Karen M. Fraser

Karen M. Fraser earned her PhD from Stanford University, where she studied both traditional Japanese art and the history of photography. Her research focuses on modern Japanese visual culture, with particular interests in Japanese photography from ca. 1860 through the 1930s, cross-cultural interactions and influences between Asia and the West, gender issues, and museum and exhibition history.

Professor Fraser’s teaching experience includes survey and upper-level courses covering both traditional and modern Asian art; cross-cultural encounters between Asian and Western art; museum history and practice; the second half of the Western survey; and study abroad courses in Paris exploring the rich history of Parisian museums. As part of her teaching practice she has worked with students to develop class-curated exhibitions on various themes including Japanese ukiyo-e woodblock prints, San Francisco ephemera, and women and the book arts.

• Program Director, Art History & Museum Studies
• Program Director, Asian Studies

• PhD, Art History, Stanford University
• MA, Art History, University of South Florida
• BS, Communications and Art History, University of Miami

• Fraser, K. (2017). "From Private to Public: Shifting Conceptions of Women's Portrait Photography in Late Meiji Japan." In Portraiture and Early Studio Photography in China and Japan, eds. Luke Gartlan and Roberta Wue, London: Taylor and Francis Group.

• Fraser, K. (2014). "Fukuhara Shinzō and the 'Japanese' Pictorial Aesthetic." Review of Japanese Culture and Society, 26, 209-227.

• Fraser, K. (2012). “Beauty Battle: Politics and Portraiture in Late Meiji Japan (1868-1912).” In Visualizing Beauty: Gender and Ideology in East Asia, ed. Aida Yuen Wong, Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press.

• Fraser, K. (2011). Photography and Japan, London: Reaktion.