Sherman Lee

Sherman Emery Lee (April 19, 1918 – July 9, 2008) was an American academic, writer, art historian and expert on Asian art. He was Director of the Cleveland Museum of Art from 1958 to 1983.

Lee earned his B.A. and M.A. at American University in Washington, D.C. He was awarded his PhD at Western Reserve University in 1941.

Lee was "a renowned expert on Asian art."

Career In 1941, Lee was named Curator of Far Eastern Art at the Detroit Institute of Arts. Among those serving with Lee at SCAP headquarters in Tokyo were Patrick Lennox Tierney and Laurence Sickman.

Quote Speaking of his service with the Monuments Men, Lee said:

We were responsible for protection of registered cultural property ... We were responsible for national parks ... We were responsible for the encouragement of the living artists and ... the democratization of Japanese museums to see that there was evenhanded fair play.

Selected works In a statistical overview derived from writings by and about Sherman Lee, OCLC/WorldCat encompasses roughly 100+ works in 300+ publications in 8 languages and 14,000+ library holdings.

Chinese Landscape Painting (1954) Japanese Decorative Style (1961) A History of Far Eastern Art (1964) Ancient Cambodian Sculpture (1969) The Colors of Ink: Chinese Paintings and Related Ceramics from the Cleveland Museum of Art (1974) The Genius of Japanese Design (1981) Reflections of Reality in Japanese Art (1983) Past, Present, East and West (1983)