In the huge House With Longan Tree (有龍眼樹的住所), which measures 90cm by 45cm, from which the title of the exhibition is taken, Wu has depicted his own studio in Beitou District, Taipei City. “These are things that are right in front of me. This is the opposite of trying to show off my knowledge or my technical skill; all I want to show is a natural composition, and show how beautiful this composition can be. Perhaps then I will make people take a second look at the things that are around them, and realize the beauty of what they see.”
In another large work, Under Seven Star Mountain (七星山下), the composition, with terraced fields forming orderly rows beneath the gentle peak of Taipei’s Seven Star Mountain, is suggestive of a traditional altar laden with offerings, forming a balance between the representational and Expressionistic.
“In art school, we absorbed huge amounts of theory about the Western artistic tradition, but this tradition was not my native language; we can learn it, even become adept, but it is never our native language,” Wu said. With these new prints, he has clearly created, if not his own language, at least a fascinating and appealing argot.
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