The Museum of Contemporary Art's Digital Sublime: New Masters of Universe opened up to great fanfare last weekend: dignitaries gave speeches, roaming waiters served sparkling beverages and cakes, and South Korean artist Jong Bum-choi gave a live performance of sound and light images projected on MOCA's facade. After two humongous white moon-shaped balloons were ceremoniously rolled away from the entrance, the exhibition officially opened and the huge art-going crowd poured in.
The Seoul Museum of Art curator Wonil Rhee who had previously organized Media City Seoul 2002 brought together 23 international digital artists for an exhibition consisting of computers, videos, paintings and photography that is a visual delight with a happy message. Lately we've been inundated with perversely morbid images from the political realm, so it's refreshing to see images that make us see the beauty in the world around us. In these dangerous times, a little bit of awe of creation goes a long way. However, even though the technology is complicated, the exhibition has a painterly focus and is not intensely conceptual allowing easier accessibility to the viewer.
PHOTO COURTESY OF MOCA
Lee Kyung-ho's Digital Moon installation epitomizes the show's theme of linking the Zen-like contemplation of the moon's reflected light with the unearthly glow of computer screens. Three large circles of light are projected in a room incorporating the viewer into a kaleidoscope of shapes, while slow moody music makes this a room for quiet
contemplation.
The exhibition often refers to Christian themes to tell us that a resurrection of possibilities exists at the click of a mouse. Strikingly, even though many of the displayed works are interactive, they don't seem deeply engaging but rather flat technical displays of what technology can do. You move a mouse around on a pad and you get a squiggle on a screen as in Golan Levin's Aurora &
Yellowtail and Miltos Manetas' Jacksonpollock.org.
Perhaps it is the limitation of technology as the imagery is controlled by its program and not by the user.
Digital art with sound easily crosses over into the domain of the nightclub scene. Wang Fujui's
More conceptually, Eva Stenram wittingly uses digital means to explore the semantic meanings in how we construct our world. The architectural surfaces of royal estates such as Windsor House and Balmoral House are superimposed on a block of low-income housing estates.
Some works hint at the dystopic aspects of technology. Joseph Nechvatal's Luna vOluptuary shows a computer virus slowly consuming and eating up a pain ting image. Jose Carlos Casado's riveting double-screen video installation Pandora's Box wryly shows a woman opening the infamous box online and unleashing wonderful cyber images. Will our new technologies unleash similar troubles?
As Taiwan’s second most populous city, Taichung looms large in the electoral map. Taiwanese political commentators describe it — along with neighboring Changhua County — as Taiwan’s “swing states” (搖擺州), which is a curious direct borrowing from American election terminology. In the early post-Martial Law era, Taichung was referred to as a “desert of democracy” because while the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) was winning elections in the north and south, Taichung remained staunchly loyal to the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT). That changed over time, but in both Changhua and Taichung, the DPP still suffers from a “one-term curse,” with the
William Liu (劉家君) moved to Kaohsiung from Nantou to live with his boyfriend Reg Hong (洪嘉佑). “In Nantou, people do not support gay rights at all and never even talk about it. Living here made me optimistic and made me realize how much I can express myself,” Liu tells the Taipei Times. Hong and his friend Cony Hsieh (謝昀希) are both active in several LGBT groups and organizations in Kaohsiung. They were among the people behind the city’s 16th Pride event in November last year, which gathered over 35,000 people. Along with others, they clearly see Kaohsiung as the nexus of LGBT rights.
Jan. 26 to Feb. 1 Nearly 90 years after it was last recorded, the Basay language was taught in a classroom for the first time in September last year. Over the following three months, students learned its sounds along with the customs and folktales of the Ketagalan people, who once spoke it across northern Taiwan. Although each Ketagalan settlement had its own language, Basay functioned as a common trade language. By the late 19th century, it had largely fallen out of daily use as speakers shifted to Hoklo (commonly known as Taiwanese), surviving only in fragments remembered by the elderly. In
Dissident artist Ai Weiwei’s (艾未未) famous return to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has been overshadowed by the astonishing news of the latest arrests of senior military figures for “corruption,” but it is an interesting piece of news in its own right, though more for what Ai does not understand than for what he does. Ai simply lacks the reflective understanding that the loneliness and isolation he imagines are “European” are simply the joys of life as an expat. That goes both ways: “I love Taiwan!” say many still wet-behind-the-ears expats here, not realizing what they love is being an
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