Time Unfrozen — From Liu Guo-song to New Media Art (白駒過隙山動水行—從劉國松到新媒體藝術) examines the temporal, spatial and psychological connections between new media art and contemporary thought. Utilizing mature art forms such as light, sound, new technology, video and installation, as well as avant-garde modalities such as virtual reality and co-intelligence, 19 collaborative teams were brought together to explore Eastern aesthetics, particularly the relationship between humanity and nature.
■ Taipei Fine Arts Museum (TFAM — 台北市立美術館), 181, Zhongshan N Rd Sec 3, Taipei City (台北市中山北路三段181號). Open daily from 9:30am to 5:30pm, closes at 9:30pm on Saturdays. Tel: (02) 2595-7656
■ Begins Saturday. Until Jan. 2
PHOTO COURTESY OF TFAM
South Korean sculptor Park Seung Mo presents a new series of sculptures in a solo exhibit at Ever Harvest Gallery. Park continues his tradition of wrapping aluminum and copper wire around objects, such as a bicycle or piano, which makes the original form less insignificant while retaining its essence.
■ Ever Harvest Art Gallery, 2F, 107, Renai Rd Sec 4, Taipei City (台北市仁愛路四段107號2樓). Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 11am to 6:30pm. Tel: (02) 2752-2353. Admission: Free until Nov. 26
■ Opening reception on Saturday at 3pm. Until Nov. 7
PHOTO COURTESY OF TFAM
Grace Wawa Yang (楊后瑜) looks back at the freedom of childhood with In Between (曖), a solo exhibit that consists of two series of photographs — Memento Mori (2008) and Realm of Play — Reverie (2009-2010) — and a video installation. Yang’s work is intended to return the viewer to childhood, a time associated with freedom and fun, but also when we learn about rules and boundaries by testing them.
■ Sakshi Gallery (夏可喜當代藝術), 33 Yitong St, Taipei City (台北市伊通街33號). Open Tuesdays to Saturdays from 1:30pm to 9:30pm, Sundays from 1:30pm to 7:30pm. Tel: (02) 2516-5386
■ Until Nov. 7
PHOTO COURTESY OF EVER HARVEST GALLERY
Just when you thought that the Polaroid camera was relegated to the dustbin of archaic technologies, the folks from the company came up with a new monochrome film, PX Silver Shade, which it released earlier this year. A series of images made by three Taiwanese photographers using the film are currently on display in an exhibit titled Impossible. The images take Taiwan as the main subject — a wedding banquet, for example, or a seascape.
■ Taiwan International Visual Arts Center (台灣國際視覺藝術中心), 29, Ln 45 Liaoning St, Taipei City (台北市遼寧街45巷29號). Open Tuesdays to Sundays from noon to 6pm. Tel: (02) 2773-3347
■ Until Nov. 14
Infinity of Chi is a retrospective exhibit of China-born, Taiwan-raised and Italy-based artist Hsiao Chin (蕭勤). Hsiao, the winner of the 2002 National Fine Art Prize (國家文藝獎), studied abstract painting and was a prominent advocate of the avant-garde wave of Taiwanese modern art during the 1950s. Hsiao’s art contains both the distinctive style of modern art, as well as the profound philosophical influence of the East.
■ Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, 80 Meishuguan Rd, Kaohsiung City (高雄市美術館路80號). Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 9am to 5pm. Tel: (07) 555 0331. Admission is NT$200, NT$150 for seniors and students
■ Until March 13
Paintings, calligraphy, antiquities and rare books form Dynastic Renaissance: Art and Culture of the Southern Song (文藝紹興-南宋藝術與文化特展), a wide-ranging exhibit that is displayed in 10 galleries on the first and second floor of the National Palace Museum. In four sections — Cultural Invigoration, Artistic Innovation, Life Aesthetics and Transmission and Fusion — the exhibit seeks to reveal how the Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279) employed innovative artistic tastes and aesthetic ideas to perpetuate its rule. [See story opposite.]
■ National Palace Museum (國立故宮博物院), 221, Zhishan Rd Sec 2, Taipei City (台北市至善路二段221號). Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 9am to 5pm, closes at 8:30pm on Saturdays. Tel: (02) 2881-2021. Admission is NT$160, NT$80 for students
■ Until Dec. 26
In the mainstream view, the Philippines should be worried that a conflict over Taiwan between the superpowers will drag in Manila. President Ferdinand Marcos Jr observed in an interview in The Wall Street Journal last year, “I learned an African saying: When elephants fight, the only one that loses is the grass. We are the grass in this situation. We don’t want to get trampled.” Such sentiments are widespread. Few seem to have imagined the opposite: that a gray zone incursion of People’s Republic of China (PRC) ships into the Philippines’ waters could trigger a conflict that drags in Taiwan. Fewer
March 18 to March 24 Yasushi Noro knew that it was not the right time to scale Hehuan Mountain (合歡). It was March 1913 and the weather was still bitingly cold at high altitudes. But he knew he couldn’t afford to wait, either. Launched in 1910, the Japanese colonial government’s “five year plan to govern the savages” was going well. After numerous bloody battles, they had subdued almost all of the indigenous peoples in northeastern Taiwan, save for the Truku who held strong to their territory around the Liwu River (立霧溪) and Mugua River (木瓜溪) basins in today’s Hualien County (花蓮). The Japanese
Pei-Ru Ko (柯沛如) says her Taipei upbringing was a little different from her peers. “We lived near the National Palace Museum [north of Taipei] and our neighbors had rice paddies. They were growing food right next to us. There was a mountain and a river so people would say, ‘you live in the mountains,’ and my friends wouldn’t want to come and visit.” While her school friends remained a bus ride away, Ko’s semi-rural upbringing schooled her in other things, including where food comes from. “Most people living in Taipei wouldn’t have a neighbor that was growing food,” she says. “So
Whether you’re interested in the history of ceramics, the production process itself, creating your own pottery, shopping for ceramic vessels, or simply admiring beautiful handmade items, the Zhunan Snake Kiln (竹南蛇窯) in Jhunan Township (竹南), Miaoli County, is definitely worth a visit. For centuries, kiln products were an integral part of daily life in Taiwan: bricks for walls, tiles for roofs, pottery for the kitchen, jugs for fermenting alcoholic drinks, as well as decorative elements on temples, all came from kilns, and Miaoli was a major hub for the production of these items. The Zhunan Snake Kiln has a large area dedicated