This course offers an introduction to the art and architecture of modern South, Southeast, and East Asia from 1800 to the present. Asia, of course, is as vast as it is diverse. Keeping this in mind, this course will not attempt an encyclopedic survey of Asian art. Instead, using a comparative perspective, each week will focus on a set of case studies—the work of particular artists and art movements or the architecture of specific Asian cities—to reconstruct an expansive history of art and architecture in Asia. Examples will range from modern painting, sculpture, photography, and architecture to contemporary new media, performances, installations, and participatory art projects. Class lectures will be complemented by a close examination of collections of Asian art on campus and in the Bay Area. Simultaneously, taking advantage of the presence of numerous diasporic Asian artists in the area, we will venture outside of the classroom to track histories of modern and contemporary Asian art in our localities, neighborhoods, and communities.