Ju Ming’s (朱銘) Living World Series of sculptures has earned him international recognition over the past 30 years. With Living World Series – Swimming (Stainless Steel) (人間不銹鋼系列 — 游泳), a series of his most recent sculptures, Ju carves figures from polystyrene foam and casts them in stainless steel, which he then polishes to a glossy and reflective finish. The resulting objects — a young girl sunning herself, for example, or a woman about to plunge into a pool — appear as though they have just emerged from water.
■ Kalos Gallery (真善美畫廊), 269, Dunhua S Rd Sec 1, Taipei City (台北市敦化南路一段269號). Open daily from 10am to 6:30pm, closed Sundays. Tel: (02) 2836-3452
■ Opening reception on Saturday at 3pm. Until Nov. 20
Photo courtesy of Kalos Gallery
Aki Gallery continues its tradition of exposing local art lovers to German art with Get Closer (新德國當代藝術特展III), a group show that features new work by five contemporary German artists working in photography, painting and sculpture. Amely Spotzl, Bernd Zollner, Josef Bernhard Zuenkeler, Caspar Pauli and Michael Sistig explore themes including personal history, the environment and life in the city.
■ Aki Gallery (也趣), 141 Minzu W Rd, Taipei City (台北市民族西路141號).
Open Tuesdays to Sundays from noon to 6:30pm. Tel: (02) 2599-1171
■ Until Oct. 31
Chinese landscape painting has undergone several stylistic changes in its long history, but the genre continues to be regarded as the essence of China’s artistic culture. With The Way of Nailing (之乎者也), Howard Chen (陳浚豪) broadens the form while remaining true to its tradition of imitation by recreating famous classical Chinese paintings using thumbtacks and mosquito nails — often employing over 100,000 nails per painting.
■ VT Art Salon (非常廟藝文空間), B1, 47 Yitong St, Taipei City (台北市伊通街47號B1). Open Tuesdays to Thursdays 2pm to 11pm, Fridays and Saturdays from 2pm to 1am. Tel: (02) 2516-1060
■ Until Saturday
The Spiritual Image (心靈影像) is a solo exhibit by US-based installation artist and sculptor Jeffrey Mongrain. His sculptures reflect scientific and religious themes and merge the austere with the abstract. In the words of Art in America’s Eleanor Heartney: “Mongrain’s richly coded [works] are visually quiet, physically eloquent and conceptually meaningful.”
■ Yingge Ceramics Museum (鶯歌陶瓷博物館), 200 Wenhua Rd, Yinge Township, Taipei County (台北縣鶯歌鎮文化路200號). Open daily from 9:30am to 5pm, closes at 6pm on Saturdays and Sundays. Tel: (02) 8677-2727
■ Until Nov. 21
Absolute Glory (風華絕代) is a group exhibit that brings together paintings by Gary Baseman, Shintaro Miyake, Kwon Ki-soo and Li Ming-tse (李明則), and others, who employ contemporary visual styles from sources including manga, anime and graphic novels to create visual myths that are rendered with depth, irony and a touch of the taboo.
■ 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 Nov. 20
Japanese photographer Shinoyama Kishin’s Shinorama Tokyo (東京廣角) offers a retrospective look at the artist’s long career. The show displays 70 of his works, including photographs of Japanese stars, Kabuki performers, sumo wrestlers, traditional ceremonies and natural scenery.
■ Taipei Fine Arts Museum (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
■ Until Jan. 2
A few weeks ago I found myself at a Family Mart talking with the morning shift worker there, who has become my coffee guy. Both of us were in a funk over the “unseasonable” warm weather, a state of mind known as “solastalgia” — distress produced by environmental change. In fact, the weather was not that out of the ordinary in boiling Central Taiwan, and likely cooler than the temperatures we will experience in the near-future. According to the Taiwan Adaptation Platform, between 1957 and 2006, summer lengthened by 27.8 days, while winter shrunk by 29.7 days. Winter is not
Taiwan’s post-World War II architecture, “practical, cheap and temporary,” not to mention “rather forgettable.” This was a characterization recently given by Taiwan-based historian John Ross on his Formosa Files podcast. Yet the 1960s and 1970s were, in fact, the period of Taiwan’s foundational building boom, which, to a great extent, defined the look of Taiwan’s cities, determining the way denizens live today. During this period, functionalist concrete blocks and Chinese nostalgia gave way to new interpretations of modernism, large planned communities and high-rise skyscrapers. It is currently the subject of a new exhibition at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Modern
March 25 to March 31 A 56-year-old Wu Li Yu-ke (吳李玉哥) was straightening out her artist son’s piles of drawings when she inadvertently flipped one over, revealing the blank backside of the paper. Absent-mindedly, she picked up a pencil and recalled how she used to sketch embroidery designs for her clothing business. Without clients and budget or labor constraints to worry about, Wu Li drew freely whatever image came to her mind. With much more free time now that her son had found a job, she found herself missing her home village in China, where she
In recent years, Slovakia has been seen as a highly democratic and Western-oriented Central European country. This image was reinforced by the election of the country’s first female president in 2019, efforts to provide extensive assistance to Ukraine and the strengthening of relations with Taiwan, all of which strengthened Slovakia’s position within the European Union. However, the latest developments in the country suggest that the situation is changing rapidly. As such, the presidential elections to be held on March 23 will be an indicator of whether Slovakia remains in the Western sphere of influence or moves eastward, notably towards Russia and