A shadowy world of images gets exposure

Often on the forefront of photographic exhibits in Taipei, the Taiwan International Visual Arts Center (TIVAC) presents a pairing of two amateur photographers whose works can both be defined by their geometric composition and, less apparent, the calculus behind their choice of subjects.

By her own account, Ena Leng (冷秀英) is a loner whose childhood friends were her books. She dabbled in writing for a time before discovering photography as a way to interact with the world. Her photos are direct evidence of her standoffishness.

Rarely does the subject matter include a person and, when it does, it's often of the back of someone's head, or the person's shadow, or of people obscured behind glass. More important, in her eye, are the set pieces these people pass through; landscapes of architectural interiors and exteriors. Personality, instead of coming from persons, comes from architectural details such as lamps, window dressings and the like. Aside from their striking geometric compositions and contrasting colors, the shots are rather pedestrian as stand-alone photos.

But in an exhibit such as the one TIVAC has put together, you get to see Leng's personal perspective of the world. Indeed, she titles her exhibit Temperature of Lonesome and, apart from its poor syntax, it's an appropriate title. For Leng, loneliness is surprisingly warm. While she often frames the world from the inside looking out, the solitude inherent in her pieces lends them a kind of stability that is impossible to achieve by sticking a lens in someone's face.

Leng's photos invite long looks and introspection -- a product more of her own personality than of her photographic skills. Certainly the folks at TIVAC saw the same. Joining Leng in the exhibit is a young amateur photographer named Henry Chen (陳斌華). Still a student at university, Chen has been taking photographs for less than a decade.

His interest in photography was first piqued by the hardware itself and this can be seen in his choice of a panoramic lens for many of his shots. What makes this choice interesting is that, instead of the sweeping vistas usually photographed with a panoramic lens, Chen has used it to get close to the arcane details of things we see every day: pedestrians waiting at a cross walk, wires hanging on the side of a building, or simply the side of the building itself.

As with Leng's photos, geometric composition is Chen's strong suit. This is best seen in a photo of an old man resting on a bench as a boy whizzes past on a bicycle. But also like Leng, Chen's best photos are those which contain no people at all. Instead, his best subject matter is shadows. Of the wires dangling alongside a building, it's not the wires you notice, but the twisted shadows they cast.

A close-up of the trunk of a tree is set off by the shadow of it's foliage cast on the sidewalk and walls behind it. In Chen's photos, shadows seen more alive than the things that cast them.

TIVAC's exhibit is a success for having paired a photographer who chooses to stand in the shadows with another who chooses to bring those shadows to life. It's well worth a look.

Exhibition information:

TIVAC's current exhibit runs through Thursday, Sept. 2. TIVAC is located at Ln 45, 29 Liaoning St, Taipei (台北市遼寧街45巷29號).