City to City: Fifteen Taiwanese Contemporary Artists

A Path in Full Bloom
Inner Landscape as Seen from City to City

Cheng Nai-ming 

"Taipei Basin like a cello lies in a casket edged with green jade. Bare Guanyin Mountain casts her winsome gaze at the strong cradling arm of Datun from a distance. Looking to the left and farther south I see the Central Range cloaked in deep forest. Sounds are locked within the Keelung Valley, the sun pokes about non-stop with a gold key. I’ve extended my icy axe to where the clouds fly and sewn a bowstring on that seven-color rainbow, and this resting cello is the wisest lyricist in the world, keeping silent for the occasional traveler." -Zheng Chouyu, Leisure 

This poem was written in Guandu in 1952 by Zheng Chouyu. Today, a fresh reading reveals just how much it reflects the nature of contemporary art in Taiwan. Zheng Chouyu uses a cello as a metaphor for the Taipei Basin. According to most people familiar with musical instruments, the cello makes a deep, sonorous and full sound yet isn’t at all noisy; it plays every sound softly and therefore calms the heart. This kind of sound is exactly like contemporary Taiwanese art; on an international stage filled with noise and excitement, contemporary artists from Taiwan seem much more profound because their work avoids flashy displays and the characteristic features of the popular art market. Art in the hands of Taiwanese artists is actually the way of their individual life philosophy. Perhaps because he wasn't comfortable with others or didn't want to compete, Zheng Chouyu used  the word "silent" at the end of his poem to make others feel the same way.

Strictly speaking, contemporary art in Taiwan is different from that of other areas because it isn't the legacy of any movement. Taiwan didn’t even have any identifiable trends due to a lack of representative artists to lead the cause, and so development coincided with the arrival of the museum era. The Taiwanese art world used any opportunity to move forward in creating an identity and standing. However, this doesn’t mean that contemporary Taiwanese art is lacking its historical background. The events and figures who appeared at different stages were sufficient to lay a foundation for the later development of Taiwan’s entire contemporary art scene.

In 1948 Chen Ting-shih was invited to Taiwan to design the rail system map that would be built by Liu Ming-chuan (this drawing is currently at the National Taiwan Museum), and the Blue Sky Painting Association was also established in this year. In 1949, Lee Chunsheng came to Taiwan to teach at the Taipei Second Girls Junior High (now called Taipei Municipal Zhong Shan Girl’s High School). In 1950 Huang Jung-tsan, Lee Chun-sheng, Liu Shih, Chu Te-chun and Lin Sheng-yang established an art study group on Taipei’s Hankou Street. In 1952 the Central Art Association, the Tainan Art Research Association and the Kaohsiung Art Research Association were all established. In 1954 Hung Jui-lin established Era Art Association with other artists. In 1955, the National Museum of History was founded on Nanhai Road, Taipei.  In 1957 the Fifth Moon Group and the Ton-Fan Group were established and held their first exhibitions. In 1958 the Modern Graphics Association was established. In 1960 Liao Shiouping established the Salon du Jour, and the Taiwan Fine Arts Associationwas also established in this year. In 1961 the New Form Arts Associationwas formed. In 1964theChinese Modern Ink Painting Societywas formed and the Wen-Hsing Galleryopened.  In 1972 the Fifth Moon Group suspended its activities and the artist Hung Tong was discovered. In 1976 Hung Tong held his first exhibition at the American Culture Centre in Taipei, which was the formal beginning of the Hung Tong craze in Taiwan.In 1977, Cathy Museum of Art, Taiwan's first private arred sculpture would be painted t museum, opened. In 1978 the Printmaker Gallery and the Spring Gallery opened in Taipei. In 1982 the 101 Modern Art Group was established. In 1983 the first official Taiwanese arts institution was establish, the Taipei Fine Arts Museum. In 1985 due to the Asian financial crisis the Cathay Museum of Art announced it would be closing. Also in this year, the director of the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Martha Su Fu decided that Lee Tsaichien’ssilver, and the Taipei Painting Group was established. In 1986 the First Annual Art Gallery Expo was held in Taipei. In 1987 Spring Gallery folded, marshal law was rescinded in Taiwan, and since the travel ban was lifted, Chinese artworks started flooding the Taiwanese market. In 1988 the National Museum of Fine Arts was established in Taichung. In 1989 Apartment 2 was established on Taipei’s Heping East Road by about twelve artists returning from overseas study, and opened the way for non-profit, alternative contemporary art spaces in Taiwan. In 1990 ITPark was established. In 1992 the Art Galleries Association R.O.C. was established. In 1994 the Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts was established. In 1995 the Taipei Fine Arts Museum invited domestic and international jurors to consider the theme ArtTaiwan, Taiwan participated in the Venice Biennale for the first time, and from 1995 on, Taiwan has participated in every Biennale. In 1998, the Taipei Fine Arts Museum invited the Japanese curator Nanjo Fumio to curate the Taipei Biennial, which formally elevated this exhibition to international status, and at the same time led Taiwanese art museums into the curatorial era. By looking at these key events, we can more or less see the course of development that contemporary art has taken in Taiwan, and overall, it was a rather smooth ascent with no overly dramatic events. So this more or less has molded the constitution of Taiwanese contemporary art, which is relatively subdued and sturdy.

