Wang Te-yu (王德瑜) works with space to create situations that meditate on the relationship between subject and object, body sensory experiences and consciousness. Since 1990 Wang has been working with different fabrics to produce an ongoing series of spatial creations that encourage the viewer’s participation. Her solo exhibition, No. 98, at Project Fulfill Art Space (就在藝術空間) is a continuation of this series, which features a large installation of the same title. The work invites viewers to climb up a gentle slope and appreciate the gallery space from different heights. No. 98 is inspired by the artist’s stay at Scotland’s Glenfiddich Artists in Residency Program last year. “The surrounding woods, the thick soft grass… along the mountain ridge a row of wind turbines turn silently; I sit alone on the hillside opening my senses to the living force of nature,” writes the artist. While preparing for the creation of No. 98, Wang organized almost 3,000 photographs of the Scottish landscape. For Wang, each photo triggers memories of a site that can be only detected by bodily sensations, such as temperature, light and smells. The artist grew particularly interested in the photos that were similar to those taken by previous residency artists. The idea of roads that were previously taken manifest ideas of shared memories, a repetition of gestures and connections between people from different times.
■ 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 April 18
Photo Courtesy of John Paulo
Liang Gallery (尊彩藝術中心) presents A Scene like Poetry (如詩的光景), a solo exhibition by award-winning Taiwanese artist Wu Chien-yi (吳芊頤). Wu creates two-dimensional Japanese (washi) paper collages as well as mixed-media installations that examine consumerist society. In the last couple years, Wu has been creating a series of collaged paintings inspired by Taiwan’s unique landscape. Window grill designs, cultural symbols, architectural patterns and commercial products are reassembled to create a sense of strangeness that allows the viewer to examine the familiar from a new perspective. These paintings provide insight into Taiwan’s history and culture by deconstructing its visual landscape, says the artist. Mirror III Ansu Hall is a robust landscape of luscious colors framed by a rigid diamond grill pattern. Mirror II Fengtian Temple is a more open composition of multi-color feathered birds and animals viewed through the perspective of two square grill frames. The animated creatures are loosely suggested by paper stripes that waver between assembly and disintegration.
■ 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 11am to 6pm
■ Until March 31
Photo Courtesy of National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts
Lee Yen-hua (李燕華) maintains a cross-disciplinary practice that includes pictography, architecture, sociology, philosophy and aesthetics. Since 2006, Lee has been exploring the medium of the book — the way we read them, the very nature of books as an intellectual object and the textural structures it contains. As a collector of antique books, the artist responds to each volume in her collection with an original language comprised of visual symbols and images based on her own life experiences. These responses are notations of her journey through each book and contain the traces of memory and encounters as a reader. Lee’s solo exhibition, Searching for: Spiritual home series (找尋內心的家系列), at Galerie Grand Siecle (新苑藝術) is an extension of her book project, in which she seeks to discover new possibilities of experimenting between art, space and memory. Inspired by her family background and the environment in which she was raised, the exhibition features abstract silhouettes of people and place, connected by arrays of silk thread. The thread illustrates paths of illumination that symbolically shed light on the artist’s memories.
■ Galerie Grand Siecle (新苑藝術), 17, Alley 51, Ln 12, Bade Rd Sec 3, Taipei City (台北市八德路三段12巷51弄17號), tel: (02) 2578-5630. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 1pm to 6pm
■ Until March 22
Photo Courtesy of Galerie Grand Siecle
National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts (國立台灣美術館) presents Contours (舞·界·線), a project by performance group Dancecology (舞蹈生態系創意團隊). Founded in 2009, the group creates performances, visual art, films and installations that realize their vision of a holistic relationship between man and nature. Dancecology works beyond the traditional constructs of theater and creates site-specific productions that attempt to eliminate the distance between the audience and actor. Contours is a 360 degree dance film that follows an abstract narrative between nature and humans. The film is shot at Lake George, an ancient lake in New South Wales, Australia, that is known for its strange patterns of high and low tides. Interpreting the cosmic energies of the lake, a diverse group of dancers express through abstract movements ecological ideas such as circulation, symbiosis, nourishment and cultivation.
