Pang Alina (Xiai)
PODCAST & BOOK
Art Gossipology
Podcast
Delving into overlooked stories in art history, this podcast challenges Eurocentric perspectives and highlights the intersections of culture, identity, and power. My goal is to make art approachable and invite more people to join the dialogue.
Episodes Overview
Unmasking Art History: From Craftsmen to “Genius Artists”
From cave painters to Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo, discover how the concept of the “artist” was created and popularized by Vasari’s writings.
Migration and Identity in Art
Explore how artists Yinka Shonibare, Do Ho Suh, and Wangechi Mutu use fabric, sculpture, and collage to express the complex emotions of displacement, cultural hybridity, and belonging.
The Silent Voices
Exploring how deaf artists like Goya, Granville Redmond, and Nancy Rourke create powerful visual expressions that speak beyond sound, using color, composition, and line as their unique language.
Misunderstood African Masks: Faces of Wood or Stories of Heritage
Uncover the vibrant life behind African masks beyond their museum display—living spiritual mediators, ritual performers, and carriers of ancestral wisdom—challenging colonial misinterpretations and revealing a rich diversity of cultural meanings and sacred traditions.
When Opposites Meet: How Art and Science Inspire and Transform Each Other
Exploring the surprising and enduring relationship between art and science—from Renaissance perspective to modern AI— revealing how these seemingly opposing fields continually exchange ideas, tools, and visions to deepen human understanding and creativity.
Who Is Looking? The Revolution of Gaze in Portraiture
Explore how artists from Dürer and Rembrandt to Velázquez and Qing dynasty painters transformed the meaning of the gaze in portraiture, revealing shifting ideas of identity, power, and self-awareness across cultures and history.
Coloring War: Vietnamese Visual Art and Nationalist Expression
Discover how Vietnamese artists like Su Yuyun and Hoang Van Kinh transformed war into visual propaganda, using traditional techniques like lacquer painting to create powerful nationalist art that documented the collective spirit and struggles during the Vietnam War.
The Secrets of Color: History, Power, and Myth Behind Pigments
Discover how colors like imperial purple, cochineal red, Maya blue, and lapis lazuli shaped art, symbolized power, fueled colonialism, and carried spiritual meaning across cultures and centuries.
Brazil’s Anthropophagic Movement: Art as Anti-Colonial Rebellion
Explore how Brazilian modernists like Tarsila do Amaral and Vik Muniz transformed colonial legacies through bold, local art forms that “devoured” European styles to create a unique cultural voice.
Urban Memory
Explores how JR, Swoon, and Theaster Gates use public art, delicate craftsmanship, and community restoration to stitch memory and connect hearts within the city.
How Silence Became the Rule in Art Spaces
A deep dive into the history and cultural reasons behind the hushed atmosphere in museums, revealing how art viewing shifted from social engagement to silent contemplation—and what that means for how we experience art today.
The Romance of Fireworks
Ancient Greece Wasn’t White – It Was a Colorful Party
Discover how scholars Vincenz and Ulrike Brinkmann revealed the vibrant colors of ancient Greek sculptures and architecture, overturning the myth of pristine white marble and exposing the cultural politics behind this misconception.
Buddhist Art
Exploring how Buddhist art traveled along the Silk Road, blending diverse cultures and beliefs into the vibrant murals and sculptures of Dunhuang’s Mogao Caves.
Imperfect Serenity: Zen and the Aesthetics of Wabi-Sabi in Japanese Art
Explore how Zen principles shape Japanese art through the embrace of imperfection, simplicity, and transience—from tranquil dry landscape gardens to the poetic beauty of kintsugi and ink painting—offering a profound alternative to Western notions of flawless perfection.
Unexpected Cultural Encounter
Explore how Cai Guoqiang transforms gunpowder and fireworks into a living artistic language that bridges history, culture, and nature—inviting audiences to experience a fleeting yet profound conversation across time and space.
The Boundaries of Art
Discover the fascinating dialogue between Japanese Ukiyo-e and Western Impressionism—how these two iconic art styles influenced each other across continents, reshaping visual culture and revealing art as a borderless journey of inspiration and transformation.
What Did the Artists Eat?
Explore how Marcel Duchamp, Picasso, Munch, Dalí, Warhol, Kusama, and AI-generated art challenge traditional definitions by transforming objects, emotions, and technology into new forms of creative expression.
Explore how artists from Jan Davidsz de Heem to Artemisia Gentileschi and Judy Chicago use food imagery to reveal aesthetics, power, gender, and identity across history.
Renaissance: The Illusion of Realism
Explore how Renaissance artists like Leonardo da Vinci, Botticelli, and Michelangelo crafted idealized, often distorted nude bodies—not as faithful depictions of reality but as visual philosophies shaped by cultural ideals, scientific exploration, and social power, a legacy that still influences how we perceive the human form today.
The Hidden Art History in Video Games
Explore how game designers secretly weave Renaissance masterpieces, Baroque chiaroscuro, and surrealist aesthetics into titles like Assassin’s Creed II, Dark Souls, and Gris, turning gameplay into a rich visual dialogue with art history.
When Art Meets Industrialization
Explore how the Industrial Revolution reshaped perceptions of handcraft and art, sparked the Arts and Crafts movement, challenged colonial legacies, and continues to influence today’s hand-made revival and cultural value of craftsmanship.
Secrets Behind the Canvas: Stories Revealed by X-Ray
Explore how X-ray technology uncovers hidden layers beneath masterpieces by artists like Van Gogh, Picasso, and Degas, revealing forgotten paintings, artistic struggles, and the evolving creative process behind iconic works.
The Hidden Stories Behind Egyptian arts and display
Explore how ancient Egyptian beliefs about death, colonial histories, and modern museum ethics shape our eerie fascination with arts, revealing them not as horror icons but as once-living individuals deserving respect and humanity.
The History of Traditional Handicraft: Underrated Global Creativity
Discover how traditional crafts—from Japanese washi paper and Indian block printing to Andean textiles, West African indigo dyeing, and Chinese embroidery—embody deep cultural knowledge, connect humans with nature and society, and preserve creativity often overshadowed by industrialization.
Asco and Chicano Art Rebellion
Explore how Los Angeles’ Asco collective used provocative street art and performance in the 1970s to confront racial discrimination, challenge mainstream art institutions, and redefine Chicano identity through radical cultural activism.
Book
Art Gossipology uncovers the untold stories behind global art movements. Through vivid narratives and cultural insights, it reveals how art has always been more than beauty — it is history, power, and resistance.
Featuring 70+ artists across 25 topics, this book takes you from Japanese ukiyo-e's influence on Impressionism to the surprising links between art and science, and the color hidden behind Greek sculptures.
Unlink traditional, academic art history texts, Art Gossipology is designed for readers who want to explore art in fun, engaging way.
Within a global perspective spanning Asia, Africa, America, and Europe, this book challenges the usual Western-centric narrative and invites you to see art through a new lens.
