LMU Art Historian Melody Rod-ari Named 2026-2027 Getty Scholar

Melody Rod-ari, associate professor of art history, has been selected as a 2026-2027 Getty Scholar. This prestigious honor recognizes her impactful scholarship and will aid her continued contribution to provenance research centered on the region of Southeast Asia.

This fall, Rod-ari will join a competitive, global cohort of scholars in residence at the Getty Research Institute, aligned on this year's theme, provenance. Her project, "Modern Borders, Ancient Objects: Complexities of Cultural Heritage Provenance and Repatriation in the 21st Century," builds on years of research into the afterlives of repatriated cultural objects, asking urgent questions about who has the authority to claim, interpret, and represent the past. The project is centered on three Buddhist bronze statues from the Champa Kingdom (dated from the ninth through 11th centuries) that were purchased by the National Gallery of Australia and later transferred to the Kingdom of Cambodia.

"The primary goal of this project is to examine how modern provenance research and cultural heritage repatriation can reshape cultural memory and facilitate in the erasure of ancient cultures and their history when objects are returned to modern nations," Rod-ari writes. The residency will afford Rod-ari the time and resources to complete a significant publication, and collaborate with the program's intellectual community.

Rod-ari is the second faculty member, following Amanda Herring, from LMU's Department of Art History to be selected for the Getty Scholars Program. "The distinction emphasizes the caliber of scholarship coming out of the program and Rod-ari's influence in shaping critical conversations around museum practice and cultural heritage," said Bryant Keith Alexander, dean of the College of Communication and Fine Arts.

Rod-ari's significant body of work has already become foundational in the teaching and study of Southeast Asian art. Through this new project, Rod-ari aims to expand how scholars and the public at large understand provenance-not simply as a record of ownership, but as a lens into power, history, and the ongoing negotiation of cultural identity.