From Tanzania to India, Oman to Malaysia, the Indian Ocean’s blue waters have linked cultures both ancient and modern.
“The Indian Ocean connected people for centuries, long before Vasco de Gama arrived. It’s all about maritime connections,” explained Professor of Art History Nancy Um, who has dedicated her career to studying the region’s art, architecture and material culture.
Um recently received a prestigious Connecting Art Histories grant from the Getty Foundation that will allow her to give back to both her discipline and the region she studies. She is the principal investigator for Indian Ocean Exchanges, a research, fellowship and travel program that will support emerging art historians based around the Indian Ocean rim in East Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, and South and Southeast Asia.