Meet the Council
Members of the Council meet several times a year to decide our programme of lectures and plan the Society’s work.
President
I am delighted to welcome you to the website of the Oriental Ceramic Society.
We are a thriving, active society based in London with a busy programme of talks and cultural activities focusing on East Asian arts, particularly ceramics. The OCS provides a unique forum for anyone with an interest in Asian arts to meet regularly with fellow enthusiasts, collectors, scholars, curators and auction house specialists in a convivial and relaxed environment.
Members of the Society meet ten times a year, mostly in the Society of Antiquaries in Burlington House on Piccadilly, where we offer monthly lectures by academics, museum curators and independent scholars on new research topics – ranging from Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Islamic ceramics, to bronzes, jades, artworks in glass and paintings. The Society organizes specialist-led handling sessions for members at museums and auction houses in the UK and our national and international tours to cultural and historic sites with Asian art interest also remain extremely popular with members. Our long-established journal Transactions continues to provide members with the latest research in the field, supplemented by the annual Newsletters. These are also available online to members, along with access to past lectures and details of future events.
The Society celebrated its centenary in 2021, marking a hundred years since its inception by twelve members to ‘widen appreciation and to acquire knowledge of Eastern Ceramic Art’. Today the Society has grown to over 1000 members and has global links with other fellow organizations, but its original core values remain equally valid and undiminished.
I look forward very much to meeting you during the coming year.
Sarah Wong
President
Bio
Sarah Wong is a Director of Eskenazi Limited with a particular interest in Buddhist sculpture and Yuan dynasty ceramics. Sarah has been a member of the OCS Council since 2017. She was responsible, with the support of the Council, for organizing the OCS Centenary exhibition in 2021: Collectors, Curators, Connoisseurs: A Century of the Oriental Ceramic Society 1921 – 2021 and co-author of the exhibition catalogue.
Clive Jacotine
Honorary Secretary
Bio
Clive Jacotine has been a Council member since 2018, and Honorary Secretary since 2021. Now retired, he held various senior management posts in public services before becoming an independent management consultant and board member of a number of non-profit organisations. His wide experience includes partnership working, governance, change management, project management and budgetary arrangements. He has a longstanding personal interest in Chinese scholar’s objects.
David Canty
Honorary Treasurer
Bio
Chartered Accountant and a due diligence consultant in asset management. His collecting interests include early Chinese and Korean ceramics and other works of art.
Ian Gaunt
Assistant Honorary Secretary
Bio
Ian Gaunt is a lawyer, international arbitrator collector of early Chinese ceramics. He was a member of the Council of the OCS from 2021 to 2024 and is currently OCS Assistant Honorary Secretary.
Jessica Harrison-Hall
Representative from the British Museum
Bio
Jessica Harrison-Hall is Keeper of Asia and Curator of the Sir Percival David Collection at the British Museum. She specialises in Ming and Qing material and visual culture.
Xiaoxin Li
Representative from the Victoria & Albert Museum
Bio
Dr. Xiaoxin Li serves as the curator of Chinese collections at the V&A, overseeing a diverse array of decorative art and design objects spanning from the Neolithic era to contemporary times. Her expertise and research interests cover Chinese ceramics, lacquerware, furniture, export art, 19th-century material culture, as well as modern and contemporary craft and design. A recipient of the Art Fund New Collecting Award, Xiaoxin is currently working on a project focused on the acquisition, display, and publication of Chinese contemporary studio craft.
Rosemary Scott
Editor of TOCS
Bio
Former curator of the Percival David Foundation of Chinese Art and head of Museums Department, SOAS, University of London, and international academic director of Christie’s Asian Art departments. Areas of academic interest include Chinese ceramics, lacquer, and early textiles.
Teresa Canepa
Co-editor of the OCS Newsletter
Bio
Teresa Canepa is an independent researcher, specializing in Chinese and Japanese export art of the 16th and 17th centuries, and co-editor of the OCS Newsletter.
