Forum Biennial of Taiwanese Contemporary Art Taipei Contemporary Art Center (TCAC), Taipei, Taiwan 4 September ~ 31 October 2010
Exhibited Works: – Sea Mantra, 2009, Video – Complete set of Lovely Daze
Sea Mantra, 2009, Exhibition viewComplete set of Lovely Daze
Press Release: Founded by a group of artists, curators, scholars and cultural activists, the mission of the Taipei Contemporary Art Center (TCAC) has been to provide a platform for public discourse where diverse voices can be heard in discussions about aesthetics and art production, and the issues related to the formation of a public culture — including cultural policies, museums, artistic organizations; as well as issues such as the relationship between art and the community, public spaces, the city, or social movements.
In line with this mission, we organized this inaugural “Forum Biennial of Taiwanese Contemporary Art”. The purpose of the biennial is twofold. First, it aims to re-examine artistic production in the specificities of every two years in an exhibition format, by presenting works that provoke thinking or controversy. Secondly, it offers an opportunity to organize large-scale forums during the exhibition period to discuss – debate – pressing public issues.
The 2010 Forum Biennial exhibition includes 25 artists and art groups. The selection emphasizes works that are topical or whose production condition is distinct as well as unique. Several works incorporate critiques or actions regarding the art system in addition to cultural production (Bbrother, CTCAC, CHOU Yu-cheng, HSIEH Muchi, PalaFang in Autumn, TSAI Charwei), or even function as cultural policy advocacy (TANG Huang-chen). Another highlight is works related to architecture, space and land. These include the investigation and documentation on space and the city (KAO Jun-honn, Jun YANG, Ariel Peng-chun KUO), intervention into architectures (SHIH Yun-yu, KHx3L, Luxury Logico), and activist engagement in urban planning (Leoliu & Takaoeki Cultural Heritage Recognition Alliance), or community participation (CHANG En-maan, CHEN Chin-pao). There is a work that directly engages with the movement of agricultural justice (HUANG Po-chih). All of these works echo the three forums one way or another; some artists participate in these forums, others organize specific discussion or performance-based events on their own.
Performativity has gained prominence over the last few years. Besides some of the above-mentioned works, the exhibition also includes performance videos that involve the body of the artist (TSUI Kuang-yu, SU Hui-yu, LIU Yu, Fuxinghen Studio). Experiments in technology and video art have become a major trend in Taiwan. Two artists who represent this trend were invited (LIN Guan-ming, YAO Chung-han). Running opposite to this new trend, are artists involved with the rare production of art comics (VIVA) and graffiti (Candy Bird).
During the biennial, three forums will be held. The first, “The Dynamics of Art and Urban Transformation,” discusses the role of art in a changing city. The second, “The New-genre Alternative Spaces: Operation and Strategies,” will include representatives from local and international alternative spaces to discuss how these art organizations cope with issues of social, political and economic conditions and present new strategies of operation. The third, “Contemporary Culture and the Policies of the Art Museum”, will invite museum professionals from Taiwan and abroad to discuss how museums sustain their publicness, professionalism and artistic integrity in the face of global neo-liberalism.
Lovely Daze is a journal of artists’ writings and artworks published twice a year in limited editions. The seventh issue: Good Intentions Lead to Hell? is a double issue: one side edited by the publisher and the reverse side by guest editor Alessandra Sandrolini reflecting on a shared topic.
