Lovely Daze Special Edition: Taipei Contemporary Art Center (TCAC) is published on the occasion of “Trading Futures”, an exhibition curated by Meiya Cheng & Pauline J. Yao from March 4 – 31, 2012. This will be the final exhibition to take place at TCAC’s temporary home on Yanping South Road in Taipei, Taiwan.
This book is an extensive survey on TCAC that includes interviews with the dynamic artists, curators, scholars, and activists who helped establish the association in 2009-2010. The interviews provide rare first-person insights into the association’s beginnings, its founding principles, its key challenges, and its undetermined future.
This book is published by Lovely Daze, a contemporary art journal in collaboration with TCAC and is co-edited by Meiya Cheng, Lesley Ma, Charwei Tsai, and Pauline J. Yao.
CONTRIBUTORS:
CHANG Tieh-Chih (TCAC Council Member). Chang is a well-known critic for music, culture and politics in Taiwan. He is a contributor for China Times (Taiwan), Hong Kong Economic Journal,
Southern Metropolis Daily (China), Sweekly (China), City Pictorial (China) and Wah Oriental Morning Post (China). He has also published several books, including Sounds and Fury: Can Rock & Roll Change the World? (2004), The Rebellious Gaze (2007) and The Sounds of Resistance (2010).
CHEN Chieh-jen (TCAC Supervisor) was born in 1960, Taoyuan, Taiwan. Currently works and lives in Taipei, Taiwan. Chen is a visual artist who has been exhibiting internationally including: Venice Biennale for Taiwan Pavilion (1998, 2004, 2008), Taipei Biennale (2000, 2002, 2004), 5th Lyon Biennale (2000), Gwangju Biennale (2000), Sao Paolo Bienal (2004, 2010), Shanghai Biennale (2004, 2010), Asian Art Triennial, Fukuoka (2005), Sydney Biennale (2006), Biennial Cuvée in Austria (2006), Istanbul Biennale (2007), New Orleans Biennial: Prospect.1, Guangzhou Triennial (2008), Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art (2009), 4th Artes Mundi Prize (2010) in UK. His has won the 13rd National Award for Arts (2009) and The Special Prize of Gwangju Biennale (2000).
Eleanore CHEN (TCAC Office Director). As an artist and art administrator, Chen setted up Open Contemporary Art Center with over ten members in 2001. During 2002-2008, she worked as the executive of the curatorial department and the chief coordinator of forums and book clubs. In 2008, she took up the position of secretary-general in Taiwan Artist-in-Residence Interchange Association (which was named Taiwan Artist Village Alliance). In 2009, she worked for architect LIU Kuo-Chang as a special exhibition executive in Open-United Studio. She was on behalf of Open-United Studio to participate in several exhibition projects, such as “Asian Art Biennial – Viewpoints & Viewing Points” and “DMY International Design Festival Berlin”. She also participated in the architecture design project – Tainan JJ-W Culture Design Hotel in Taiwan.
Hsin Chun CHEN (TCAC Managing Supervisor). Chen works as an independent curator and an urban activist. Also she is the CEO of Yimen International Company. Chen was the secretary general and a member of managing council at Association of Culture Environment Reform Taiwan
and the project manager of OURs project: The Organization of Urban Re-s. She acts as the urban activist of Movement of anti-creative star at Huanshan 1914 creative park in Taipei (2004); Settlement movement of THAV (2006): Treasure-hill Activists CO-OP: You Only Die Twice (2007) ; Art Reform Environment Project of San-chong District in New Taipei City (2007), Roaming Behind History of the Public Art Project at Academia Sinica (2009) in Taipei, International Design Exhibition hosts by the Council of Indigenous Peoples, Executive Yuan: Breathing Revival (2011) in Taipei and the Jane Ingram Allen (2011) solo exhibition in Taichung.
