Grace Lai

Guided by curiosity, Grace Lai is an art historian and curator interested in uncovering stories held by objects overlooked or dismissed by history. Positioning material culture as a decoder of the immaterial, her research seeks to untangle the complex web of connections, histories, and social structures inherited by objects in the hopes of addressing issues relevant to museum collections and societies today. Grace has published extensively on contemporary craft, with a focus on studio glass, jewelry, textiles, and surface design. Currently, Grace is the curator of applied arts and design at Tāmaki Paenga Hira Auckland War Memorial Museum, where she leads the exhibition, development, and research of a nationally significant archive of craft from Aotearoa New Zealand and abroad.