Eslite Gallery presents The Universe in a Grain of Dust (世界微塵裡), a retrospective of the late Taiwanese painter Lee An-cheng (李安成). Lee grew up around an elder brother who was keen on fostering an appreciation of the arts among his younger siblings. In their household, materials for painting and calligraphy were readily available, while Lee showed promising talent in both areas at an early age. Lee’s 1987 debut solo exhibition garnered considerable attention in ink art circles. Despite being trained in traditional techniques, Lee showed little interest in copying past styles and showed originality and modern spirit. He drew from his own lived experiences, including childhood memories and observations of his surrounding environment. Lee enjoyed a career of several stylistic phases, from early figures and landscapes works to later years of free, wild brushstrokes that express a sense of artistic freedom. The exhibition includes works entrusted by the artist to the gallery.
■ Eslite Gallery (誠品畫廊), 5F, 11 Songgao Rd, Taipei City (台北市松高路11號5樓), tel: (02) 8789-3388. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 11am to 7pm
■ Starts tomorrow. Until Oct. 13
Photo Courtesy of Eslite Gallery
Over the last four years, Galerie Nichido Taipei has maintained an ongoing program of guest-curated shows that encourage deeper cultural exchange between Japan and Taiwan. A new show curated by Guo Jau-lan (郭昭蘭) opens tomorrow. Rotating Exploded View Diagram of Historiography (旋轉歷史編撰學的爆炸圖) is a group exhibition that seeks to present art in the context of a historical mapping. Referencing a schematic diagram style called exploded view, in which components are rendered in a deconstructed three dimensional model, Guo sees the exhibition as an analytical space where relationships and order are emphasized. Show highlights include Hotel Edgar Quintet, a painting of a Parisian hotel by prominent 20th century Japanese artist Leonard Tsuguharu Foujita. Taipei-based artist Au Sow-yee (區秀詒) presents an extension of her 2018 work, Nanyang Intelligence Bureau (南洋情報交換所) that focuses on power relations between Japan, Taiwan, countries of the ASEAN group and the politics that concern their surrounding seas.
■ Galerie Nichido Taipei (台北日動畫廊), 3F, 57, Dunhua S Rd Sec 1, Taipei City (台北市敦化南路一段57號3樓), tel: (02) 2579-8795. Open Tuesdays to Saturdays from 11am to 7pm
■ Starts tomorrow. Until Oct. 20
Photo Courtesy of Taipei Fine Arts Museum
Presently on view at Tina Keng Gallery is a solo exhibition by Lin Ju (林鉅). Lin is known for his distinct painting style that often shows obscure or mysterious symbols adapted from various world religions and myths. Flowing Reformation (九節拂風) draws its Chinese title from Buddhist breathing exercises that the artist practices, and involves nine cycles of breathing. This method is related to ideas of self-generation and immortality, a central theme in Lin’s artistic practice. “Twice I’ve come into this world,” he once said. “Chaotic the first time, estranged the second.” A selection of works inspired by Lin’s recent encounter of Sanyu’s (常玉) paintings last year at the gallery will be on display. These works are double sided, showing a painting on one side of the canvas and drafts and drawings on the other, which, when combined, reveal an intriguing process of thought and action.
■ Tina Keng Gallery (耿畫廊), 15, Ln 548, Ruiguang Rd, Taipei City (台北市瑞光路548巷15號), tel: (02) 2659-0798. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 10am to 7pm
■ Until Oct. 6
Photo Courtesy of Taipei Fine Arts Museum
Huang Hua-chen (黃華真) is a Taipei-based painter and lecturer whose recent works convey her spiritual contemplations based on the Christian faith. Her solo exhibition, In Wilderness: Beam Through the Dust (曠野的溫柔), at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum includes works that reference stories from the Old Testament. Huang examines biblical anecdotes to examine her own doubt, anger and fatigue, and how has art helped her mediate such periods of struggles and transformation.
■ 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 Nov. 3
Photo Courtesy of Tina Keng Gallery
Sera Chen (陳郁文) creates video installations, photographs and new media works that explore the dynamics and relationships between man, nature and society. Her solo exhibition, Everyday Fictionality: Beholding Shadows of Illusion (日常的虛構重建:虛與實的感知體系), features a video installation that reveals an interplay between readymade objects, virtual objects and appropriated objects, as well as an encounter between computer rendered realities and physical spaces. The show examines the changing definitions of nature, artificiality, reality and simulation.
■ 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 Nov. 3
A few weeks ago I found myself at a Family Mart talking with the morning shift worker there, who has become my coffee guy. Both of us were in a funk over the “unseasonable” warm weather, a state of mind known as “solastalgia” — distress produced by environmental change. In fact, the weather was not that out of the ordinary in boiling Central Taiwan, and likely cooler than the temperatures we will experience in the near-future. According to the Taiwan Adaptation Platform, between 1957 and 2006, summer lengthened by 27.8 days, while winter shrunk by 29.7 days. Winter is not
Taiwan’s post-World War II architecture, “practical, cheap and temporary,” not to mention “rather forgettable.” This was a characterization recently given by Taiwan-based historian John Ross on his Formosa Files podcast. Yet the 1960s and 1970s were, in fact, the period of Taiwan’s foundational building boom, which, to a great extent, defined the look of Taiwan’s cities, determining the way denizens live today. During this period, functionalist concrete blocks and Chinese nostalgia gave way to new interpretations of modernism, large planned communities and high-rise skyscrapers. It is currently the subject of a new exhibition at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Modern
March 25 to March 31 A 56-year-old Wu Li Yu-ke (吳李玉哥) was straightening out her artist son’s piles of drawings when she inadvertently flipped one over, revealing the blank backside of the paper. Absent-mindedly, she picked up a pencil and recalled how she used to sketch embroidery designs for her clothing business. Without clients and budget or labor constraints to worry about, Wu Li drew freely whatever image came to her mind. With much more free time now that her son had found a job, she found herself missing her home village in China, where she
In recent years, Slovakia has been seen as a highly democratic and Western-oriented Central European country. This image was reinforced by the election of the country’s first female president in 2019, efforts to provide extensive assistance to Ukraine and the strengthening of relations with Taiwan, all of which strengthened Slovakia’s position within the European Union. However, the latest developments in the country suggest that the situation is changing rapidly. As such, the presidential elections to be held on March 23 will be an indicator of whether Slovakia remains in the Western sphere of influence or moves eastward, notably towards Russia and