Amy CHENG (TCAC Council Member). Cheng is an art critic and an independent curator who lives and works in Taipei. She is the founder of TheCube Project Space in Taipei, which opened in 2010. Since 2000, she has worked as a feature writer for Taiwan ARTCO magazine where she currently works as lead feature writer. She has curated the exhibitions: Invisible City , Vancouver Centre for Contemporary Asian Art (2003); Ruins and Civilization, Taipei (2004); the 2004 Taipei Biennial: Do you Believe in Reality? (co-curator: Barbara Vanderlinden); Altered States, Taipei (2006); THTP/Phase Five/Oversight/2008 , Vancouver; Traversing the Fantasy, Taipei (2011); the 54th Venice Biennale for Taiwan Pavilion (2011) and the 3rd Taiwan International Video Art Exhibition (2012). Meiya CHENG (TCAC Council Member) Lives and work in Taipei. Cheng was the curator at MOCA, Taipei (2006-2008.). Cheng has curated show “Augmenting the World” at 6th Taipei Digital Art Festival International Section (2011), the video art section of Urban Nomad film festival at Taipei Contemporary Art Center (2010), “Silence Attacks – The solo exhibition by Lin Guang Ming,” and “Bringing to View the Invisible Spectacle” by Norihisa Hashimoto at MOCA, Taipei. Her articles have been published in Artco Magazine (Taiwan), MOCA Taipei exhibition catalogues, Gallery Magazine (China), Art and Investment (China). She received the curatorial research grant from National Foundation for Arts and Culture (2008) and was the curator-in-residence at 3331 Arts Chiyoda, Tokyo (2011).
Manray HSU (TCAC Council Member). Hsu lives in Taipei and works as an independent curator and art critic. He served on the international jury at the Hermès Foundation Missulsang for Korean contemporary artists and the 49th Venice Biennale for Estonia Pavilion (2006). Hsu has curated various exhibitions including The Sky is the Limit: 2000 Taipei Biennial (2001), (co-curated with Jerome Sans); How Big Is the World? O.K Center for Contemporary Art, Linz, Austria (2002); Liverpool Biennale (2006, co- curated with Gerardo); Naked Life (2006), (co-curated with Maren Richer); MoCA, Taipei, and Taipei Biennale (2008), (co-curated with Vasif Kortun).
HUANG Wen-Hao (TCAC Supervisor). Huang established IT Park (an artist’s space in Taipei) with Tsong Pu, Liu Qing-Tang and Chen Hui-Jiao in 1988. Huang is the founder and the art director of ETAT Lab in Taipei, which opened in 1995. With Ku Shih-Yung, Alf Chang and Fujui Wang’s company, Huang sets up the media lab at ETAT Lab that aims at exploring the interactive installation and experiments of technology. He worked as the managing council at Environmental Culture Transformation Association, member of council at SOKA of Modern Art Association, curator in chief of Navigator: Digital Art in Making (2004) and the curator of Bias: sound art exhibition (2005). In 2006, Huang undertakes the Taipei Digital Art Festival and establishes Digital Art Center preparation office. In 2008, acts as the Chairman of the Board. Huang holds a position of CEO at the Digital Art Center Taipei in 2009.
Sandy LO (TCAC Managing Council). Lo is a curator, art critic and art historian researcher. She also curated the 2nd Taipei Public Art Festival The New World of Datong (with a co-curator, 2004-2005), Border-Crossing: The Shadow Dance of Cities (2005) in Shanghai and Taipei, Pop Pill (Taiwan section in Shanghai-cool ,Shanghai, 2005), Exorcising Exoticism (granted by National Foundation for Arts and Culture, Taipei, 2006). She is the author of Encyclopedia of Taiwan Art Critic: Wang Bai-Yuan, Taiwan Contemporary Art Series: Culture and Colonialism (2003) and
Comprehensive Collection of Taiwan regional Art History: Hsinchu City and Miaoli Country (2006).
Lesley MA (Lovely Daze Editor). Ma is a Ph. D. student in art history, theory, and criticism at the University of California, San Diego. Her research interest includes postwar Taiwan Modernist painters, women artists in 1930s Shanghai, and contemporary art productions of the Pacific Rim. In addition to editing Lovely Daze, Ma currently is a curatorial coordinator at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles for Cai Guo-Qiang’s upcoming solo exhibition and a writer for Chuan, a new art publication in Taipei. From 2005 to 2009, Ma was a project director at Cai Studio. She has a B. A. in History and Science from Harvard College and a M. A. in Museum Studies from New York University.
