In addition to lost-wax casting, which is favored by Tittot artists in Taipei, there are a number of modern techniques adopted by glass artists world-wide.
Of the three most important glass art centers in the world today, Prague, with a 400-year-old tradition in the industry, is best-known for its outstanding cutting techniques. Venice, on the other hand, possesses expertise in glass-blowing as well as hot forming. Seattle is distinguished for its installed art.
Sunny Wang (王鈴蓁), a Taiwan- and Australia-trained artist, says that compared with ceramics, mastering glass art techniques is more difficult and time consuming. It requires more expensive hardware and the cost of good-quality glass granules or powder is 10 times higher than the price of pottery clay in Taiwan.
Furthermore, the time taken for glass to anneal is around three days, whereas ceramics usually take one day. This means that the electricity bill for glasswork is up to three times higher than that of ceramic workshops. Also, glass art objects are generally cheaper than ceramic artifacts in Taiwan, which could be an indication that the local market for top-quality glasswork has not ripened yet.
Nevertheless, Wang still prefers glass art production. "I am simply fascinated by the transparency, rich colors and the unusual sense of space that glassware presents. It really cannot be found in any ceramic artworks."
President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday delivered an address marking the first anniversary of his presidency. In the speech, Lai affirmed Taiwan’s global role in technology, trade and security. He announced economic and national security initiatives, and emphasized democratic values and cross-party cooperation. The following is the full text of his speech: Yesterday, outside of Beida Elementary School in New Taipei City’s Sanxia District (三峽), there was a major traffic accident that, sadly, claimed several lives and resulted in multiple injuries. The Executive Yuan immediately formed a task force, and last night I personally visited the victims in hospital. Central government agencies and the
Australia’s ABC last week published a piece on the recall campaign. The article emphasized the divisions in Taiwanese society and blamed the recall for worsening them. It quotes a supporter of the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) as saying “I’m 43 years old, born and raised here, and I’ve never seen the country this divided in my entire life.” Apparently, as an adult, she slept through the post-election violence in 2000 and 2004 by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), the veiled coup threats by the military when Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) became president, the 2006 Red Shirt protests against him ginned up by
As with most of northern Thailand’s Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) settlements, the village of Arunothai was only given a Thai name once the Thai government began in the 1970s to assert control over the border region and initiate a decades-long process of political integration. The village’s original name, bestowed by its Yunnanese founders when they first settled the valley in the late 1960s, was a Chinese name, Dagudi (大谷地), which literally translates as “a place for threshing rice.” At that time, these village founders did not know how permanent their settlement would be. Most of Arunothai’s first generation were soldiers
Among Thailand’s Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) villages, a certain rivalry exists between Arunothai, the largest of these villages, and Mae Salong, which is currently the most prosperous. Historically, the rivalry stems from a split in KMT military factions in the early 1960s, which divided command and opium territories after Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) cut off open support in 1961 due to international pressure (see part two, “The KMT opium lords of the Golden Triangle,” on May 20). But today this rivalry manifests as a different kind of split, with Arunothai leading a pro-China faction and Mae Salong staunchly aligned to Taiwan.
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