JEAN-MICHEL ALBEROLA was born in 1953 in Algeria in a French family and currently lives and works in Paris. He studied at the Marseilles Academy of Art and has been teaching at L’École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux Arts, Paris since 1991. His paintings, graphics works, sculptures, and installations have been exhibited broadly in France and abroad including at the Centre Georges Pompidou (1983, 1985, 1987, 1993, 2007, 2008); Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennial (2003); Musée du Louvre (1993, 2005); Musée d’Art Moderne de la ville de Paris (1981, 1992, 1997, 2009), Venice Biennale (1982), and Galerie Daniel Templon (since 1982). FRANCIS ALÿS was born in 1959 in Antwerp. He attended the Institute of Architecture in Tournai and the Istituto di Architettura in Venice before living in Mexico City in 1986 where he currently resides. His work encompasses various media often involving the participation and presence of the artist. These performed events are then documented as videos, photographs, writings, paintings, and animations. Alÿs’ work has been shown in many international institutions including a recent exhibition ‘A Story of Deception’ at Tate Modern, London (2010). www.francisalys.com
PAOLA ANZICHE was born in 1975 in Milan. She graduated from the Städelschule, Staatliche Hochschule Für Bildende Künste, in Frankfurt am Main. Her solo exibitions include: Greater Torino: Paola Anzichè-Paolo Piscitelli, Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, Torino (2010); Tapis-à-porter, Careof, Milano( 2009); The Functional Fake Objects, Placentia Arte, Piacenza (2007); She participated in the residency program, Pact Zollverein, Essen (2010); Cité Internationale Universitaire de Paris, Fondation Biermans-Lapôtre, Paris (2009); Centre International d’Accueil et d’Echanges des Recollets, Dena Foundation for Contemporary Art, Paris (2009); group exihbitions include: Meteoriti in Giardino, Fondazione Merz, Torino (2009); Sans les Murs, Glassbox, Cité Internationale Universitaire de Paris, Paris (2009); Die Sammlung Rausch, It Takes Something to Make Something, Portikus, Frankfurt am Main(2008). www.anziche.blogspot.com
KELLY CARMENA lives and works in New York City.
HARUN FAROCKI was born in 1944 in Germany. He studied at the Deutsche Film und Fernsehakademie in Berlin where he currently lives and works. He began his career as a film director and was editor of Filmkritik, a magazine where he articulated an important set of theoretical ideas about the image from 1974 to 1984. Employing a wide range of media (photographs, drawings, documentary images, films), his own work questions the production and perception of images, decoding the medium of film and examining how audiovisual culture relates to politics, technology and war. Since 1996 he has participated in numerous solo and group exhibitions internationally including Documenta 12 in Kassel, Germany.
www.farocki-film.de
JEAN-BAPTISTE GANNE was born in 1972 in France and currently lives and works in Nice. He studied at Villa Arson, Nice, and was an artist-in-residence at Rijksakademie in Amsterdam from 2003-2004 and at Villa Medici in Rome until April 2007. With various modes of expression such as photography, writing, performances, video, and installations, the activities of Jean-Baptiste Ganne are articulated around the “representation of politics and the politic of representations”. He illustrated Marx’s Capital chapter by chapter (The Illustrated Capital, 1998-2003), he was on strike (cooking) for six days during open studios in Rijksakademie (The Cookist, 2003 and redid the performance at the SFAI in San Francisco, 2007), decided to spread out his production budget converted to ten cents coins in Rome (Senza Titolo (All that Glitters is Gold), 2007) or read the whole Don Quijote in luminous morse code with a red lamp (Amsterdam, 2005; Nice, 2006; Istanbul, 2007; Gent, 2008; Paris, 2009). He exhibited with WHW in Zagreb (2001) published with Fotohof in Salzburg (2003), showed at Ellen de Bruijne Project in Amsterdam (2005 and 2006), was part of Istanbul Biennal (2007) and La Force de l’Art 02 in Paris (2009).
DORA GARCIA was born in 1964 in Valladolid, Spain. She studied Fine Arts at the University of Salamanca, Spain, and the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam, Holland. She currently lives and works in Brussels. Dora García uses the exhibition space as a platform to investigate the relationship between the visitor, the artwork, and the place. To this end, the artist often draws on interactivity and performance. Through minimal changes, not encroaching on the space, the room is converted into a sensory experience, with each visitor leaving it again with his or her perceptions altered, or at the very least perhaps with a degree of skepticism. She has exhibited at various international exhibitions including The Flower of May, Gwangju Biennale, Manifesta (2010); 2nd Athens Biennale, 10th Biennale de Lyon (2009); Sydney Biennale, H Box, MUSAC, Leon, Spain, MUDAM, Luxembourg, Tate Modern, London (2008) and numerous solo and group exhibitions internationally.
www.doragarcia.net
JOHAN GRIMONPREZ was born in 1962 in Roeselare, Belgium, and currently lives in Brussels and New York. He studied at the School of Visual Arts and attended the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program in New York. Grimonprez achieved international acclaim with his film essay, Dial H-I-S-T-O-R-Y. With its premiere at Centre Pompidou and Documenta X in Kassel, 1997, it eerily foreshadowed the events of September 11th. Grimonprez’s productions have traveled the main festival circuit from Telluride, Los Angeles, Rio de Janeiro, to Tokyo and Berlin. Curatorial projects were hosted at major exhibitions and museums worldwide such as the Whitney Museum in New York, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich and the Tate Modern in London. Grimonprez is currently a faculty member at the School of Visual Arts (New York).
