Conan Cheong is a PhD candidate in Art History and Archaeology at SOAS University of London. His research focuses on the relationship between model, original, and replica in the making and use of Buddhist images (inclusive but not limited to images of the Buddha and Buddhist monks) in Theravada Southeast Asia, centering on the specific case of the 35,000 photographs taken and collected by Buddhist monks held in the Buddhist Archive of Laos in Luang Prabang. He is also curatorial advisor for the upcoming Museum of Buddhist Art in Vat Saen, Luang Prabang, a community museum which was the vision of the late abbot Sathu Nyai Phra Khamchan Viracitta Mahathela (1920-2007).

As Curator for Buddhist and Hindu Southeast Asia at the Asian Civilisations Museum, Singapore from 2016-2023, he worked to develop collaborative relationships between the museum and source or use communities through projects in the museum’s Faith and Belief permanent galleries and in special exhibitions like Body and Spirit: The Human Body in Thought and Practice (2022-23). As a member of Circumambulating Objects: on Paradigms of Restitution of Southeast Asian Art (CO-OP), he hopes to work with the team to collectively articulate strategies of collaborative collecting and art appraisal which may present more sustainable and equitable alternatives to the dominant market-oriented system of antiquities collecting at the root of contemporary questions of restitution and repatriation.