There is a powerful and quiet dignity to these images. In several of the photos, the figures' shadows are left on the print. Several slide projectors then slowly restore the figure to his or her place in the photo, and seemingly bringing the photo's subjects back to life. Wu's Aborigines fade away, but he brings their memory back to life.
Wu's installation is multi-layered, touching on themes such as presence and absence, rewriting of history, authorship and the essence of memory. His work also hints at personal narrative and his own personal predicament. Part Han and part-Tayal, Wu straddles both cultures in a world where stereotypes of Aborigines persist. Facing discrimination, Aborigines are eager to defend their own heritage against stereotypes. Wu's exhibition is a way of reconciling his background and presenting himself as falling in between these two worlds.
Wu's exhibition would have appeared to be about personal memory were it not for the inclusion of an evocative video. A combination of hallucinatory colors with footage from a circa-1930 documentary that depicts Japanese soldiers' authoritarian demeanor towards Taiwan's Aborigines brings the social and political context to his work. But Wu does not come across as didactic even in this piece. The footage is blurry and diluted, suggesting that the past is already forgotten. Memories change, assimilate, fade away. So when presented images of colonizers and colonized, and since many of our own ancestral backgrounds are blended and assimilated, with whom do we identify?
For your information:
What: Walis Wu 吳鼎武, "The Invisible Project - Y2K+1"
Where: Taipei Fine Arts Museum, 181 Chungshan N. Rd., Sec. 3
When: Until March 18
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