Taiwan is preparing for its vibrant exhibition at the Venice Biennale which opens in 2 weeks. The Venice Biennale is to the art world like the Cannes Festival is to film: incredibly prestigious and well attended by arts professionals and art lovers. This is why the Taiwan Pavilion located at the Palazzo delle Prigione, a former royal prison close to the San Marco Plaza, becomes an important venue for Taiwanese artists to exhibit internationally every two years.
Running from June 15 to Nov. 2, the 50th Venice Biennale is divided into two sections: numerous national pavilions (independently run by the participating countries) and an international exhibition with the theme, Dreams and Conflicts: The Viewer's Dictatorship.
PHOTO COURTESY OF TFAM
Even though the Venice Biennale has been held for over a century, Taiwan is a relative newcomer, having only exhibited since 1995. Under the auspices of the Taipei Fine Arts Museum (TFAM), the art chosen for the Taiwan pavilion undergoes a democratic selection process whereby a committee of art professionals selects proposals from invited curators. The chosen curator then works with the museum and the artists, and within a period of six months, the team creates the exhibition, the catalog, invitations and construction plans, and then installs the work on site.
PHOTO COURTESY OF TFAM
This year, Taiwan's exhibition, titled Limbo Zone, was curated by Lin Shu-min (林書民), a holographic artist who exhibited at the Taiwan Pavilion in 2001. The four selected Taiwanese artists, Yuan Goang-ming (袁廣鳴), Daniel Lee (李小境), Lee Ming-Wei (李明維) and Cheang Shu-Lea (鄭淑麗), have studied and exhibited abroad. Lin and both Lees live in NY, Cheang lives in London and only Yuan is based in Taiwan.
Asked about the Taiwanese artists who no longer live in Taiwan, Lin said "Where you are doesn't really affect your cultural roots." His selection reflects the demographic fact that many Taiwanese artists are increasingly studying and making art abroad, while still maintaining their ties with Taiwan.
This would have been the first year China had a national pavilion, but they cancelled due to the SARS situation; however, there are many Chinese artists represented in the international exhibition. Lin said that during the past few weeks Taiwan had to make contingency plans due to SARS. He's grateful that the Taiwan Pavilion can proceed as originally planned, and expressed regret that the China Pavilion (which was to have been located near the Taiwan Pavilion) had to withdraw. "The Taiwan and China Pavilions can draw international attention to contemporary Chinese art."
Being both an artist and a curator has made Lin more sensitive to seeing all the aspects of the art process from conception to the total exhibition including written statements, spatial design, relationships of work and lighting. He chose the artists due to their exploration via their technological and conceptual media which straddles the limbo between dreaming and the inevitable conflicts that arise, thus creating art that precariously wavers between dystopia and utopia.
Yuan Goang-Ming's digital photo series City Disqualified shows the busy urban Hsimen District by day and by night, completely devoid of human inhabitants, a city that is silent, that is unfit. In Human Disqualified a moving scanner shines a light onto the photoluminescent pigment on the wall, making the image of the city appear and disappear by turns.
New York-based photographer, Daniel Lee, will exhibit Origin, a video installation about the evolution of the species and 108 Windows, which is based on the legend of the 108 Beings of the five underworlds from the Hanshan Temple in China. At the tone of a bell, a computer-altered image of a human face combined with an animal will be projected in a darkened room. Lee's trans-species images evoke the mapping of the human genome and the dangerous territory into which technology is leading us. The tone of the bell perhaps then becomes a warning signal.
Cheang Shu-Lea, who cast a porn film at TFAM for the Taipei Biennial 2000, will exhibit her interactive futuristic project Garlic = Rich Air. In the year 2030, all global currencies have crashed, leaving garlic as the only legitimate currency. Signing on to the Web gives one 10,000 Garlic Creditos which can be exchanged for real cloves of fresh Italian-grown garlic. Several computers and plasma screens will be installed so that viewers can participate in this online game which links the global economy, stock market trading, Internet technology, consumption and sci-fi fantasy.
Lee Ming-Wei will exhibit The Sleeping Project, a conceptual interactive work where the intimacy of sleep shared with a different stranger takes place every night for two weeks. The room will contain two beds that combine the design elements of a Ming Dynasty luohan bed and a gondola. Lee and his chosen guest will spend the night together in the Prigione, and, in exchange for a good night's sleep, the guest is invited to display his or her personal items in one of the fourteen cabinets for the remainder of the exhibition.
For further information about the Venice Biennale visit www.labiennale.org.
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