NS HARSHA was born in 1969, and currently lives and works in Mysore, India. He studied painting at the Faculty of Fine Arts, Baroda in 1995. Since then he has taken part in a variety of collaborative projects and exhibitions internationally including Serpentine Gallery, London (2008), Maison Hermes, Tokyo (2008); the Singapore Biennale (2006); The House of World Cultures, Berlin (2005); the 2nd Fukuoka Asian Art Triennial (2002); and the Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Arts, Australia (1999). Harsha won the third Artes Mundi prize in 2008.
www.nsharsha.com
ALFREDO JAAR was born in 1956 in Santiago, Chile, and currently lives and works in New York. He attended Instituto Chileno-Norteamericano de Cultura, Santiago (1979) and Universidad de Chile, Santiago (1981). In installations, photographs, film, and community-based projects, Jaar explores the public’s desensitization to images and the limitations of art to represent events such as genocides, epidemics, and famines. Jaar’s work bears witness to military conflicts, political corruption, and imbalances of power between industrialized and developing nations. Subjects addressed in his work include the holocaust in Rwanda, gold mining in Brazil, toxic pollution in Nigeria, and issues related to the border between Mexico and the United States. Jaar’s works have been exhibited extensively including Biennales of Venice (1986, 2007), Sao Paulo (1987, 1989), Sydney (1990), Istanbul (1995) Johannesburg (1997), Gwangju (1995, 2000), as well as the Documenta exhibitions (1987, 2002) in Kassel. He became a Guggenheim Fellow in 1985 and a Mac Arthur Fellow in 2000. In 2006, he was awareded Spain’s Premio Extremadura a la Creacion.
www.alfredojaar.net
LESLEY MA is a Ph. D. student in art history, theory, and criticism at the University of California, San Diego. Her most recent research project is on the “modern” choices made by members of the Chinese Women’s Calligraphy and Painting Society in 1930s Shanghai. She is also an official groupie of Cloud Gate Dance Theatre of Taiwan.
MIKE PARR was born in 1945 in Sydney. In 1968, he enrolled to study painting at the National Art School. In 1970, with Peter Kennedy, he established ‘Inhibodress’, an artists’ cooperative and alternative space for conceptual art, performance art, and video. Widely known as a performance artist, Parr also works with drawings, prints, paintings, photographs, and videos. His work has been exhibited in Australia and overseas including most recent exhibitions: MIRROR/ ARSE, Revolutions – Form That Turn at Sydney Biennale (2008) and Volte Face: Mike Parr Prints & Reprints 1970-2005 at Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney (2006).
MICHELANGELO PISTOLETTO was born in 1933 in Biella. He began to exhibit his work in 1955. An inquiry into self-portraiture characterizes his early work. In the two-year period, 1961-1962 made the first Mirror Paintings, which are the foundation of his subsequent artistic output and theoretical thought. In 1965 and 1966 he produced a set of works entitled Minus Objects, considered fundamental to the birth of Arte Povera, an art movement of which Pistoletto was an animating force and a protagonist. During the nineties, with Project Art and with the creation in Biella of Cittadellarte – Fondazione Pistoletto and the University of Ideas, he brought art into active relation with diverse spheres of society with the aim of inspiring and producing responsible social change. In 2003 he won the Venice Biennale’s Golden Lion for Lifelong Achievement. In 2004 the University of Turin awarded him a laurea honoris causa in Political Science. On that occasion, the artist announced what has become the most recent phase of his work, Third Paradise.
www.pistoletto.it
RENATA POLJAK was born in 1974 in Split, Croatia and currently lives and works in Paris. She earned her undergraduate degree from the Arts Academy in Split, and her post-graduate degree from the École Régionale des Beaux-Arts de Nantes, France. She has been invited to residencies in San Francisco, Vienna, and New York. Poljak’s work has been shown internationally and has received numerous awards including the first prize at the True Diva Biennale, Skowhegan, Maine (2009), Golden Black Box Short Award at the Balkan Black Box Festival in Berlin (2006), and the Annual Award of Women’s Art Center Electra in Zagreb, Croatia (1997). In 2010, her videos were screened at “Renata Poljak, in the frame of Prospective Cinema”, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris.
