Camouflage is a solo exhibition by Emma Hack, the skin artist behind Gotye’s Somebody I Used to Know . Hack is displaying 15 photographs from three projects, including Birds of Prey — live birds in painted trees — and Wallpaper Mandela, hand-painted women who blend seamlessly into intricate floral wallpaper.
■ Bluerider Art, 9F, 25-1, Renai Rd Sec 4, Taipei City (北市大安區仁愛路四段25-1號9樓), tel: (02) 2752-2238, open Tuesdays to Sundays from 9am to 6pm
■ Until Oct. 6
Photo courtesy of Bluerider Art
Seminal photographer Chang Chao-tang (張照堂) brings 400 works from his career to solo exhibition Time: The Images of Chang Chao-tang (歲月). Pieces, which date from 1959 to the present, include never-before-seen portraits, a series taken with a cell phone, eight documentaries and TV programs, notes, sketches and two “exhibitions within an exhibition” — replicas of experimental installations from the 1960s. Together, they’re a record of a pioneering artist’s career, and of Taiwan’s sweeping sociopolitical changes over the same period. Chang is winner of the Golden Bell, National Award for Arts and the Executive Yuan’s National Culture Award for lifetime achievement.
■ 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
Photo courtesy of Yo Gallery
■ Opens tomorrow. Until Dec. 29
In 1986, German sociologist Ulrich Beck coined the term “risk society” to describe how the future world will have little time for wealth production, as it will be occupied with managing human-created “risks” such as global warming. Risk Society (風險社會) features young Germans who believe that the risk society has already become a reality. Curated by Melanie Bono, 22 German artists present mixed-media installations organized under four themes: Micro-Macro; Detachment and Disenchantment; We Are All Individuals; and New Models of Collaboration. Matthias Fritsch is showing his silent film with live accompaniment by Taiwanese band Nighteentael (十九兩).
■ Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei (MOCA, Taipei), 39 Changan W Rd, Taipei City (台北市長安西路39號), tel: (02) 2552-3720. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 10am to 6pm. General admission: NT$50
Photo courtesy of MOCA, Taipei
■ Opens tomorrow. Until Nov. 10
The Grime Casebook (髒兮兮事件簿) features graffiti art by AhdiaOne (阿迪啊萬) and Candy Bird. Their themes cover “dirty” social phenomenon such as forced land development and politicians who are well-dressed but corrupt to the core.
■ Yo Gallery (悠畫廊), Store B44, Creative Area, Zhongshan Metro Mall, Taipei City (臺北捷運中山地下書街 文創區B44展間), tel: (02) 2563-3151, open Tuesdays to Sundays from 1pm to 8:30pm
■ Opening reception today at 6:30pm. Until Oct.13
In Memory of the Minimalist Master (紀念台灣極簡主義宗師) presents the legacy of Richard Lin (林壽宇, 1933-2011), a Taiwanese painter who made his name in London. Jia Art Gallery’s retrospective show includes his earlier abstract paintings and 10 classical pieces from the White series, which use different shades of white to embody states like thin, wet and dry.
■ Jia Art Gallery (家畫廊), 1F-1, 30, Zhongshan N Rd Sec 3, Taipei City (台北市中山北路三段30號1樓之1), tel: (02) 2595-2449. Open Tuesdays through Sundays from 10am to 6pm
■ Until Sept. 29
Sept.16 to Sept. 22 The “anti-communist train” with then-president Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) face plastered on the engine puffed along the “sugar railway” (糖業鐵路) in May 1955, drawing enthusiastic crowds at 103 stops covering nearly 1,200km. An estimated 1.58 million spectators were treated to propaganda films, plays and received free sugar products. By this time, the state-run Taiwan Sugar Corporation (台糖, Taisugar) had managed to connect the previously separate east-west lines established by Japanese-era sugar factories, allowing the anti-communist train to travel easily from Taichung to Pingtung’s Donggang Township (東港). Last Sunday’s feature (Taiwan in Time: The sugar express) covered the inauguration of the
The corruption cases surrounding former Taipei Mayor and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) head Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) are just one item in the endless cycle of noise and fuss obscuring Taiwan’s deep and urgent structural and social problems. Even the case itself, as James Baron observed in an excellent piece at the Diplomat last week, is only one manifestation of the greater problem of deep-rooted corruption in land development. Last week the government announced a program to permit 25,000 foreign university students, primarily from the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia, to work in Taiwan after graduation for 2-4 years. That number is a
In a stark demonstration of how award-winning breakthroughs can come from the most unlikely directions, researchers have won an Ig Nobel prize for discovering that mammals can breathe through their anuses. After a series of tests on mice, rats and pigs, Japanese scientists found the animals absorb oxygen delivered through the rectum, work that underpins a clinical trial to see whether the procedure can treat respiratory failure. The team is among 10 recognized in this year’s Ig Nobel awards (see below for more), the irreverent accolades given for achievements that “first make people laugh, and then make them think.” They are not
This Qing Dynasty trail takes hikers from renowned hot springs in the East Rift Valley, up to the top of the Coastal Mountain Range, and down to the Pacific Short vacations to eastern Taiwan often require choosing between the Rift Valley with its pineapple fields, rice paddies and broader range of amenities, or the less populated coastal route for its ocean scenery. For those who can’t decide, why not try both? The Antong Traversing Trail (安通越嶺道) provides just such an opportunity. Built 149 years ago, the trail linked up these two formerly isolated parts of the island by crossing over the Coastal Mountain Range. After decades of serving as a convenient path for local Amis, Han settlers, missionaries and smugglers, the trail fell into disuse once modern roadways were built