Sawangwongse Yawnghwe is a Netherlands-based artist from Myanmar. He is the grandson of Sao Shwe Thaik, the first president of Myanmar after the country gained independence from Britain in 1948. Yawnghwe grew up in Canada where his family had been driven into exile after a military coup in 1962. Through paintings and installations, the artist engages with his family history as well as the present and past history of his country. Yawnghwe Office in Exile / State Museum / Absoluter Gegenstoss / Absolute Recoil (良瑞流亡辦公室|國家博物館:絕對反叛) is a solo exhibition and the title refers to a fictional office in exile and a state museum that “is impossible to exist even in today’s Burma,” writes TKG+ Projects in a press release. “Democratized on the surface, Burma’s political structure is still heavily influenced by military intervention.” The show explores the history of Shan exiles and the suppression of their history by the Burmese military forces. Yawnghwe works with photographs of his grandparents, father and uncle when they were involved in military and political organizations. The exhibition asks: “Is there truth in history? Do the historical facts that are taken for granted equal to reality, even truth?”
■ TKG+ Projects, B1, 15, Ln 548, Ruiguang Rd, Taipei City (台北市瑞光路548巷15號B1), tel: (02) 2659-0798. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 11am to 7pm
■ Until July 7
Photo Courtesy of National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts
The Taipei Fine Arts Museum (台北市立美術館) presents In the Sunshine of the Relaxed Majorities (在放鬆的多數的陽光中), a solo exhibition by Taiwanese artist James Ming-hsueh Lee (李明學). The title draws on the writings of French philosopher Jean Baudrillard, who discusses the meaning of visual symbols and experiences in relation to social values. Lee centers his practice on the idea of “relaxed-aesthetics,” which refers to a negation of method in his treatment of theory and practice. Through image and text, Lee examines paradoxical moments that encompass a mixture of conditions, including sadness and happiness, misunderstanding and understanding. Such moments are hard to describe through language and can be more aptly processed through visual metaphors, says the artist. Lee reinterprets familiar items in his everyday life, creating absurd and playful readings and misreadings that draw attention to the flexibility of definitions and the possibility of multiple meanings.
■ Taipei Fine Arts Museum (台北市立美術館 TFAM), 181, Zhongshan N Rd Sec 3, Taipei (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
■ Until July 21
Photo Courtesy of Taipei Fine Art Museum
Currently on view at Mumu Gallery (木木藝術) is a solo exhibition by Japanese artist Yuya Suzuki. Suzuki participated in a Tainan’s Soulangh Artist Village residency program (蕭?國際藝術村) in 2017 and debuted his first show in Taiwan at Absolute Space for the Art (絕對空間) in the following year. Suzuki’s practice encompasses a range of mediums including drawing, video, sculpture and painting. His work explores cognitive strategies, ideas of simulation and abstraction of urban landscapes. In an essay dedicated to his work, curator Anca Mihulet writes about the artist’s almost compulsive way of reproducing reality; he creates abstract shapes based on observations of the city, which serve as signs of secrecy, truth and memory. New Excavation continues his exploration of the urban environment by reflecting on what he terms cracks in reality — objects and situations that deviate from their original function. While Suzuki has carries out his studies in many cities, he engagee with dimensions that speak to the universal.
■ Mumu Gallery (木木藝術), 50, Minde Rd, Tainan City (台南市民德路50號), tel: (06) 252-6121. Open Mondays to Saturdays from 10am to 6pm
■ Until June 22
Photo Courtesy of TKG Plus
Chen Po-i (陳伯義) is a Taiwanese artist and curator with a background in oceanic engineering. He is known for creating photographs that highlight humanitarian concerns and social issues in Taiwan. Chen says the camera can be used to express the collective memories of Taiwan. Chen’s solo show, Firework Baptist (食炮人), at VT Art Salon (非常廟藝文空間), features a series of photographs taken during Tainan’s Yanshui Beehive Fireworks (台南鹽水蜂炮), a large religious celebration that takes place every year during Lantern Festival. Legend has it that a terrible plague broke out during the Qing dynasty; people prayed to the God of War (Guan Gong, 關公), who instructed them to parade his statue throughout the streets and set off firecrackers along his path. People today join the procession decked out in full body protection and helmets to be blasted with heavy doses of firecrackers. The more people are bombarded, the better their luck in the next year. “People put up with the pain…to pray for fortune and health,” writes the gallery.
■ 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), tel: (02) 2516-1060. Open Tuesdays to Thursdays from 1:30pm to 9pm, and Fridays and Saturdays from 1:30pm to 10pm
■ Until July 6
Photo Courtesy of VT Art Salon
Chen Han-sheng (陳漢聲) is a Taiwanese artist who works with experimental animation, mixed media art and kinetic installations. Chen explores topics related to his identity and background, and Once Lake—Field Now (湖底 尖山腳), currently on view at National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts (國立台灣美術館), is inspired by his hometown of Dashe District (大社) in Kaohsiung, where his family owns a plot of farmland. Chen grew up at a time when most of his peers came from farming families. As neighboring areas continued to build chemical plants, Chen’s father eventually became the only farmer in his village. Social developments and the changing relations with the land are issues Chen examines, and draws from the legacy of his grandfather and his attitude towards living. The plot of land passed down by his grandfather bears personal significance to the artist as a place of childhood memories. The exhibition includes collected artifacts, real-time images juxtaposed with animations that create a sense of split reality divided by temporal difference.
■ 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 July 14
Photo Courtesy of MUMU Gallery
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