HIGHLIGHT
After touring the island, CowParade has made its way back to Taipei for Cow for Charity! Forty-two of the 108 iconic fiberglass cows created for CowParade Taipei will be auctioned off on Sept. 6. Proceeds from the auction will go to support four local organizations that promote art education for children: Quanta Culture & Education Foundation (廣達文教基金會), Children’s Art Education Foundation (兒童藝術基金會), Love Life and Da-Yu-Hhuang Children’s Theatrical Company (黃大漁兒童劇團).
Opening bids for the bovines (in three poses — standing, grazing and reclining) range from NT$200,000 to NT$400,000, depending on the pedigree of the artist who created each and the materials used. Taipei is the second Asian city to host the public art exhibit, after Tokyo. Over the past decade, CowParade has seen more than 5,000 beasts designed by roughly 10,000 artists attract half a billion viewers at five dozen exhibitions throughout the globe’s major cities. According to its Web site, CowParade has raised more than US$20 million through charitable organizations and the auction of the cows since its inception as a public art event in 1999.
■ Huashan Culture Park (華山文化園區), 1, Bade Rd Sec 1, Taipei City (台北市八德路一段1號). On the Net: www.cowparade-taipei.com
■ Sept. 6. The auction begins at 2pm
Timed to coincide with Taiwan Designer’s Week, Hacking IKEA 2009 is a group exhibit that seeks to add creativity to standardized and mass-produced objects. Designers from Taiwan, France, Germany and the Netherlands will exhibit commercial products tinged with artistic resonance as a means of offering a different approach to design. Hacking IKEA also seeks to introduce global design concepts and trends to Taiwan and create a platform for designers to show off and share their ideas.
■ Huashan Culture Park (華山文化園區), 1, Bade Rd Sec 1, Taipei City (台北市八德路一段1號). Open daily from 10am to 9:30pm. For more information call Sasson Kung (龔維德) at 0928-616-424 or Lin Yu-chuan (林育全) at 0989-009-617. On the Net:
www.hackingikea.info
■ Friday to Sept. 6
The Fragmentized Illusion (片段的幻象) is a group exhibition of contemporary photography by some of Taiwan’s top photographers, including Mei Dean-E (梅丁衍), Wu Tien-chang (吳天章), Chen Shun-chu (陳順築) and Yao Jui-chang (姚瑞中).
■ Galerie Grand Siecle (新苑藝術), 17, Alley 51, Ln 12, Bade Rd Sec 3, Taipei City (台北市八德路三段12巷51弄17號). Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 1pm to 6pm. Tel: (02) 2578-5630
■ Until Sept. 20
American sculptor and ceramicist Kenneth Baskin explores the integration of actual and abstracted machine parts in a solo exhibition that is part of Yingge Ceramics Museum’s 20th Century Artifacts Series. Objects resembling cogwheels and pinions fired in sea blues, metallic grays and earthy browns serve as metaphors for the relationships of balance and stability, tension and ease and opposition and compromise.
■ Yingge Ceramics Museum (鶯歌陶瓷博物館), 200 Wenhua Rd, Yinge Township, Taipei County (北縣鶯歌鎮文化路200號). Open Tuesdays to Fridays from 9:30am to 5pm and Saturdays and Sundays from 9:30am to 6pm. Tel: (02) 8677-2727
■ Until Oct. 18
Abandoned operating rooms, gas mask-wearing humans in vibrant landscapes and centaurs rummaging through vehicles are among the surrealist scenes depicted in a solo exhibition of oil paintings by Chinese artist Jia Aili (價藹力).
■ Michael Ku Gallery (谷公館), 4F-2, 21, Dunhua S Rd Sec 1, Taipei City (台北市敦化南路一段21號4樓之2). Open Tuesdays through Sundays from 11am to 8pm. Tel: (02) 2577-5601
■ Until Sept. 20
The Simple Art of Parody is a group exhibition by artists from Russia, India, Japan, Singapore and Taiwan that explores the theme of parody — and related ideas such as satire, irony and humor — through installation art, photography, painting and sculpture as a means of revealing the contradictions in contemporary society.
■ Museum of Contemporary Art,
Taipei (MOCA, Taipei), 39 Changan W Rd, Taipei City (台北市長安西路39號). Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 10am to
6pm. Tel: (02) 2552-3721. On the Net: www.mocataipei.org.tw
■ Until Oct. 25
June 9 to June 15 A photo of two men riding trendy high-wheel Penny-Farthing bicycles past a Qing Dynasty gate aptly captures the essence of Taipei in 1897 — a newly colonized city on the cusp of great change. The Japanese began making significant modifications to the cityscape in 1899, tearing down Qing-era structures, widening boulevards and installing Western-style infrastructure and buildings. The photographer, Minosuke Imamura, only spent a year in Taiwan as a cartographer for the governor-general’s office, but he left behind a treasure trove of 130 images showing life at the onset of Japanese rule, spanning July 1897 to
In an interview posted online by United Daily News (UDN) on May 26, current Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) was asked about Taichung Mayor Lu Shiow-yen (盧秀燕) replacing him as party chair. Though not yet officially running, by the customs of Taiwan politics, Lu has been signalling she is both running for party chair and to be the party’s 2028 presidential candidate. She told an international media outlet that she was considering a run. She also gave a speech in Keelung on national priorities and foreign affairs. For details, see the May 23 edition of this column,
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At Computex 2025, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) urged the government to subsidize AI. “All schools in Taiwan must integrate AI into their curricula,” he declared. A few months earlier, he said, “If I were a student today, I’d immediately start using tools like ChatGPT, Gemini Pro and Grok to learn, write and accelerate my thinking.” Huang sees the AI-bullet train leaving the station. And as one of its drivers, he’s worried about youth not getting on board — bad for their careers, and bad for his workforce. As a semiconductor supply-chain powerhouse and AI hub wannabe, Taiwan is seeing
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