Chu Chun-teng (朱駿騰) is showing his latest multi-channel video installation in his solo show August 15 (八月十五). The work is based on the disappearance of an elderly man. Chu started an investigation and uncovered security footage that caught the last sighting of the man. Recordings of his family recount their final moments with him and the ensuing search, while another part of the installation follows elderly people with mental disabilities around a nursing home. August 15 is a powerful conceptual work that examines the fragility of our mental state and raises awareness of dementia and mental wellbeing.
■ Meme Space (覓空間), 12F, 9, Roosevelt Rd Sec 2, Taipei City (台北市羅斯福路二段9號12樓); tel: (02) 2396-5505. Open Mondays to Saturdays from 11am to 6pm
■ Until Sept. 23
Photo courtesy of the artist and National Museum of History
Kao Jun-honn (高俊宏) is showing his latest installations and video works in Abandoned Path: A Creator’s Geopolitical Method (棄路：一位創作者的地理政治之用). Kao’s practice is meticulous and carefully planned. In his 2014 video Dual 1984, he merged two separate events from the UK and Taiwan — an accidental explosion at a coal mine that killed many and news footage of coal mining strikes, as well as interviews with people who discuss both events. The result is an eerie statement about the politics of energy.
■ Asia Art Center I (亞洲藝術中心一館) 177, Jianguo S Rd Sec 2, Taipei City (台北市建國南路二段177號), tel: (02) 2754-1366. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 10am to 6:30pm
■ Until Sept. 24
Photo courtesy of the artist and Kuandu Museum of Fine Arts
Hsieh Mu-chi (謝牧岐) is showing new acrylic paintings in his solo show Unforgotten (忘山). Hsieh’s landscape paintings ponder the genre itself, where the mind of the artist is part of the scenery, and effectively distorting the boundary between reality and representation.
The solo exhibition I’m Here (我就在這兒) features a survey of Chinese artist Mao Xuhui’s (毛旭輝) oil paintings. As one of the pioneers of Chinese contemporary art, Mao represents abstract ideas and concepts — an overturned chair or scissors, for example, may represent death or loss of power. His works are melancholy, due in part to the tragic loss of his daughter.
Things Wholesale (好多事量販) is a solo show of Lee Ming-hsueh’s (李明學) conceptual installations. Fascinated by mass consumerism, Lee depicts candy, stationary, cleaning supplies and coins as elements of desire. By employing these seemingly benign objects, the artist questions the perception and reality of consumer culture among other issues.
Photo courtesy of Bluerider Art Gallery
■ Kuandu Museum of Fine Arts (關渡美術館), 1 Xueyuan Rd, Taipei City (台北市學園路1號), tel: (02) 2896-1000 X 2432. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 10am to 5pm
■ All exhibitions until Sept. 24
Swiss installation artist Marck will present mixed media installation works in The Box, his first solo show in Taiwan. Marck’s installations are made with LCD panels, sand, wood, electronic devices and steel are trade marks of Marck’s highly recognizable style. His integration of humans in mechanical environments questions the human condition and the relationship between humans and our inventions.
Photo courtesy of the artist and Kuandu Museum of Fine Arts
■ Bluerider Art Gallery (藍騎士藝術空間), 9F, 25-1, Renai Rd Sec 4, Taipei City (台北市仁愛路四段25-1號9樓), tel: (02) 2752-2238. Open Tuesdays to Saturdays from 9am to 6pm
■ Opening reception tomorrow from 4-6pm. Until Oct. 28
Mind Roaming in Nature (自然心遊) is a solo exhibition by Lo I-hui, (羅一慧). Lo’s semi-representational landscapes suggest a natural environment that has been deteriorating.
Photo courtesy of In River Gallery
■ In River Gallery (穎川畫廊), 2F, 45, Renai Rd Sec 1, Taipei City (台北市仁愛路一段45號2樓), tel: (02) 2357-9900. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 1pm to 8pm
■ Until Oct. 4
Lee Shien-wen (李賢文) is showing his ink paintings at the National Museum of History in a show titled Dreaming Back to Nature (返回自然之夢). Lee examines religious themes that are rendered in a simple style that is similar to illustration, offering a view of the natural world that is fresh and uplifting.
■ National Museum of History (國立歷史博物館), 49 Nanhai Rd, Taipei City (台北市南海路49號), tel: (02) 2361-0270. Open Tuesdays to Sundays from 10 am to 6pm
■ Until Sept. 24
Sept.16 to Sept. 22 The “anti-communist train” with then-president Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) face plastered on the engine puffed along the “sugar railway” (糖業鐵路) in May 1955, drawing enthusiastic crowds at 103 stops covering nearly 1,200km. An estimated 1.58 million spectators were treated to propaganda films, plays and received free sugar products. By this time, the state-run Taiwan Sugar Corporation (台糖, Taisugar) had managed to connect the previously separate east-west lines established by Japanese-era sugar factories, allowing the anti-communist train to travel easily from Taichung to Pingtung’s Donggang Township (東港). Last Sunday’s feature (Taiwan in Time: The sugar express) covered the inauguration of the
The corruption cases surrounding former Taipei Mayor and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) head Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) are just one item in the endless cycle of noise and fuss obscuring Taiwan’s deep and urgent structural and social problems. Even the case itself, as James Baron observed in an excellent piece at the Diplomat last week, is only one manifestation of the greater problem of deep-rooted corruption in land development. Last week the government announced a program to permit 25,000 foreign university students, primarily from the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia, to work in Taiwan after graduation for 2-4 years. That number is a
This year’s Michelin Gourmand Bib sported 16 new entries in the 126-strong Taiwan directory. The fight for the best braised pork rice and the crispiest scallion pancake painstakingly continued, but what stood out in the lineup this year? Pang Taqueria (胖塔可利亞); Taiwan’s first Michelin-recommended Mexican restaurant. Chef Charles Chen (陳治宇) is a self-confessed Americophile, earning his chef whites at a fine-dining Latin-American fusion restaurant. But what makes this Xinyi (信義) spot stand head and shoulders above Taipei’s existing Mexican offerings? The authenticity. The produce. The care. AUTHENTIC EATS In my time on the island, I have caved too many times to
In a stark demonstration of how award-winning breakthroughs can come from the most unlikely directions, researchers have won an Ig Nobel prize for discovering that mammals can breathe through their anuses. After a series of tests on mice, rats and pigs, Japanese scientists found the animals absorb oxygen delivered through the rectum, work that underpins a clinical trial to see whether the procedure can treat respiratory failure. The team is among 10 recognized in this year’s Ig Nobel awards (see below for more), the irreverent accolades given for achievements that “first make people laugh, and then make them think.” They are not
RSS