Karina Corrigan's interests have always centered on the material culture of global connections. A graduate of Wellesley College, she holds master’s degrees in historic preservation from the University of Pennsylvania and in American material culture from Winterthur Museum.

She serves as the Deputy Chief Curator and The H.A. Crosby Forbes Curator of Asian Export Art at the Peabody Essex Museum (PEM). As Deputy Chief Curator, Corrigan explores new ways to celebrate PEM’s rich and storied collection by spearheading new research, enhancing access, and cultivating new acquisitions.

In her curatorial practice she oversees the largest, most comprehensive public collection of art made in China, Japan and South Asia for export to other cultures. Corrigan has organized ten exhibitions at PEM, including Power and Perspective: Early Photography in China (2022), Asia in Amsterdam: The Culture of Luxury in the Golden Age (2015) and Taj Mahal: the Building of a Legend (2005).