www.renatapoljak.com
JOAQUIN SARMIENTO was born in 1977 in Bogota. He graduated with a degree in Mechanical Engineering from Tufts University in the United States. After working as an engineer for several years, he decided to pursue his passion for photojournalism. Sarmiento completed a postgraduate program in Photography at the SENAC School in Sao Paulo and has worked as a freelance photographer since. In 2005, the city of Sao Paulo awarded him a grant which initiated Um Olhar (One View). The Um Olhar project brought cameras and photography lessons to youngsters living in local favelas. After three years in Brazil, Sarmiento moved back to Colombia where he currently resides, and continues his work in photography with a focus on the Caribbean region. Following Um Olhar, he has moved on to organizing workshops in schools and prison facilities in Bogota. His work has been published in various news magazines throughout Latin America and has been exhibited in Colombia, Brazil, and Portugal.
www.joaquinsarmiento.com
ALESSANDRA SANDROLINI is an independent curator, critic, and Phd candidate at La Sorbonne. She currently lives between Bologna where she was born and Paris where she won a curatorial residency of the Dena Foundation For Contemporary Art in 2005. She worked as curator at Villa Medici in Rome and at Centre Pompidou in Paris where she researched and assisted in curating the shows Dada (2005); Mouvements des Images (2006); and Traces du Sacré (2008).
SABRINA SHAFFER is marrying Christopher Finally this fall.
www.otabo.com
RIRKRIT TIRAVANIJA has transformed the constant movement and cultural interaction of his own life into an engaged conceptual art practice. Born in 1961 in Buenos Aires, of Thai origin, he was raised in Thailand, Ethiopia, and Canada and educated in Chicago and New York. He now lives between Berlin and New York, also spending time in Thailand. His work is exhibited around the world in major museums, galleries, and international art events. He is co-curator of ‘Utopia Station’ at the Venice Biennale in 2003.
CHARWEI TSAI is grateful to all her dear friends who are the vital forces of Lovely Daze reaching its fifth anniversary. At times it has been hard for the mind to live with a suitcase and travel all the time, so she is truly thankful to those who made the short encounters become long-lasting friendships. She looks forward to attending her best friend’s wedding this fall in the Dominican Republic.
www.charwei.com
MARNIE WEBER was born in 1959 and currently lives and works in Los Angeles. She received her B.A. from University of California, Los Angeles. Much of Weber’s visual art revolves around a recurring cast of characters. An animal often found in her work is the bear, which is linked to the Greek goddess Artemis. These characters, among others, are placed in vividly colorful environment, ornate, Empire-style interiors, or dark, dense, eerie landscapes. Her work most often focuses on the adventures of women, which sometimes take the form of half-human, half-animal hybrids with bodies cut from pornographic magazines, and other times, pale-faced, folksy ghosts known as Spirit Girls. The Spirit Girls is the name of Marnie Weber’s alt-rock musical group and also refers to a group of characters that are found in her art. Weber has two solo albums, Woman with Bass (1994) and Cry for Happy (1996), both recorded as Marnie. In 2004, a compilation of her work was released entitled Songs Forgotten: The Best of Marnie 1987 – 2004. Marnie Weber has participated in numerous exhibitions internationally and her work was featured on the cover of the 1998 Sonic Youth album A Thousand Leaves.
www.marnieweber.com
ICARO ZORBAR is a Colombian artist who works with machines and songs. His work is of a performative character; using cassette tapes, fans, and music boxes, sometimes his presence among machines and sound takes on the form of “assisted installations”. Icaro holds an MFA from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia. He has shown in Buenos Aires’ Museum of Contemporary Art, Galería Vermelho in Sao Paulo, New York’s ‘Younger Than Jesus’ exhibition at the New Museum of N.Y, and the Beijing Biennale. Zorbar currently lives and works in Bogotá, Colombia. www.icarozorbar.wordpress.com
Special thanks from Alessandra to: Emanuela Baldi, Brian Butler, Giuliana Carusi Setari, Ann Cesteleyn, Victoire Disderot, Eugenie Goldshmeiding, Cameron Jamie, Renata Lucas, Aurelie Wacquant Mazura, Maria Pistoletto, Francesca Ruggeri, Didier Shulmann.
