Taipei Contemporary Art Center (台北當代藝術中心) launches the first iteration of Female Avatars’ Futurist Statement (女頭目的未來學), a program of exhibitions and workshops that explore new directions in feminist thought. The center describes modern societies as dominated by capitalism and information technology, while people live in conditions in which equality and diversity are compromised. The program hopes to “unite leaders and art workers who share a vision of matrilineal production.” The program includes a lineup of female artists who grew up during the rise of Internet and have been affected by cross-cultural life experiences. The first is a solo exhibition, You Are My Sunshine, by Wang Pei-hsuan (王佩瑄). Wang is a Taipei-based artist who examines portraiture, landscape and migrating bodies in the context of personal experiences and mainstream narratives. She creates poetic scenarios by dissembling and reassembling materials, images and objects. The show focuses on Wang’s ongoing project based on her family’s experiences of migration and her relationship with her niece, whom she views as her alter ego. A talk is scheduled for tomorrow; for more details please visit: www.tcac.tw.
■ Taipei Contemporary Art Center (台北當代藝術中心), 11, Ln 49, Baoan Street, Taipei City (台北市保安街49巷11號), tel: (02) 2550-1231. Open Wednesday to Sunday from 1pm to 7pm
■ Until June 30
Photo Courtesy of Powen Gallery
Co-organized by Hong Kong’s alternative space Para Site, Hong Gah Museum (鳳甲美術館) presents Two Exhibitions: Chris Evans, Pak Sheung-chuen (Chris Evans, 白雙全:雙個展), which expands on the show’s debut at Para Site in 2017. The current version includes new commissions by both artists and works specific to the context of Taiwan. Chris Evans is a London-based artist who creates sculptures, letters, drawings, film scripts and social situations that evolve through conversations with specific people selected by their public image or symbolic role in society. Jingle (Hong-gah museum) is a sensor-activated broadcast that announces the arrival and exit of visitors to the exhibition. The broadcast is based on a recording Evans made of a Taiwanese farmer, an occupation that the artist associates with financial stability. Also included in the exhibition are two airbrush paintings that depict Taiwan’s cityscape from the perspective of life insurance companies. Pak is a Hong-kong based artist known for presenting documents and readymade objects associated with his own experiences. After the failure of Hong Kong’s Umbrella Movement in 2014, the artist entered “an aesthetic pilgrimage of self-healing” that began with making observational drawings of court proceedings that involved political activists, writes the museum’s press release. Pak presents a series of furniture, drawings and wallpapers based on his conversations with Lam Tse Kin (林子健), a member of Hong Kong’s opposition Democratic Party who was charged with misleading police in March; and Lam Wing Kei (林榮基), former manager of Causeway Bay Books, a Hong Kong bookstore known for carrying books on philosophy, history and banned literature.
■ Hong Gah Museum (鳳甲美術館), 11F, 166 Daye Rd, Taipei City (台北市大業路166號11樓), tel: (02) 2894-2272. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 10:30am t’’o 5:30pm
■ Until July 28
Photo Courtesy of Mind Set Art Center
Dissociate — Imaging (解離—成像), a solo exhibition by Taipei-based artist Jhong Jiang-Ze (鍾江澤) is currently on view at Mind Set Art Center (安卓藝術). Jhong’s paintings depict the various ways people perceive and react to the world. “A subject with clear definition is not my interest, because the darkness inspires more…imagination,” writes the artist, who believes that the realm of mystery and ambiguity grants a sense of creative freedom. The new works were are inspired by film stills from popular movies, such as Clockwork Orange, 2001: A Space Odyssey and Psycho because of the unique aura these images possess that is specific to the online cinematic experience. Jhong’s paintings seek to interpret the texture of images seen through his monitor, often characterized by low-resolution, rugged pixilation and double vision.
■ Mind Set Art Center (安卓藝術) 108, Heping E Rd, Taipei City (台北市和平東路108號), tel: (02) 2365-6008. Open Tuesdays to Saturdays from 11am to 6pm
■ Until July 6
Photo Courtesy of Asia Art Center
Noriyuki Haraguchi is a post-war Japanese artist and iconic figure of Mono-ha, a Tokyo-based art movement in the 60’s and 70’s. The term ‘Mono-ha’ literally refers to “the study of things” and artists involved focused on exploring the materiality of natural and industrial materials. Haraguchi began exhibiting his works during the rise of campus protests against the Vietnam War and the Japan-US Security Treaty in the late 1960’s. His early paintings and sculptures drew from the aesthetics of heavy industrial materials, including I-beams, car parts, waste oil, polyurethane and rubber. In the 1970s, Haraguchi became internationally known for Matter and Mind, which consisted of a pool of waste oil. Haraguchi’s current solo exhibition, Substance and Motion (物,及其動勢) at Asia Art Center II (亞洲藝術中心二館), features 21 new works. Abandoned, neglected or forgotten objects are repurposed as parts of artworks to evoke memories of the past and offer reinterpretations of history. Iron, wood and polyurethane continue to maintain a prominent presence in his work; though in his newest work, the glossy surface of industrial materials are dulled and muted.
■ Asia Art Center II (亞洲藝術中心二館), 93, Lequn 2nd Rd, Taipei City (台北市樂群二路93號), tel: (02) 8502-7939. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 10am to 6:30pm
■ until June 30
Photo Courtesy of Hong Gah Museum
Hsu Hsin-wen (許馨文) is a Taiwanese artist with a background in graphic design. She creates sculptures and installations made with everyday objects, such as pencils, waters pipes, branches and paper. Hsu uses the familiarity of these objects as a tool to create a sense of resonance with viewers. Her solo exhibition, Conversation of Split & Illusion (拋 — 物) on view at Powen Gallery (紅野畫廊), features a network of everyday objects, which the gallery describes as a landscape of relationships. The show also includes a series of sculptures made with segments of transparent water pipes that evoke cell activity. A Square, for example, depicts a cross section of water pipes framed in a rectangular glass box. The exhibition preface draws references to the process of cell division, in which new bodies are created and new energy generated. While associating with biological perspectives of life and creation, the works can also be appreciated purely for their aesthetics. Scenery in Memory is an arrangement of elastic tubes that resemble an ocean wave.
■ Powen Gallery (紅野畫廊), 11, Ln 164, Songjiang Rd, Taipei (臺北市松江路164巷11號), tel: (02) 2523-6009. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 10am to 7pm.
■ Until June 30
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
Ahead of incoming president William Lai’s (賴清德) inauguration on May 20 there appear to be signs that he is signaling to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and that the Chinese side is also signaling to the Taiwan side. This raises a lot of questions, including what is the CCP up to, who are they signaling to, what are they signaling, how with the various actors in Taiwan respond and where this could ultimately go. In the last column, published on May 2, we examined the curious case of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) heavyweight Tseng Wen-tsan (鄭文燦) — currently vice premier
The last time Mrs Hsieh came to Cihu Park in Taoyuan was almost 50 years ago, on a school trip to the grave of Taiwan’s recently deceased dictator. Busloads of children were brought in to pay their respects to Chiang Kai-shek (蔣中正), known as Generalissimo, who had died at 87, after decades ruling Taiwan under brutal martial law. “There were a lot of buses, and there was a long queue,” Hsieh recalled. “It was a school rule. We had to bow, and then we went home.” Chiang’s body is still there, under guard in a mausoleum at the end of a path
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