Feather Project
Author: Charwei Tsai
Listen to the Sound of the Earth Turning
Exhibition:
– The Womb & The Diamond, 2021
Installation of mirrors, hand-blown glass and a diamond, 300x600cm
– Five Dakini Series, 2021
Drawings, 180x180cm each
Collection of Live Forever Foundation
Both on view at “Listen to the Sound of the Earth Turning”
Curated by Mami Kataoka
Haruko Kumakura, and Hirokazu Tokuyama
Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan, 2022
Photo by T. Koroda, Courtesy of Mori Art Museum
Since 2020, an invisible virus has stolen away our everyday, and wrought havoc on our way of life and state of mind. Under these circumstances much artistic expression, including contemporary art, resonates more keenly than ever. Listen to the Sound of the Earth Turning explores ways to live this new life as the pandemic persists, and the nature of “wellbeing” that is the holistic health of both body and mind, from multiple perspectives found in contemporary art. Works on subjects with a connection to life and existence – nature and humans, the individual and society, family, the repetitious nature of daily living, the spiritual world, life and death – will encourage us to consider what it means to “live well.”
Emphasizing the type of experience only accessible in the real-life space of the museum, this exhibition will showcase approximately 140 works by sixteen artists from both home and abroad – including installations, sculptures, video, photography, paintings and more. Honing the senses and engaging with art by experiencing first-hand the materials and scale of works will prompt viewers to consider what “wellbeing” means for themselves, rather than what is suggested by others or wider society.
The title of the exhibition is a quote from a piece of instruction art (*) by Yoko Ono, and invites us to expand our consciousness to encompass all the majesty of the cosmos, reminding us that we are no more than a tiny part of its workings, and guiding us toward new ways of thinking. As we address questions of human life in the world at an essential level now that the pandemic has struck us, perhaps it is this very imagination that will present to us possibilities for the future.
Exhibition text by Mori Art Museum
Songs We Carry, Lumbung Radio, Documenta
Lumbung radio, Documenta
Kassel, Germany
17th Joly, 2022
Initiative for Practices and Visions of Radical Care and dialogues on “On Care and Resilience” with Charwei Tsai
Curated by Simona Dvorak
You can listen to a sound contribution by Charwei Tsai, a Taiwanese-born artist who currently lives and works in Taipei and Paris. In her art practice, Tsai uses a variety of media in politically engaged and performative formats. For one hour, Tsai will share with us the multiple voices of struggle, resistance and hope, which take the form of a sound and poetic language beyond verbal expression within “The Songs We Carry”.
Circle
Performance of Circle & Screening of Lanyu: Three Stories at Forum Climat, Centre Pompidou, Paris, France, 2022
Sound for Circle by Davaajargal Tsaschikher
Special thanks to Simona Dvorak, Linus Gratte, Chrlene Dinhut, Eva Daviaud & team, Arco Renz
Photo Courtesy of Centre Pompidou & the artist.
Charwei Tsai’s artistic practice oscillates between the intimate and the universal and the relationship between man and nature. With the performance Circle, the Taiwanese artist draws, with a calligraphic gesture, a circle on a block of ice and lets it melt slowly. The captivating and amplified sound of the melting, raises the invisible mechanisms, while the circle reminds us of the interdependence of natural facts: as the empty form facing the full form, it is at the same time the form of the finitude and the infinitude.
The performance of Circle & Screening of Lanyu: Three Stories is a part of Centre Pompidou’s Forum Climat: quelle culture pour quel futur ? The forum explores the questions of: What if the ecological transition was above all a cultural transition? This is the question at the heart of the Climate Forum: what culture for what future? organized in partnership with Ademe (the French Agency for Ecological Transition).
For three days, the public is invited to reflect on the evolution of society, to imagine a livable world for 2050 and to debate concrete solutions in the company of scientists, artists and activists.
From a Dust Particle to the Universe
From a Dust Particle to the Universe, 2021
Installation with cinnabar natural pigments & ink
700 x 600cm
National Taichung Theatre’s Art Corner
Commissioned by Live Forever Foundation, Taichung, Taiwan
From a Dust Particle to the Universe, Tsai’s largest drawing to date, is a site-specific production for the National Taichung Theatre’s Art Corner. Over a five month period of durational performance, the artist paints a large circle form with cinnabar, a red pigment that is extracted from minerals that are traditionally used medicinally for calming the spirit.
Starting from the center of the circle in a spiral direction, Tsai writes the Samantabhadra Aspiration Prayers 普賢行願品 from the well-known Flower Ornament Sutra 華嚴經 like flower petals large and small covering the entire surface. The characters of ten particular aspirational phrases are burnt with thin incense sticks, allowing light to pierce through each character. The large drawing is then hung on the window panels of the opera house. This work is dedicated to all the lives lost during the pandemic years.
