Jo Anne Van Tilburg was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota and graduated from the University of Minnesota in 1965. Dr. Van Tilburg received her Ph.D. from the University of California at Los Angeles in 1986. She is an archaeologist, Research Associate of The Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA and Director of the UCLA Rock Art Archive Founded by the late Clement W. Meighan in 1977, the Rock Art Archive is the only such research and teaching facility at the university level in the Western Hemisphere.
Working with a staff of computer analysts and digital artists, Dr. Van Tilburg directs "Captured Visions", a rock art recording project in the Great Basin for which the Archive won the 2001 California Governor's Award for Historic Preservation. Major aspects of her work include the administration of a small grants program, training in field methods and the creation of prototype digital storage projects for special collections, including Robert F. Heizer’s early fieldnotes and correspondence on the subject of California rock art.
Dr. Dr. Van Tilburg is the Director of the Easter Island Statue Project. She has conducted seasonal fieldwork in the Pacific since 1982, including in the Republic of Belau (Micronesia) and on Easter Island (Polynesia). She is considered the world’s leading expert on Easter Island statues, and has worked closely with the Easter Island community to inventory, describe and catalog nearly 900 statues. She has produced a typological analysis and classification of the statue corpus that is a significant aid to chronological studies. In an effort to delineate the aesthetic dimension of Easter Island culture, she has conducted extensive archival and museum studies throughout the world and, since 1995, has researched the life of Edwardian archaeologist Katherine Routledge, the first woman to conduct field work on Easter Island and in the Pacific. Van Tilburg's biographical study of Routledge is "Among Stone Giants: The Life of Katherine Routledge and Her Remarkable Expedition to Easter Island" (Scribner's 2003).
Appearing frequently on BBC radio and television and on public television in the United States, Dr. Van Tilburg has a commitment to public education. Her research has been featured prominently on documentaries dealing specifically with Easter Island, including BBC Horizon, PBS Nova, The Learning Channel, Discovery Channel, The History Channel (with Thor Heyerdahl) and Arthur C. Clarke’s Mysterious World. In 1998 she completed an experimental archaeology project to make and move a replica statue on Easter Island. A documentary film and web site (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/easter/) were produced for Nova by WGBH Boston.
A biographical sketch of Jo Anne Van Tilburg’s life and professional accomplishments is entitled “Accidental Archaeologist.” It was filmed in Los Angeles and London and presented by Charles Osgood on CBS Sunday Morning, in 1995.
In 1989, Dr. Van Tilburg founded the Rapa Nui Outrigger Club (RNOC) as a sports club and integral part of Kahu Kahu O Hera, an association of artisans, elders and others on Easter Island. Working together with colleagues and friends in California and Hawaii, as well as from many other areas around the world, RNOC succeeded in creating and bringing to fruition a major program of cultural rediscovery. Traditional Polynesian technology and expertise in outrigger canoe paddling was adapted to a recreation and sports organization that has been a major force of cultural rediscovery. Young people have gained a sense of new direction and accomplishment through this program.
Chelstrom, M. 2001. A Tribute to Outstanding Minnesota Women. New York: Chelstrom
Who's Who of American Women 2000-2001. New Jersey: Marquis Who's Who in Rock Art Studies. 2000. Valcamonica: Center for the Study of Prehistoric Art.