At the Taipei International Book Exhibition (TIBE) next month, books would grow into digital forests, turn into games and even be served like a balanced meal, organizers said at a preview yesterday.
For the 34th edition of the TIBE this year, Thailand is to be the guest of honor, with the event centered on the theme “Reading is Amazing,” the Ministry of Culture and Taipei Book Fair Foundation said.
The ministry held a news conference in Taipei to introduce the pavilions and themed areas of the exhibition, to be held from Feb. 3 to 8 at the Taipei World Trade Center.
Photo courtesy of the Taipei Book Fair Foundation
TIBE combines exhibits, sales and interactive events, showcasing Taiwan’s thriving publishing industry and featuring pavilions designed around contemporary issues, the ministry said.
The children’s pavilion is set up like a food market, with six stalls each featuring six books on specific topics, including emotional development, creativity and imagination, curatorial consultant Ko Chien-hua (柯倩華) said.
Each book is paired with a dish from vegetables to desserts, encouraging kids to peruse a well-rounded selection of books that can help them grow, as a balanced, nutritional meal does, Ko said.
The digital pavilion uses sound with the theme “voices from the pages,” integrating artificial intelligence (AI) to transform readers’ voices into digital trees, National Tsing Hua University Graduate Institute of Art and Technology professor Tseng Yu-chang (曾鈺涓) said.
AI would analyze the voice of each reader at the pavilion to generate a unique tree, creating an immersive forest where visitors can see, hear and smell stories, Tseng said.
The Taiwan comics pavilion, organized by the Taiwan Creative Content Agency, is centered on the idea of chasing celebrities, characters and products, inviting readers to follow comics like they would idols, agency comic marketing director Wen Chun-ya (溫淳雅) said.
With a stage set up in the pavilion, it would feature nine events including book signings, dialogues with authors and performances, Wen said.
The literature area, curated by the National Museum of Taiwan Literature, is themed on traveling through books with the slogan “wandering words, free spirits,” museum director Chen Ying-fang (陳瑩芳) said.
It is to feature nearly 100 works selected by the museum presenting the life experiences of Taiwanese writers, Chen said.
The area would also include 39 talks by 52 speakers, she added.
The civic book area brings together independent publishers, non-government organizations and independent bookstores, Indie Publishers Association of Taiwan managing director Liu Tzu-hua (劉子華) said.
It is centered around roads, traffic and stations, with the idea that reading can help people navigate through difficult roadblocks in life, Liu said.
TIBE would also include rest areas where visitors can read, a book prize winners pavilion and an international book area, Taipei Book Fair Foundation CEO Hsu Wen-chen (徐文貞) said.
This year’s exhibition has invited 92-year-old author and teacher Huang Chun-ming (黃春明) and picture-book author Lai Ma (賴馬) to serve as reading ambassadors, each recommending 10 books that would be displayed in the rest areas, Hsu said.
The exhibition is free for children under 18, people with disabilities and their primary caregiver, as well as same-day travelers from outside of Taipei, New Taipei City and Keelung who present a train ticket, she said.
In addition, this year’s exhibition would feature an all-new mobile game, The Enemy of All Readers, Taipei Legend Studio creator Hsiao Hsiang-shen (瀟湘神) said.
The game, like a reading version of Pokemon, would send players to different areas within the exhibition and in Taipei to get to know the local book culture and battle enemies, Hsiao said.
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