Hsu Wei-hui’s (徐薇蕙) sculptures and installations invite the viewer to question, to challenge and to re-examine gender roles and how ideals of beauty operate to create standards of female perfection. In The Counteroffensives (粉紅逆襲), a must-see exhibition currently on view at Liang Gallery (尊彩藝術中心) until Feb. 28, Hsu ponders the contradictions and conflicts between notions of imagined beauty and the impossibility of living up to an unrealistic expectation that, for many, is all too real. Drawing on her considerable artistic talent, Hsu’s feminine sculptures — dresses, flower petals and kitchen utensils — all made from facial masks, symbolize the human body and the changes it undergoes over time. Guerilla Girls, several installations some of which contains thousands of plastic toy soldiers dressed in patterned dresses and painted hot pink, inverts our stereotypical assumptions about the toys boys play with, and serves as an entertaining and thought-provoking statement about female empowerment.
■ Liang Gallery (尊彩藝術中心), 366 Ruiguang Rd, Taipei City (台北市瑞光路366號), tel: (02) 2797-1100. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 10am to 6pm
Photo courtesy of Liang gallery
■ Until Feb. 28
Photo courtesy of Liang gallery
Photo courtesy of Liang gallery
Photo courtesy of Liang gallery
Photo courtesy of Liang gallery
Photo courtesy of Liang gallery
Photo courtesy of Liang gallery
Photo courtesy of Liang gallery
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