The source of this sturdy feeling in the contemporary art world of Taiwan is the artists that comprise it, and to expand this point a bit, the artists’ strength is entirely due to an environment that gives them an opportunity to develop their own vitality. After Taiwan entered the museum era, contemporary art then of course had a fundamental platform, but the museums could only accommodate a limited number of contemporary art shows each year. Alternative spaces inundated Taiwan from the north to the south in the period starting from 1989, and close to seventy-percent of these were used as the primary stage for contemporary art in Taiwan. There were only a small number of galleries in Taiwan that could support contemporary art during this period and perhaps gallery owners didn’t consider this lack significant. However, currently the art world is crazy about contemporary art from China, and this popularity has spread to Asia in general, so Taiwan is also benefiting from this reconsideration. Consequently, those Taiwanese galleries who were not into contemporary art in the past are starting to reconsider Taiwaneseartists, and they have discovered that their galleries are outmoded and lack vitality. It is difficult for them to find a common ground with a contemporary art scene that has been evolving all along. In the final analysis, Taiwanese art galleries completely avoided contemporary art for eight years, so how can they make up for an eight year gap in a short six months? This crisis in contemporary art has already been put on the table and only time will tell how much longer galleries can sustain interest in contemporary Taiwanese art. The art environment has steadily encouraged a disconnect between the galleries and the artists, so contemporary artists have rarely felt influenced by economic conditions in the larger environment. The good artists continued with their work no matter what conditions existed in the market and had the work ready for any eventuality, which was completely different from how things were done in the past when art was primarily market driven. The older generation rushed work to the galleries non-stop, with little regard for whether the paint was even dry. The result is that the older generation of artists have been completely thrown out of the current marketplace, since after all, quality of work is the main factor in determining the longevity of an artist’s career. 

When the Taiwanese art market was good, specifically, good for the elder generation and core artists, it was difficult for artists making contemporary art to break into the market. Because of this, they became accustomed to this kind of isolation and learned to draw satisfaction from carrying forth their expressive language and artistic ideas. No one would say that the contemporary Taiwanese artists Yang Mao-lin, Chen Chieh-jen, Hou Chun-ming, Lian Jian-shing, Kuo Wei-kuo, Lee Ming-tse, Su Wong-shen and Lin Ju are inexperienced, but rather their works are hot in the current market. Nonetheless, their favorite place to be is still their studios, and they haven’t moved into big houses or bought fancy cars, they don’t wear designer clothes or have extramarital affairs; it seems that contemporary artists in Taiwan are fairly complacent! 

The Lin & Keng Gallery of Beijing is holding the exhibition City to City—Fifteen Taiwanese Contemporary Artists. The fact that these fifteen artists are being shown together is a testament to the gallery’s unique vision. Among the artists, some of them had their first solo exhibition with Lin & Keng Gallery and others have cooperated with the gallery for over ten years, but for others it is their first time to work with the gallery. Regardless of what kind of dealings they have had with the gallery in the past, these artists share some things in common; their work perfectly epitomizes developments in the contemporary art scene, they are the next generation of Taiwanese artists, they were all born and raised in Taiwan, and their works don’t possess any of the trendy earmarks of the marketplace. From the broader point of view of themes found in contemporary Taiwanese contemporary art, these artists seem to be little interested in political topics, and popular social issues are expressed in an annotated manner, rather than directly. Also, the fact that Taiwan’s political and social environment was liberalized earlier than China’s gives the artists’ language a freshness, a greater degree of freedom and more flexibility. This is, without doubt, a good thing, but may also be seen as a disadvantage in the sense that it may make the special qualities of the artists' underlying culture appear superficial. For the most part, these artists can explain the ideology behind Taiwanese contemporary art with their own artistic temperaments and language. Comparing this to the prevalence among China’s contemporary artists of aping popular market trends, Taiwanese contemporary artists seem much more pluralistic. I have attempted to divide the work of these fifteen artists into five categories. This isn’t an attempt to classify these artists, but merely intended as assistance in understanding and appreciating these works based on certain similarities in spirit and appearance.