Hsu Ming-jen (許銘仁) depicts the natural beauty and scenery surrounding Grass Mountain Village in his solo show On the Other Side of the Landscape (在風景的彼岸). Hsu says he used drawing as his medium in this series because it “illustrates my thoughts and observations for its direct and basic quality.” The clean and blurred lines of these images mirror the artist’s ideas about the monumentality of mountains and the mysterious landscapes that blanket them.
■ Grass Mountain Artist Village (草山國際藝術村), 92 Hudi Rd, Taipei City (台北市湖底路92 號). Open Wednesdays to Sundays from 10am to 4pm. Tel: (02) 2862-2404. Opens Saturdays at 11am
■ Until July 25
Taiwan’s fishing ports, farm scenes and village life are among the rich and vibrant landscapes seen in the retrospective exhibit of Chen Bo-wen (陳博文), The Beauty of Taiwan — A Memorial Exhibition of the Art of Chen Bo-wen (展現台灣風情 — 陳博文創作紀念展). In addition to Chen’s realist paintings, the exhibition includes sketches from his notebooks and extracts of writing that shed light on his artistic philosophy in a show that illustrates not only the artist’s achievements but also his profound love for his native land.
■ National Museum of History (國立歷史博物館), 49 Nanhai Rd, Taipei City (台北市南海路49號). Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 10am to 6pm. Tel: (02) 2361-0270. General admission: NT$30
■ Until July 25
Pale human heads emerging from the throat of verdant green frogs and an emaciated flying horse with its front half in the form of the torso of a naked woman are among the surrealist figures found in Japanese painter Tomohiro Takagi’s solo show Fur — Away. Takagi’s unusual and highly original paintings playfully depict the relationship between humans and nature, while also offering warnings about environmental destruction.
■ Elsa Art Gallery (雲清藝術中心), 3F, 1-1 Tianmu E Rd, Taipei City (台北市天母東路1-1號3樓). Open daily from 1pm to 7pm, closed Mondays and Tuesdays. Tel: (02) 2876-0386
■ Until July 18
Tripolar — 3 Positions in German Video Art presents six works by three German artists, Robert Seidel, Max Hattler and Daniel Burkhardt, working in video. The show attempts to map the characteristics of German video art and its evolution over the past several decades. The exhibition is also screening Taipei Impressions, a video meditation on the artists’ one-week sojourn to Taipei.
■ Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei (MOCA, Taipei), 39 Changan W Rd, Taipei City (台北市長安西路39號). Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 10am to 6pm. Tel: (02) 2552-3721. General admission: NT$50
■ Until July 18
Chinese-born German artist Zhang Qikai (張奇開) examines the perceived discordant relationship between East and West in Mr Panda’s Wonderland (Mr.熊貓的魔法時空). Employing China’s iconic panda as an emblem of the spiritual quest to find true meaning, Zhang’s realistic paintings juxtapose the materialistic aspirations of the West, symbolized, for example, by diamonds, dice and poker cards, with the spiritual longings of an artist far from home.
■ Metaphysical Art Gallery (形而上畫廊), 7F, 219, Dunhua S Rd Sec 1, Taipei City (台北市敦化南路一段219號7樓). Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 11am to 6:30pm. Tel: (02) 2711-0055
■ Until June 30
In late October of 1873 the government of Japan decided against sending a military expedition to Korea to force that nation to open trade relations. Across the government supporters of the expedition resigned immediately. The spectacle of revolt by disaffected samurai began to loom over Japanese politics. In January of 1874 disaffected samurai attacked a senior minister in Tokyo. A month later, a group of pro-Korea expedition and anti-foreign elements from Saga prefecture in Kyushu revolted, driven in part by high food prices stemming from poor harvests. Their leader, according to Edward Drea’s classic Japan’s Imperial Army, was a samurai
The following three paragraphs are just some of what the local Chinese-language press is reporting on breathlessly and following every twist and turn with the eagerness of a soap opera fan. For many English-language readers, it probably comes across as incomprehensibly opaque, so bear with me briefly dear reader: To the surprise of many, former pop singer and Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) ex-lawmaker Yu Tien (余天) of the Taiwan Normal Country Promotion Association (TNCPA) at the last minute dropped out of the running for committee chair of the DPP’s New Taipei City chapter, paving the way for DPP legislator Su
Located down a sideroad in old Wanhua District (萬華區), Waley Art (水谷藝術) has an established reputation for curating some of the more provocative indie art exhibitions in Taipei. And this month is no exception. Beyond the innocuous facade of a shophouse, the full three stories of the gallery space (including the basement) have been taken over by photographs, installation videos and abstract images courtesy of two creatives who hail from the opposite ends of the earth, Taiwan’s Hsu Yi-ting (許懿婷) and Germany’s Benjamin Janzen. “In 2019, I had an art residency in Europe,” Hsu says. “I met Benjamin in the lobby
It’s hard to know where to begin with Mark Tovell’s Taiwan: Roads Above the Clouds. Having published a travelogue myself, as well as having contributed to several guidebooks, at first glance Tovell’s book appears to inhabit a middle ground — the kind of hard-to-sell nowheresville publishers detest. Leaf through the pages and you’ll find them suffuse with the purple prose best associated with travel literature: “When the sun is low on a warm, clear morning, and with the heat already rising, we stand at the riverside bike path leading south from Sanxia’s old cobble streets.” Hardly the stuff of your