Wen C. Fong (Chinese: 方聞; pinyin: Fāng Wén; 1930 – October 3, 2018) was a Chinese-American historian of East Asian art.
In 1959 he co-founded the first doctoral program in Chinese art and archaeology in the United States, which was later expanded to include Japan.
Fong held his personal calligraphy exhibition at the age of 10 and was acclaimed as a prodigy.
[2] In 1959, Wen Fong and Frederick W. Mote co-founded the first doctoral program in Chinese art and archaeology in the United States,[1][2] which was expanded to include Japan in 1962.
[2] At the Met, he had an influential debate with art historian James Cahill over the authenticity of The Riverbank, a famous 10th-century painting attributed to the Southern Tang master Dong Yuan.
[6] Cahill made an explosive argument that the painting was a fake created by the 20th-century master painter and forger Zhang Daqian,[4] while Fong disagreed with his finding.