Two artists have accused the Taiwan Railways Administration (TRA) of sabotaging their artworks in New Taipei City’s Banciao Station (板橋) by making modifications unilaterally and not informing the artists first.
The artworks — three created by artist Kristy Chu (曲家瑞) and one by artist Huang Ming-che (黃銘哲) — were used by the Ministry of Transportaion and Communications’ Railway Reconstruction Bureau to decorate the then-newly built Banciao Station in 2002.
However, two of Chu’s works were recently found to have been covered up by canvas, and the piece Have You Eaten Yet? (呷飽沒) was missing.
Photo: Huang Li-hsiang, Taipei Times
The lower part of Huang’s piece was removed because the TRA said it was obstructing passengers walking in the station. The artwork had cost about NT$14 million (US$460,000) to construct.
Huang said in an interview with the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) that he had absolutely no idea that his artwork, titled Desire is Flying (慾望在飛行) was being modified.
He said the modification was “a brutal act” and that the TRA had failed to recognize the passion of the artist and had killed it instead.
Chu, who is known for being frank and outspoken, said the TRA showed no respect to artists.
She said that one of her artworks in the station, Graduation Class of 2010 (畢業班2010), took her about eight months to complete as she needed to go to an elementary school in Banciao and create work based on the images of the students, adding it also helped her win the Public Art Award for involving public participation in the creation of the pieces.
Chu said she spent about two years working on the other two pieces, On the Way Home (回家路上) and Have You Eaten Yet? which were inspired by the faces of people on the streets.
The TRA might as well give these works back to her if it does not appreciate them, so that she can sell them and donate the money to disadvantaged children in remote areas, she said.
In response, TRA Director-General Chou Yung-hui (周永暉) said the agency needs to review how it places public art, but he said the allegation of sabotaging the artwork was exagerrated.
He said the TRA had in the past adjusted the locations in which some of the works were placed because they could get in the way of people using the station.
Chou said the TRA had moved the lower half of Huang’s artwork a long time ago, adding that it is unlikely to put that part back because it prevented passengers from moving around the station freely.
He also said that the canvases covering Chu’s Graduation Class 2010 and On the Way Home would be removed immediately.
The lower part of Desire is Flying and Chu’s piece Have You Eaten Yet? should still be in storage, Chou added.
According to the TRA, the lower part of Desire is Flying was only 1.8m above the ground when the piece was installed in the station, and many passengers complained that they hit their heads on it.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching