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By Noah Buchan
STAFF REPORTER
Wednesday, Sep 09, 2009, Page 15

EXHIBITION NOTES: WHAT: The Fragmentized Illusion: An Exhibition of Taiwan Contemporary Photography (片段的幻象:台灣當代攝影展) WHERE: Galerie Grand Siecle (新苑藝術), 17, Alley 51, Ln 12, Bade Rd Sec 3, Taipei City (台北市八德路三段12巷51弄17號). TEL: (02) 2578-5630 WHEN: Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 1pm to 6pm. Until Sept. 20

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What does it mean to be Taiwanese? Can the answer be found among the crumbling walls of a temple in Chiayi, or in the faded black-and-white photo of a family standing outside Kaohsiung Train Station?

The Fragmentized Illusion: An Exhibition of Taiwan Contemporary Photography (片段的幻:台灣當代攝影展) presents work by four of Taiwan’s top artists who examine this topic through mixed media and digital prints.

“The artists didn’t directly experience, for example, the Japanese colonial period or the early history of Taiwan,” said Siraya Pai (白斐嵐), a project administrator for Galerie Grand Ciecle. “But because they live on this land they want to examine and become part of its history.”

Mei Dean-E (梅丁衍), Wu Tien-chang (吳天章), Chen Shun-chu (陳順築) and Yao Jui-chung (姚瑞中) are all second-generation Mainlanders, or Taiwanese whose parents moved from China to Taiwan when it was occupied by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) after World War II. They came of age during the upheavals of the

mid-1980s, a time of increased agitation for

freedom and democracy that culminated in the lifting of Martial Law in 1987.

“Up until that time, Taiwanese identity was repressed by the [KMT] government. They educated us to be Chinese, not Taiwanese. But during the 80s and 90s, people started to think about who we are,” Pai said.

Mei draws on images from the Japanese colonial period and early KMT occupation, such as anti-communist propaganda and show trials, to re-create fragment of Taiwan’s collective memory, while Chen examines the accuracy of his own memory through reproductions of black-and-white snapshots of his family taken in front of the Kaohsiung and Taipei train stations when he was a boy.

Wu adopts the so-called taike (台客) aesthetic using temple rituals and the faux neon glitz of betel nut girls in his digital images to examine a uniquely Taiwanese aesthetic. (Taike is a pejorative term once used by Mainlanders to belittle native-born Taiwanese that has been co-opted by Taiwanese youth seeking a uniquely Taiwanese identity). Yao’s brooding digital prints of deserted buildings, half-demolished factories and abandoned temples leave the viewer thinking that Taiwan’s economic miracle is a thing of the past.

Falling on the 60th anniversary of the KMT’s retreat to Taiwan from China, the exhibit — with its themes of Taiwanese identity and suggestion of decay — seems explicitly political. Was this the gallery’s intention?

“We didn’t set out to do a political exhibition ... but it is how it came out,” said Pai. She added that the artists who were active during the years immediately prior to and after the lifting of Martial Law thought they could use art and activism to create a better society. “But after 20 years of effort, [they] realize that much hasn’t changed,” she said.

The exhibition indirectly raises other questions: How will these artists, many of whom will probably live to see the centenary of the KMT’s occupation, be depicting Taiwan 40 years in the future. And will there be a nation called Taiwan to depict? Looking at the emerging generation of artists and the disenchantment of the artists represented in the exhibit, Pai is somewhat pessimistic.

“Earlier generations care more about this issue because they grew up at a time when it was trendy. But the younger generation of artists seem to care more about globalization,” Pai said.

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