Beth Gardiner
Co-editor of the OCS Newsletter
Bio
Beth Gardiner is council member of the Oriental Ceramic Society in London and co-editor of the Society’s Newsletter. She has published articles in Orientations and Arts of Asia. She received her master’s degree in art history from Sotheby’s Institute, London and her undergraduate degree in art history from Duke University in the United States. Her particular interest is Chinese porcelain discovered in early colonial North America.
Stuart Balmer
Bio
Stuart Balmer is a collector with a special interest in mid-15th century Chinese ceramics. He previously served on the OCS Council 2017-21, and on the OCS Centenary Exhibition Committee. He is also a current member of the Board of Directors for the Museum of East Asian Art, Bath since 2015.
Melanie Gibson
Bio
Dr. Melanie Gibson is Editor of the Art History Series at GINGKO and lectures on the history of the ceramics of the Islamic world. She is a trustee of The Friends of Leighton House, and her current research is on The Arab Hall at Leighton House.
Dr Helen Glaister
Bio
Dr Helen Glaister is an art historian specialising in Chinese Ceramics and Decorative Arts. In addition to her current role as Course Director of the Arts of Asia Programme at the V&A, Helen lectures on Chinese art and has authored numerous publications, with a particular interest in the fields of the history of collectors and collecting, Qing ceramics and Chinese export art.
Henry Howard-Sneyd
Bio
Chairman of Asian art, Europe and Americas at Sotheby’s and auctioneer globally, Henry particularly admires and collects Song ceramics.
Kate Hunt
Bio
Kate Hunt is a Director and International Specialist in Chinese Art at Christie’s in London. She has a broad knowledge of Chinese ceramics and works of art and has worked in the field for over 25 years. After completing a Masters degree at SOAS in Chinese ceramics, she began her career as a dealer at Spink & Son. She went on to work as an art and antiques journalist before joining Christie’s in 2012.
Asaph Hyman
Bio
Asaph Hyman is Bonhams Global Head of Chinese Ceramics & Works of Art, and also oversees the Himalayan, Southeast Asian and Indian art department. Asaph regularly works with important collections of Chinese art in museums and private collections, assisting in authentication and dating as well as providing insurance and auction valuations. He has been responsible for the significant growth of Bonhams in this category. He has an LLB from the Faculty of Law at the Hebrew University, Jerusalem, an LL.M in Trade Regulation (Antitrust & Competition Law) from New York University School of Law, as well as an M.A. in Fine and Decorative Art from Sotheby’s Institute of Art, London.
James Lin
Bio
Dr. James C. S. Lin is responsible for the Asian art collection at the Fitzwilliam Museum. He obtained a Master’s degree and a Ph.D. in Chinese Art History at the University of Oxford and then worked as a research assistant in the Ashmolean Museum between 2000 and 2002. He was employed as a special assistant at the British Museum, helping to set up the Selwyn and Ellie Alleyne Gallery of Chinese Jade between June and November 2002. He then returned to Oxford as the first Christensen Fellow in Chinese Painting, at the Khoan and Michael Sullivan Chinese painting gallery at the Ashmolean Museum. In September 2004, he was appointed as the Assistant Keeper of Applied Arts at the Fitzwilliam Museum. He is now Senior curator of Chinese art.
brian m. salzberg
Bio
Brian M. Salzberg is Professor Emeritus of Neuroscience and of Physiology at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine. He developed optical methods for studying electrical activity in cells, including voltage sensitive dyes and molecular indicators of rapid changes in intracellular calcium concentration. He applied these techniques to the study of nervous systems. Salzberg received his Ph.D. in Physics from Harvard and was elected a Fellow of the American Physical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the Optical Society of America. He sits on the Trustees Committee for Asian Art of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and he is a collector of Pre-Ming Chinese ceramics.
Alice williamson
Bio
Gallery director at Priestley & Ferraro specialising in early Chinese and Korean ceramics and works of art, with a particular interest in Song dynasty ceramics.