Dec. 24 will be the 20th birthday of the Taipei Fine Arts Museum. To celebrate, the museum has organized a series of retrospective exhibitions on the history of Taiwanese art. With each exhibition encompassing the artistic trends of a decade, the series will take place at the museum until the end of this year. For those interested in a panoramic view of artistic developments in Taiwan, the series serves as a good crash course.
Artists in the politically conservative 1950s were no less active than today's. The 1960s is defined by artistic movements which sought to keep abreast of international trends. Taiwanese consciousness was an important characteristic of the 1970s. Popular culture showed its overwhelming influence in the 1980s art circle. The lifting of martial law in 1987 gave rise to the explosion of creative freedom and diversity of the 1990s. The large number of the exhibits and the detailed introductions on the walls of the galleries also help the viewer get a grasp of the history of Taiwanese art after Japanese occupation.
"From the Ground Up: Artists Association in 1950s Taiwan," (長流 -- 五○年代台灣美術發展) currently on show at TFAM, is the first installment of the series. Not long after the "Japanese Era," when the Japanese educational system introduced the "Ecole de Paris" artists to Taiwanese students, the majority of 1950s artists formed research groups with those working in the same city and often held group exhibitions.
The most active among these groups include Taiyang Art Research Association, Blue Sky Painting Association (青雲畫會), Modern Graphics Association, Tainan Art Research Association (台南美術研究會), Green House Art Research Association (綠舍美術研究會), Kaohsiung Art Research Association (高雄美術研究會), Central Art Association (中部美術協會), Seven Friends Painting Association (七友畫會), Era Art Association (紀元美術會), Hsinchu Art Research Association (新竹美術研究會), Tong Fang Painting Association (東方畫會) and Fifth Moon Group (五月畫會).
Taiyang Art Research Association (台陽美術協會) was set up in 1934 and was a well-established group by the 1950s. Apart from paintings, it offered Taiyang awards to encourage young talents. Several members of the group went on to become influential figures for later generations of artists. Yang San-lang (楊三郎), who died in 1995, persisted in landscape all his life. His oil paintings of scenery representative of Taiwan have been increasingly appreciated since the 1990s.
A popular medium in the decade was print, which was mainly used to make political propaganda, until the establishment of the Modern Graphics Association (現代版畫會) in 1958. The group aimed to promote prints as an art form in their own right. Yang Yin-feng (楊英風), who died in 1997 and is better remembered for his abstract sculpture, was a co-founder of the group. A rare chance to see the early works of such a master Taiwanese artist is one more reason to go to the well-organized exhibition. "From the Ground Up: Artists Association in 1950s Taiwan" will run until June 15 at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum,181, Chungshan N Rd Sec 3, Taipei. (台北市中山北路三段號)
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