

  • 2023 - The UC Berkeley South Asia Art & Architecture Dissertation Competition – Recipient of the Honorable Mention 

  • 2023 - Graduate Valedictorian for the Faculty of Fine Arts


Service

  • Core Member, Reading Across Campus Meeting at American University in Dubai

  • External juror for Advanced Studio Art Final Show 2024 'Iconoclast.' Department of Visual Communication. American University in Dubai.

  • Co-Coordinator, “Creating Third [٣] Space: Afghan & Iranian Creatives,” an interactive workshop with Ferozan Nasiri and Mélika Hashimi. Global Asia/Pacific Art Exchange 2019: Asian Indigenous Relations in Contemporary Art. Montreal, (New York, Vancouver).


Conferences

  • Kanwal Syed. “Critical Pedagogy as Methodology to Decolonize Art History Survey Courses,” in the panel Art and Representation: Asian Art in Transition Symposium on Modern and Contemporary Art, University Sains Malaysia.

  • Kanwal Syed. “Contesting the Term "Islamic Art" Through Pedagogical Practice,” in the panel International Art Histories at CAA-Getty International Program Pre-conference Colloquium, Chicago 2024.

  • Kanwal Syed. Panel Co-chair, The Ecofeminist Link: Foregrounding Environmental Concerns in Contemporary Feminist/Indigenous Art, CAA Annual Conference, February 2021, online.


Teaching & Research

Assistant Professor of Art History at American University in Dubai
  • ARTS 200 - Prehistory to Early 14th Century
  • ARTS 201 - Early Renascence to 20th Century
  • MEST329 - Islamic Art and Architecture

Sessional Lecturer, University of British Columbia,
  • ARTH 375- Encountering India: The Age of the Mughals
  • 2022
  • Part-time Faculty, Art History, Concordia University
  • ARTH 389 - Issues in Ethnocultural Art Histories: Gender
  • Representations in Contemporary Pakistani Art.
  • 2018

Teaching Assistant, Art History, Concordia University
  • ARTH 364 - Renaissance Art & Architecture: Reanimating Antiquity
  • ARTH298 - Inuit Graphic Arts in Canada (2021)
  • FFAR298 - Special Topics in Fine Arts: Films About the Diaspora
  • E-course ARTH 272 - From Realism to Abstraction in Canadian
  • E-course ARTH271 - Aspects of Canadian Art (2019)
  • ARTH 361- Studies in Ancient Roman Art and Architecture
  • (2018) ARTH 300 - Art Historical Methods (Fall 2018)
  • E-course: Montreal - Evolution Through Architecture and Urbanism
  • (2016- 17)
  • ARTH200 - Perspectives in Art History (2014–2017)
  • 2014–2020

Research Assistant to Professor Alice Ming Wai Jim


Visiting Lectures


  • American University in Dubai (SoaS) lecture series  Arts and Sciences Lecture Series : “Critical Pedagogy as  Methodology to Decolonize Art History Survey Courses”

  • Concordia University Guest lecture: “Homeland Security: Pakistani Art Post–9/11.” In the course, Studies in the History of Media Art

  • Concordia University Guest lecture: “Redefining Female Subjectivities in Contemporary Pakistani Art post 9/11.” In the course, Media, Technology, and Politics. February 2020

  • Université de Montréal, Art History Guest lecture: “Nuances of Subalternity and Agency in Spivak’s Essay, ‘Can A Subaltern Speak?’” in Gender and Art


Membership

  • (EAHR) Ethnocultural Art Histories Research

  • (EAHR) Ethnocultural Art Histories Research in Media

  • (GAX) GLOBAL ASIA/PACIFIC ART EXCHANGE

  • (UAAC-AAUC) Universities Art Association of Canada/l’association d’art des universités du Canada

  • (CAA) College Arts Association

  • Global South Working Group