Esther Jacobson-Tepfer

My life work has taken a rather long journey, from an initial focus on Chinese art history, through Central Asian Buddhist art, to over twenty years of fieldwork in the Altai Mountains of Russia and Mongolia. I am the Maude I. Kerns Professor Emeritus in the Department of the History of Art and Architecture, University of Oregon, where I taught the history of Asian art for forty-seven years. In that capacity, my focus became rock art and surface monuments in the Mongolian Altai Mountains.

My published work, including twelve books and many articles, reflects my passion for considering prehistoric monuments within their landscape and in relationship to their paleoenvironment. My most recent publications include Monumental Archaeology in the Mongolian Altai (Brill 2023) and a memoir of my intellectual journey, Journey into Other Worlds (Luminare 2023). Among my other publications are a prize-winning volume, Archaeology and Landscape in the Mongolian Altai: An Atlas (ESRI Press 2010, with James Meacham and Gary Tepfer); and The Hunter, the Stag, and the Mother of Animals (Oxford University Press 2015).

I received an Honorary Doctorate from the Mongolian Institute of Archaeology in 2003. In the intervening years, I have worked closely with Mongolian authorities on two successful World Heritage Nominations, Petroglyphic Complexes of the Mongolian Altai (2011) and The Sacred Landscape of Burkhan Khaldun (2015). For my contributions to the preservation of Mongolia’s cultural heritage, the Mongolian Academy of Sciences honored me with their highest recognition, the Kublai Khan Gold Medal (June 2016).