Reality — Representation (實.現) presents a series of documentary photographs recently acquired by the Taipei Fine Arts Museum. Over the past two decades, photography in Taiwan has continued to evolve and the exhibition is meant to reflect how the photographers convey their affection for and interpretation of the country, particularly its environmental features, cultural patterns and struggles in a rapidly changing society. The exhibit is composed of photographs taken over the course of 20 years by eight photographers born in the 1950s and 1960s.
■ 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), tel: (02) 2595-7656. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 9:30am to 5:30pm and until 8:30pm on Saturdays. Admission: NT$30
■ Until Jan. 13
Photo courtesy of TFAM
According to Mind Set Art Center (安卓藝術), A Conscious Choice for Temporary Blindness is an artistic experiment that is both abstract and contradictory. It features representational yet dreamy paintings by Romanian artists Ana Maria Micu and Catalin Petrisor, who use their canvases to imagine the state of blindness as a metaphor for lost memories. As the gallery’s press release says, “they individually play with images and various materials to discover the multiple possibilities [to] re-establish a state of parallel reality between illusion and reality.”
■ Mind Set Art Center (安卓藝術), 16-1, Xinsheng S Rd Sec 3, Taipei City (台北市新生南路三段16-1號), tel: (02) 2365-6008. Open Tuesdays to Sunday 2pm to 6pm
■ Until Jan. 13
Photo courtesy of metaphysical art gallery
Tetsu and Otyu is a solo exhibition of photographs by Japanese photographer Tomomi Sakuma that narrates the day-to-day life of his grandparents, their names being the exhibit’s title, following World War II, and are meant to inspire hope to those who lived through last year’s earthquake and tsunami. “I hope the pictures ad story told within the pictures could also help others, who see them, to find joy and happiness,” writes Sakuma in his artist’s introduction.
■ 1839 Little Gallery (1839小藝廊), B1, 120 Yanji St, Taipei City (台北市延吉街120號B1), tel: (02) 2778-8458. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 11am to 8pm
■ Until Dec. 30
Hsu Yin-ling’s (許尹齡) new series of 21 paintings, collectively titled Gourmet Drama (料理劇), meditates on the relationship between people and the food they eat, drawing the viewer’s attention to common associations of food and how they symbolize different aspects of contemporary society.
■ Project Fulfill Art Space (就在藝術空間), 2, Alley 45, Ln 147, Xinyi Rd Sec 3, Taipei City (台北市信義路三段147巷45弄2號), tel: (02) 2707-6942. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 1pm to 6pm
■ Until Feb. 7
Dialogs presents the work of 14 emerging and established South Korean artists, including Nam June Paik, who is generally considered an important innovator of video installation. Painting, sculpture, photography and video come together in works that span influences ranging from pop art to abstract to expressionism.
■ 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), tel: (02) 2711-0055. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 11am to 6:30pm
■ Until Jan. 6
May 6 to May 12 Those who follow the Chinese-language news may have noticed the usage of the term zhuge (豬哥, literally ‘pig brother,’ a male pig raised for breeding purposes) in reports concerning the ongoing #Metoo scandal in the entertainment industry. The term’s modern connotations can range from womanizer or lecher to sexual predator, but it once referred to an important rural trade. Until the 1970s, it was a common sight to see a breeder herding a single “zhuge” down a rustic path with a bamboo whip, often traveling large distances over rugged terrain to service local families. Not only
By far the most jarring of the new appointments for the incoming administration is that of Tseng Wen-tsan (鄭文燦) to head the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF). That is a huge demotion for one of the most powerful figures in the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). Tseng has one of the most impressive resumes in the party. He was very active during the Wild Lily Movement and his generation is now the one taking power. He has served in many of the requisite government, party and elected positions to build out a solid political profile. Elected as mayor of Taoyuan as part of the
Moritz Mieg, 22, lay face down in the rubble, the ground shaking violently beneath him. Boulders crashed down around him, some stones hitting his back. “I just hoped that it would be one big hit and over, because I did not want to be hit nearly to death and then have to slowly die,” the student from Germany tells Taipei Times. MORNING WALK Early on April 3, Mieg set out on a scenic hike through Taroko Gorge in Hualien County (花蓮). It was a fine day for it. Little did he know that the complex intersection of tectonic plates Taiwan sits
Last week the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) released a set of very strange numbers on Taiwan’s wealth distribution. Duly quoted in the Taipei Times, the report said that “The Gini coefficient for Taiwanese households… was 0.606 at the end of 2021, lower than Australia’s 0.611, the UK’s 0.620, Japan’s 0.678, France’s 0.676 and Germany’s 0.727, the agency said in a report.” The Gini coefficient is a measure of relative inequality, usually of wealth or income, though it can be used to evaluate other forms of inequality. However, for most nations it is a number from .25 to .50