■ National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts (國立台灣美術館), 2, Wuquan W Rd Sec 1, Taichung City (台中市五權西路一段2號), tel: (04) 2373-3552. Open Tuesdays to Fridays from 9am to 5pm, Saturdays and Sundays from 9am to 6pm.
■ Until April 28
Photo Courtesy of White Stone Gallery
Back to Originality and Simplicity: Japanese Contemporary Ink Exhibition Part 2 (返璞歸真: 日本當代水墨展 Part 2) is the second phase of White Stone Gallery’s (白石畫廊) exhibition series focused on ink art masters from Japan. Ink art originates in China and has been adopted and cultivated with various cultural interpretations throughout Asia. According to the gallery, it is a distinct cultural code of the Asian region and a symbol of Eastern aesthetics. Japanese ink art began in the Kamakura period (12th to 14th centuries). The exhibition presents post war to contemporary ink art from Japan, a period marked by a refusal of strong colors and representational landscape. Japanese ink art is characterized by simple contours that create pronounced abstract space with unique aesthetics. The exhibition focuses on artists from the Gutai group, a radical postwar collective that rejected traditional aesthetics and explored the body and matter with performances and installations. The show highlights the works of eight representative Gutai artists, including Kazuo Shiraga’s radical action paintings, Kiro Uehara’s erase-prints and Rogen Ebihara’s poetic calligraphy.
■ White Stone Gallery (白石畫廊), 1 Jihu Rd, Taipei City (台北市基湖路1號), tel: (02) 8751-1185. Opens Tuesdays to Sundays from 11am to 9pm.
■ Until March 24
In late October of 1873 the government of Japan decided against sending a military expedition to Korea to force that nation to open trade relations. Across the government supporters of the expedition resigned immediately. The spectacle of revolt by disaffected samurai began to loom over Japanese politics. In January of 1874 disaffected samurai attacked a senior minister in Tokyo. A month later, a group of pro-Korea expedition and anti-foreign elements from Saga prefecture in Kyushu revolted, driven in part by high food prices stemming from poor harvests. Their leader, according to Edward Drea’s classic Japan’s Imperial Army, was a samurai
The following three paragraphs are just some of what the local Chinese-language press is reporting on breathlessly and following every twist and turn with the eagerness of a soap opera fan. For many English-language readers, it probably comes across as incomprehensibly opaque, so bear with me briefly dear reader: To the surprise of many, former pop singer and Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) ex-lawmaker Yu Tien (余天) of the Taiwan Normal Country Promotion Association (TNCPA) at the last minute dropped out of the running for committee chair of the DPP’s New Taipei City chapter, paving the way for DPP legislator Su
Located down a sideroad in old Wanhua District (萬華區), Waley Art (水谷藝術) has an established reputation for curating some of the more provocative indie art exhibitions in Taipei. And this month is no exception. Beyond the innocuous facade of a shophouse, the full three stories of the gallery space (including the basement) have been taken over by photographs, installation videos and abstract images courtesy of two creatives who hail from the opposite ends of the earth, Taiwan’s Hsu Yi-ting (許懿婷) and Germany’s Benjamin Janzen. “In 2019, I had an art residency in Europe,” Hsu says. “I met Benjamin in the lobby
April 22 to April 28 The true identity of the mastermind behind the Demon Gang (魔鬼黨) was undoubtedly on the minds of countless schoolchildren in late 1958. In the days leading up to the big reveal, more than 10,000 guesses were sent to Ta Hwa Publishing Co (大華文化社) for a chance to win prizes. The smash success of the comic series Great Battle Against the Demon Gang (大戰魔鬼黨) came as a surprise to author Yeh Hung-chia (葉宏甲), who had long given up on his dream after being jailed for 10 months in 1947 over political cartoons. Protagonist