In conjunction with the publication of the new book “YAO JUI-CHUNG", artist Yao Jui-Chung and the book’s chief editor and curator Sophie McIntyre, will be engaged in an exciting conversation for the book launch. This book marks the first comprehensive English-language monograph on Yao Jui-Chung’s artistic endeavors over the past 30 years. It includes color plates, an essay by Sophie McIntyre, as well as an interview between curator Hou Hanru and Yao Jui-Chung.
About "YAO JUI-CHUNG"
Taiwanese contemporary artist Yao Jui-chung has gained international renown for his imaginative, bold and incisive, and often humorous critiques of his country’s complex and contested identity and history. Born in 1969, Yao grew up during a tumultuous period, when Taiwan transformed from authoritarianism to democracy. His art, which comprises photography, video, installation, and painting, draws inspiration from history, politics, and society, and from China’s and Taiwan’s ancient artistic and religious traditions and mythical worlds. As well as being an artist, Yao also works as a curator and writer and has published several books on Taiwanese art.
This monograph is the first-ever comprehensive study of Yao Jui-chung’s work in English, examining his practice over the past three decades. Featuring more than 200 images, it offers an essay by scholar, curator and Taiwan art specialist Sophie McIntyre and an in-depth interview with the artist by Hou Hanru, the artistic director of Rome’s MAXXI. The book will appeal to specialists, collectors, and students of art, as well as scholars and students in Taiwan and China studies, politics, and history.
Yao Jui-Chung graduated from the Taipei National University of the Arts with a degree in art theory, he currently works as an artist and professor at the Department of Fine Arts of the National Taiwan Normal University. Yao specializes in photography, installation, and painting. The themes of his works are varied, but they all examine the absurdity of the human condition. His work is housed in renowned institutions and private collections, including the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei, New Taipei Art Museum, New Taipei City, Taiwan; Taiwan; Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, Kaohsiung, Taiwan; National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, Taichung, Taiwan; Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane, Australia; Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art Collection, Cornell University, U.S.; Bibliothèque National de France, Paris, France. he has exhibited internationally. In 1997, he represented Taiwan in “Facing Faces-Taiwan” at the Venice Biennale. After that, he took part in the International Triennale of Contemporary Art Yokohama (2005), Asia Biennale (2015), Sydney Biennale (2016), 14th Curitiba International Biennial (2019), XIII Krasnoyarsk Museum Biennale (2019), Taipei Biennial (2020), and Jakarta Biennale (2021). He received the Taishin Arts Award (Taiwan) in 2018, and the Arts & Business Awards from the Ministry of Culture of Taiwan in 2019.
About the panelist｜Sophie McIntyre
Sophie McIntyre is Senior Lecturer at Queensland University of Technology, and a curator and writer specialising in art from Taiwan and the Asia-Pacific. She is the author of Yao Jui-chung (姚瑞中) (Scheidegger & Spiess, 2023) and Imagining Taiwan: The Role of Art in Taiwan’s Quest for Identity (Brill, 2018), and she has published widely on visual art, curatorial practice and museology in international journals, books and other publications. Most recently, Sophie initiated and is co-organiser of an ongoing First Nations Arts Exchange research program titled Grounded in Place: Dialogues Between First Nations Artists from Australia and Taiwan, which has included an online international symposium (2021), a publication (Pacific Arts, UCLA, 2022), and two field research trips involving four Indigenous artists from Queensland and Taiwan.
Prior to joining academia full-time, Sophie was an art museum director and curator in universities and public galleries in Australia, Taiwan, and New Zealand. She has curated over 30 exhibitions including: Ink Remix: Contemporary Art from Mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong (touring, 2015–2017); Penumbra: New Media Art from Taiwan (2007); Islanded: Contemporary Art from New Zealand, Singapore and Taiwan (touring 2005–2006, co-curated with Lee Weng Choy and Eugene Tan); and Face to Face: Contemporary Art from Taiwan (touring, 1999–2000). She has received awards and grants for her academic and curatorial projects, and has been a visiting research fellow in universities in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the United Kingdom.