Charwei TSAI (Lovely Daze Publisher). Tsai was born in Taiwan (1980) and presently lives and works in Taipei and Paris. Tsai utilizes a variety of media in a politically engaged, performative practice. At once highly personal yet general in concern, Tsai grounds her self and art practice in a sense of (national / Taiwanese) identity and the consequent implications. Geographical, social and spiritual concerns inform a body of work directed towards activating participation outside the confines of complacent contemplation. She has had solo exhibitions in Beijing, Bogotá, Hong Kong, Mumbai, Paris, Singapore, Sydney, Taipei, and Tokyo, and her projects have been included in various international exhibitions, including the inaugural Singapore Biennale (2006), Traces du Sacré at the Centre Pompidou, Paris (2008), 6th Asia Pacific Triennial (2009), Yokohama Triennale and Rhurtriennale (both in 2011). In addition to her art practice, Tsai publishes, designs and edits Lovely Daze, a curatorial journal published twice a year.
Kuang-Yu TSUI (TCAC Managing Council). Tsui is a conceptual artist from Taiwan who has exhibited internationally including in UK, Japan, Korea, Spain, Holland, Italy, and Turkey. Tsui has participated in: Taipei Biennial: Do You Believe in Reality? (2004), the 51st Venice Biennale: The Experience of Art (2005), Liverpool Biennale (2006), the 24th Kasel Documenta Video Festival (2007), Taipei Biennale (2008) and Today Contemporary Art from Taiwan at the Gyeongnam Art Museum (2010).
Herman WANG (TCAC Technical Advisor). Wang specializes in exhibition technique setting, interactive program design, and installation setting. His experiences regarding exhibition installation include IDA Congress Taipei (2011), Entre-Temps: The Narrative Artist, Taipei, (2011), Trans-Cool Tokyo: Contemporary Japanese Art from MOT Collection, Taipei Fine Arts Museum (2011), Republic without People, Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts (2011), Glenn Murcutt: Architecture for Place — Thinking Drawing/Working Drawing, Taipei (2011), Forum Biennale, TCAC (2010), Mobility, Sound, and Form – Sound, Centre National de Creation Musicale, Taipei (2010), Mind as Passion, Taipei (2009), Pixar 20 years of Animation, Taipei Fine Arts Museum (2009) and Taipei Biennale (2008).
WANG Jun-Jieh (TCAC Council Member). Wang lives and works in Taipei as a multi-media artist and a curator. In 1989, Wang collaborated with the New York media-watcher group Paper Tiger TV in producing the video How History Was Wounded, which deals with the political stance of Taiwan’s media during the June 4th Tiananmen incident. His works has shown in the Gwangju Art Biennale (1995 and 2002), the 47th Venice Biennale (1997), the Johannesburg Biennale (1997), Taipei Biennale: Site of Desire (1998), Asian Art Triennial (1999), Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art (1999), Taipei Biennale: The Sky Is the Limit (2000) and Promenade in Asian exhibition at Art Tower Mito (2002). He has curated the exhibitions of Navigator: Digital Art in the Making (2004), Taipei Biennale: Dirty Yoga (2006), the 4th Digital Art Festival (2009), Quanta Tech Art & Performance Festival (2010) and the VIDEONALE: Dialogue in Contemporary Video Art (2011).
Wu Chi-Tsung (TCAC Council Member). Wu is fascinated by images, how they are made and how we see them. His works to date have mostly involved photography and video and the processes which are needed to create images. He experiments with and manipulates these processes, exploiting the alchemy inherent in chemical photography or changing the elements of timing, which makes film the medium of movement. Wu Chi-Tsung was born 1981 in Taipei, Taiwan where he now lives and works. He was a finalist of the Artes Mundi prize (2006), in addition to having exhibited in many international exhibitions including ‘The Elegance of Silence’ at the Mori Art Museum in Tokyo (2005), the 6th Shanghai Biennale (2006), “Our Future”, Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing, China (2008), “The Tradition of the New” at Sakshi Gallery, Mumbai, and “Taiwan Calling” at Műcsarnok – Kunsthalle Budapest and Ludwig Museum, Budapest, Hungary (2010).
Jun YANG (TCAC Founder & Consultant). Yang was born in China in 1975. He immigrated to Austria with his family at the age of 4. Currently lives and works in three locations: Vienna, Yokohoma, and Taipei. His works encompass various mediums—including film, installation art, publications, symposia, and even the new development of public spaces—while interminably addressing the problem to institutions, societies, and audiences, calling into question whether reality is, in fact, ‘real.’ His previous exhibitions include 51st Venice Biennale (2004), Liverpool Biennial (2006), and Manifesta 4 (2002). His commissioned large-scale, public art projects include gfzk Garden, a garden for Museum for Contemporary Art Leipzig, as well as Paris Syndrome Café, a set of renovation plans for a café, the University of Bern’s Sports and Physical Education Center, and the new City Hall in Innsbruck, Austria, among others.
