English 
Español Jo Anne Van Tilburg, Ph.D. Biography
Jo Anne Van Tilburg taking measurements at Rano Raraku Interior Quarry, Rapa Nui (Easter Island). ©2003 EISP/JVT/Photo: Alana Perlin.
Dr. Jo Anne Van Tilburg is an archaeologist and the Director of the Easter Island Statue Project, an archaeological inventory and database project that has produced a stylistic analysis of nearly 900 monolithic statues (moai). Her research interest addresses the integration of symbolism and structure and the complex ways in which humans employ cultural resources, social practices, and ancient aesthetics to relate to and alter, shape, and impact the natural landscape. Social processes and the interactive roles of art, history, and ecology are explored in on-going field and museum studies. Her most recent field project is the digital mapping of the interior of Rano Raraku Statue Quarry, Easter Island.
Van Tilburg is an appointed member of the National Landmarks Committee, US National Park Service Advisory Board; a Research Associate of the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA, where she directs the UCLA Rock Art Archive; recipient of the 2001 California Governor’s Award for Historic Preservation, and a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society. Captured Visions, her major project at the Archive, is a spatial and correspondence analysis of rock art symbols collected at Little Lake Ranch in the Owens Valley, California. A biographical sketch of her career was presented by Charles Osgood on CBS Sunday Morning in 1994.
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.