Lovely Daze is a curatorial journal of artists’ writings and artworks published biannually in limited editions. For this special edition: Rose, we are pleased to present a collection of delicious recipes composed by pastry chef Angela Garcia, with drawings by artist Cristina Rodriguez. The joint creation was realized for
Lovely Daze Issue 6: “A rose is a rose is a rose is a rose”, with the essence of the perennial celebrated as the main ingredient.
ANGELA GARCIA was born in Colombia in 1980. She graduated from l’Ecole Supérieure des Arts Culinaires de Paul Bocuse in Lyon, France. Having graduated with the Grand Diplome (Major de Promotion), Angela further cultivated her technique under the direction of such chefs Alain Ducasse (Paris and New York), Pascal Barbot (Paris), Cristophe Moret (Paris), Carlo Cracco (Milan), Pascal Molines (Lyon), Claus Weitbrecht (Lyon), Christophe Canati (Saint-Émilion). Inspired by the concept of Lovely Daze, Angela launched her own company, Lovely Daze Desserts in Miami.
LESLEY MA is excited to start a new chapter of her life as she will be a Ph. D. student in Art History, Theory, and Criticism at the University of California, San Diego in fall 2009. She thanks her friends, family, and New York for the inspiration throughout the past six years.
CRISTINA RODRIGUEZ is a Colombian artist and designer currently living and working in the colorful Little Havana neighborhood in Miami, Florida. Cristina earned a BFA in Industrial Design at Rhode Island School of Design and furthered her studies at Parsons School of Design in New York. She co-founded the by_number studio in 2003, a design collective fabricating one-of-a-kind, handmade products.
SABRINA SHAFFER is adventuring in New England with Christopher Finlay, whom she very much enjoys cooking for. A hard copy of Charwei’s Transience sits on the fireplace mantle of their kitchen.
www.otabo.com
CHARWEI TSAI wakes up in a different city every month. Her dreams are mixed with strangers and long-lost friends, set in seemingly familiar hallways. She feels especially confused when finally arriving at home to find herself editing a cookbook in French, a language that continues to escape her tongue.
Mushroom Mantra, 2009, Installation for 6th Asia Pacific Triennial
Brisbane, Australia 5 December 2009 ~ 5 April 2010
Exhibited Works: – Mushroom Mantra, 2009, Installation – Circle I, 2009, Video – Hand Washing Project, 2009, Installation – Water Project, 2009, Installation
Mushroom Mantra, 2009, Installation for 6th Asia Pacific TriennialMushroom Mantra, 2009, Installation for 6th Asia Pacific TriennialMushroom Mantra, 2009, Installation for 6th Asia Pacific TriennialPreparation for Mushroom Mantra, 2009, Installation for 6th Asia Pacific TriennialArtist’s talkHand Washing Project, Installation,
Collection of Queensland Art GalleryHand Washing Project, Installation,
Collection of Queensland Art GalleryWater Project, 2009,
Installation for 6th Asia Pacific Triennial, Collection of Queensland Art Gallery
Press Release: ‘The 6th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art’ (APT6) was held from 5 December 2009 – 5 April 2010 and occupied the entire Gallery of Modern Art (GoMA) as well as the iconic Watermall and adjoining galleries at the Queensland Art Gallery (QAG).
APT6 included the work of more than 100 artists from 25 countries, including collaborations and collectives, which reflect the diversity of practices across Asia, the Pacific and Australia.
APT6 had a number of specific focuses and thematic links while considering recent shifts in contemporary art in communities that had not been represented in the APT before, including works by artists from Tibet, North Korea (DPRK), Turkey and Iran, and from countries of the Mekong region such as Cambodia and Myanmar (Burma).
APT6 also acknowledged the innovation that exists in performance and music in Asia and the Pacific. To this end, the Pacific Reggae Project looked at this musical genre as it has developed in Hawai’i, the Solomon Islands, New Caledonia, Vanuatu and New Zealand.
The major thematic cinema program for APT6 looked west to explore cultural constellations across the Indian subcontinent (Sri Lanka, India, Bangladesh, Kashmir,Pakistan) to West Asia and the Middle East (including Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Turkey, Armenia, Lebanon, Israel and Palestine).