YAO Jui Chung (TCAC Chairman). Yao graduated from BA Fine Art at the Taipei National University of the Arts. He has exhibited at the Venice Biennale (1997), Yokohama Triennale (2005), Asia-Pacific Triennial (2009) and Taipei Biennale (2010). Apart from creating art, Yao has curated exhibitions including The Realm of Illusion – The New Wave of Taiwan Photography (2002), King-Kong Never Dies – The Contemporary Performance & Video Art , Taiwan (2003) and Spellbound Aura-The New Vision of Chinese Photography (2004). His essays have been published in many art journals. He has also published several books, including Installation Art in Taiwan since 1991-2001 (2002), The New Wave of Contemporary Taiwan Photography Since 1999 (2003), Roam The Ruins of Taiwan (2004), Performance Art in Taiwan 1978-2004 (2005), A Walk in the Contemporary Art – Roaming the Rebellious Streets (2005), Ruined Islands (2007), Yao Jui Chung (2008), Beyond Humanity (2008), Nebulous Light (2009), Biennial-Hop (2010), Romance (2009) and Mirage: Disused Public Property in Taiwan (2010). Yao has also worked in theater, film, art education, critic and curating.
Pauline J. YAO (Independent Curator). Yao is an independent writer, curator and educator based in Hong Kong and in Beijing where she co-founded the nonprofit art space Arrow Factory in 2008. A contributor to Artforum, e-flux Journal, Frieze, and the Chinese language publications Artco Monthly and Contemporary Art and Investment; she is the author of In Production Mode: Contemporary Art in China (CCAA/Timezone 8 Books, 2008) and co-editor of 3 Years: Arrow Factory (Sternberg Press, 2011). She has worked previously as an Assistant Curator of Chinese art at the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco and Co-Director of Osage Art and Ideas, Hong Kong, and served on the curatorial team of the Shenzhen Hong Kong Bi-City Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism in 2009.
Acknowledgment from TCAC: (alphabetical order)
Thanks to the artists listed below for their generous donation of artworks to fundraise for the operation expense of TCAC (2010-2012): CHANG Chien-Chi, CHANG Huei-Ming, CHANG Nai-Wen, CHEN Chieh-jen, Howard CHEN, CHEN Shun-Chu, CHIU Chao-Tsai, Heman CHONG, CHOU Yu-Cheng, CHOU Tai-Chun, Minja GU, Isa Meng-Chuan HO, HOU I-Ting, HSU Chia-Wei, HU Xiangqian, HUNG Tung-Lu, KUO I-Chen, LEE Kit, LIAO Chi-Yu, Hongjohn LIN, LIN Ping, KAO Jun-Hung, LIU Chih-Hung, Arthur OU, SHYU Ruey-Shiann, PENG Yu, SU Hui-Yu, Sam Meng-Hung SU, SUN Yuan, Koki TANAKA, Charwei TSAI, TSUI Kuang-Yu, TU wei Cheng, WANG Jun-Jieh, WANG Wen-Chih, WANG Ya-Hui, WU Chi-Tsung, WU Dar-Kuen, WU Mali, WU Tien-Chang, XU Tan, Jun YANG, YAO Jui Chung, YU Cheng-Ta, and YUAN Goang-Ming.
TCAC Lovers:
CHEN Bo-Wen, Michael LIN, Cesar REYES, Rudy TSENG, Jun YANG, Chi-Wen Gallery, HCT LOGISTICS CO., LTD., JUT Foundation For Arts & Architecture, Leisure Art Center, Tangram Art Center, and Tina Keng Gallery.
Supporting Associations:
Association of the Visual Arts in Taiwan, Kuandu Museum of Fine Arts, LuxuryLogico, Open-Contemporary Art Center Taishin Bank Foundation for Arts and Culture, and Taiwan Photo Museum
Special Thanks: CHEN Rong-Chuan, CHENG Li-Chen, Andre LEE, Masato NAKAMURA, and Charwei TSAI
Sponsors: JUT Foundation For Arts& Architecture and Optoma
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