“Every living being is an artist - an artist in the sense that he can develop his own capacity.” —Joseph Beuys
Thinking originates from human’s confusion. When one is aware that there’s more to everything than meets the eye, the desire to seek answers is generated. Thinking opens the window to the world for human, making us the vessel of understanding of oneself, the surroundings and our collective consciousness. An artist’s thinking could be of greater creativity – the existence and development of art are based on the artists’ dissatisfaction of the current status, and their creations in response to it.
The development of an exhibition is also an accumulation of thinking. “What are artists thinking?” and “why do artists create?” are the core meditation of this curation. The quests are on one hand research questions on each artist’s creation, on the other hand a possible route to understanding art for the audiences. The curating process is like a deconstruction of the artists’ thinking patterns. Through their responses, we could look further into their self-reflections, physical activities, care for the society and extraordinary perspectives.
Creation is the unique language of artists. They respond to their life, the society, the environment and express their unique senses and imagination through thinking. Social turn in contemporary art has blurred the boarder between art and life, and artists have extracted art from daily life through observations, experience and beliefs. In the exhibition Think Like An Artist, 11 contemporary artists from different generations are gathered, including TSONG Pu, YU Wen Fu, CHEN Chun Hao, HUANG Lan Ya, LEE Ming Hsueh, TSENG Sevenlight, FAN Sih Ci, LO Yi Chun, LI Cheng Hsun, CHENG Wan Chien and WU Chien Yi. Based on their creating methods and materials, interactive corners are designed to engage the audiences in the artistic thinking and the creations. At the same time, parents and children are guided to explore the artists’ mind through the children-friendly curation, further think outside the box and notice the beauty and wisdom of life.
“Daily life” has been the shared focus of artists from different generations. As a contemporary artist who creates poetic subjectivity through rational orders, TSONG Pu screens off a sphere of meditation from ordinary things with the creative language shuttling in life. Appreciating life with humor, LEE Ming Hsueh reexamines objects and reverse the customary understanding of life, creating as the circulation of thinking and stop thinking operates. Dedicated to sense of hearing, CHENG Wan Chien think unconventionally to discover more of the easily-overlooked, trying to compose surprises in daily life through random sound compositions.
Time-consuming labour and actions are also the way artists express their thoughts. Rubbing his mind with creation, YU Wen Fu explores the existence of himself from the past to the present, further into the future. Believing in the meaning of all existence and the possible interactions between the audiences and him, LI Cheng Hsun applies layers of paints as he sticks and tears off paper tapes, recording everything in life as if keeping a diary. Viewing creation as a journey into the unknown, FAN Sih Ci challenges herself with a long-term artistic action of doing what she is not good at, digging into the limitation of herself.
The compromising and intertwining between the exterior and interior of oneself is the life-long meditation for some artists. By figuring out his creative logic as an artist, CHEN Chun Hao strikes a balance between senses of accomplishment and frustration, while encountering the trials of putting thoughts into practice. Seeking the best coexistence of herself and the surroundings, HUANG Lan Ya perceives creation as the learning of Ego and Superego through self reflections and circulations inside out and back again. Telling the lasting fairytales through creations, TSENG Sevenlight looks for a balance between her mind and life through the tempo and breathe of sewing, staying honest to the status as both a mother and an artist.
Aside from focusing on oneself, some artists are interested in understanding the world around and constructing historical perspectives. Perceiving the world through creation, WU Chien Yi interacts with the society through socially engaged art, through which she reminds the audiences of the collective impression and nostalgia, generating the ability of viewing things differently. Through researches on historical data and with imagination, LO Yi Chun fills up the overlooked historical parts in her creations, intending to change the interpretations of history.
The exhibition provides the audiences with an index of various ways of thinking. Originating from life, the thinking varies from the spirit of thinking outside the box, the pursuit of one’s inner self, the engagement in the society and the wisdom of balance between the exterior and interior of life. To children, especially preschool kids, respect for their instinct of contemporary artists’ thinking could spark surprising understandings of art. The ultimate core of artistic thinking is that there are never fixed rules behind. Everyone is welcomed to enter each encounter artists bring up with confidence and in relax.
Curator | Chang Hsin Chih
Artists | Tsong Pu, Yu Wen Fu, Chen Chun-Hao, Huang Lan Ya, Lee Ming Hsueh, Tseng Sevenlight, Fan Sih Ci, Lo Yi Chun, Li Cheng Hsun, Cheng Wan Chien and Wu Chien Yi
Director | Ministry of Culture
Organizer | Hsinchu City Government
Curator | wòwò Aesthetics
