The grand opening of the Tainan Main Municipal Library today is to feature exhibitions on James Maxwell, a Scottish Presbyterian missionary and physician, and the literature of Tainan’s coastal areas, the Tainan Cultural Affairs Bureau said yesterday.
The new main library in the city’s Yongkang District (永康), built on a site formerly occupied by an army artillery school, cost about NT$1.93 billion (US$67.7 million), the bureau said.
Co-organized with the Presbyterian Church in Taiwan, the exhibition on Maxwell is a tribute to his life and work in Taiwan, and marks the 100th anniversary of his passing, Cultural Research Division director He Yi-fen (何宜芳) said.
Photo: Wu Chun-feng, Taipei Times
Maxwell is best known in Tainan for in 1865 founding the Khoan-sai Street Clinic, the first modern hospital in Taiwan and the predecessor to today’s Tainan Sin-lau Christian Hospital.
Maxwell was also an advocate of malaria prevention and banning opium, He said, adding that the bureau in 2014 listed him as a significant figure in Tainan’s history.
The Presbyterian Church is also to hold a series of concerts, lectures and events focused on family histories, she said.
The main library’s other exhibition, on the “Saline Land” literary movement that originated in Tainan’s coastal townships during the Japanese colonial era, is to showcase more than 500 titles by renowned authors, the bureau said.
The library is to display texts authored by Gustave Cheng (鄭順聰), illustrations of Tainan’s coastal landscape by Da Chang (大昌) and installation art pieces, the bureau said.
The artworks and texts have been selected to evoke memories of Tainan, and visitors are encouraged to take selfies with the pieces, the bureau said.
Separately, an exhibition titled “Facets of Authority: A Special Exhibition of Imperial Portraits from the Nanxun Hall” opened yesterday at the National Palace Museum in Taipei, showcasing the cultural changes across Chinese dynasties.
The 25 artworks exhibited are listed either as national treasures or important artifacts, and are part of a collection brought from the Forbidden City in Beijing decades ago, the museum said in a statement.
Dubbed an “all-star” ensemble by the museum, emperors and empresses from the Song, Yuan and Ming dynasties are depicted in the portraits, as well as Xia Dynasty founder Yu the Great (禹王) and Tangtaizong (唐太宗), the second emperor of the Tang Dynasty.
The portraits from the Song Dynasty show details such as an undershirt, woven from golden threads, protruding from the sleeves of an outer garment, and delicate cushions on a seat, which illustrate “low-key luxury,” the museum said.
The portraits from the Yuan Dynasty highlight the rulers’ Mongolian heritage, while the four portraits from the Ming Dynasty call attention to changes in fashion, the museum said.
Highlighting the distinguished style of powerful people, the exhibition is curated to give visitors a deeper perspective on time-specific clothing, composure, extravagance, symbols and materials, it said.
For visually impaired visitors, the museum would provide a special audio guide and replicas of the chairs in the portraits, which visitors are allowed to touch, it added.
The exhibition runs through April 6.
The Grand Hotel Taipei on Saturday confirmed that its information system had been illegally accessed and expressed its deepest apologies for the concern it has caused its customers, adding that the issue is being investigated by the Ministry of Justice Investigation Bureau. The hotel said that on Tuesday last week, it had discovered an external illegal intrusion into its information system. An initial digital forensic investigation confirmed that parts of the system had been accessed, it said, adding that the possibility that some customer data were stolen and leaked could not be ruled out. The actual scope and content of the affected data
DO THEY BITE IT? Cats have better memories than people might think, but their motivation is based entirely around the chance of getting fed Cats can remember the identity of the people who fed them the day before, Taipei-based veterinarians said on Friday, debunking a popular myth that cats have a short memory. If a stray does not recognize the person who fed them the previous day, it is likely because they are not carrying food and the cat has no reason to recognize them, said Wu Chou Animal Hospital head Chen Chen-huan (陳震寰). “When cats come to a human bearing food, it is coming for the food, not the person,” he said. “The food is the key.” Since the cat’s attention is on the food, it
A New York-based NGO has launched a global initiative to rename the nation’s overseas missions, most of which operate under the name "Taipei," to "Taiwan Representative Office (TRO)," according to a news release. Ming Chiang (江明信), CEO of Hello Taiwan, announced the campaign at a news conference in Berlin on Monday, coinciding with the World Forum held from Monday through Wednesday, the institution stated in the release. Speaking at the event, Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Huang Jie (黃捷) said she believed this renaming campaign would enable the international community to see Taiwan
TOO DANGEROUS: The families agreed to suspend crewed recovery efforts that could put rescuers in danger from volcanic gases and unstable terrain The bodies of two Taiwanese tourists and a Japanese pilot have been located inside a volcanic crater, Japanese authorities said yesterday, nearly a month after a sightseeing helicopter crashed during a flight over southwestern Japan. Drone footage taken at the site showed three bodies near the wreckage of the aircraft inside a crater on Mount Aso in Kumamoto Prefecture, police and fire officials said. The helicopter went missing on Jan. 20 and was later found on a steep slope inside the Nakadake No. 1 Crater, about 50m below the rim. Authorities said that conditions at the site made survival highly unlikely, and ruled
RSS