絕對空間2022年年報-英文版 by LeeRu

Math,Empty Can Wei-Chen Chen Solo Exhibition

2020 Next Art Tainan:Uneven Parell I-Chen Kuo×Zi-Yin Chen

ExtraOrdinary Human Mu-Jen LU×Jin Shi×Tsung-Yu Tsai

The Diamond that is Raindrops Ya-Hui Wang Solo Exhibition

Landscape Remains Jo-Mei Lee Solo Exhibition

Journal of Visited Light Po-Yen Wang×Tzu-Huan Lin×Tzu-An Wu

Moonlight Over the Island Affects People Watching the Sea Tong-Chiao Chuang Solo Exhibition

Family Recipes: Mother's Forest Ping-Yu Pan Solo Exhibition

Math, Empty Can

Statement by Wei-Chen Chen “How should people exercise our imagination through material and the history it contains?” The origin of art is contemplated through observations made on everyday materials. Through practice and reconsideration of concepts such as ready-made, appropriation, and classic beauty, trajectories are extended from self-experience, cultural identity and circumstantial consciousness. Attempts are also made to allow materials under the artist’s control to be seen in ways that are different from their usual controlled and disciplined functions, meaning, and referential qualities. Although society is being systematically naturalized, geometricized, and stylized, an empty can that has been haphazardly left on a stairway is still spotted in the city.

Wei-Chen Chen Solo Exhibition

1 2 3

1/18 Sat. | 3/1 Sun.

1.Digital Tree, Pedestal, Can 180×180× 220 cm Wood, Paint, Aluminum Can, Caulk,2020 2.Photo Credits by Absolute Space for the Arts 3.Melamine 08, 45×7×22cm, Marble, 2019. Photo Credits by Wei-Chen CHEN

About Wei-Chen Chen Wei-Chen Chen was born in 1993 in Taipei and graduated from the Graduate School of Fine Arts, National Taipei University of the Arts. Through the practice and rethinking of concepts such as ready-made objects, appropriation, and classical beauty, she extends her own experience, cultural identity, and environmental awareness, and sees material materials as different from their everyday disciplined functions, meanings, and even referential nature. Sculptures and installations have been presented in solo exhibitions at Black and White Cut, Absolute Space, and ITPark, and her works won The 1st. Contemporary Sculpture Lih Pao Prize in 2019, the Plastic Art Category in the S-An Art Award in 2017, and the Gold Prize in the Student Category in the 7th Golden Ceramic Award in 2015. In the mocking character and self-flirtation that permeate her works, she feels the object and its opposite, which is Wei-Chen Chen 's personal exploration process and spiritual reflection.

Section of Light, Square Wall, 617×282× 221 cm, Wood, Paint, Caulk, Stainless steel, 2020.

Digital Tree 2 130×106× 114 cm, Wood,2019.

2020 Next Art Tainan: Uneven Parell I-Chen Kuo × Zi-Yin Chen

3/12 Thu. | 4/12 Sun.

Statement by Hwei-lan Chang T h e t h e m e o f t h e 2 0 2 0 N e x t A r t Ta i n a n Awards “Uneven Parallel” is named from a verse, “Uneven amaranths flowing on the water, and I only search for the one I want,” in Guan Ju – a poem in the famous a n c i e n t a n t h o l o g y, S h i J i n g ( C l a s s i c o f Poetry). The verse implicates searching the best and most suitable thing for a person. The naming also combines themes from author Ai-Ling Chang’s aesthetic viewpoint “uneven contrast” – symbiosis, layering, and contrast. The exhibition invites winners of the Next Art Tainan Awards and artists of different generations and cultural backgrounds from Ta i w a n , F r a n c e , a n d J a p a n , t o p r e s e n t their artworks. The artworks, including paintings, sculptures, mixed media, new media, are displayed diversely through space installations and “In Situ”. By gathering 10 exhibition venues in Tainan to converse and interact, personal memories and their relations with time and space are explored. Fractions of memories also reorganize the new possibilities of reading, i n c l u d i n g “ D i ff é r a n c e ” b e t w e e n t r a d i t i o n

Promise2061 Kuo,I-Chen 308×165× 104cm Mi×ed media installation: 1986 stamp of CometHalley,

and modernism, memories and imagination of the future, conversations between life experiences and history, the hustle and loneliness of the modern day, and layers of all kinds of circumstances. This exhibition “Uneven Parallel,” with the participation of the audience, will influence the observation phenomena while attempting to construct the conversing relationship between two subjects. At the same time, the audience is invited to use “displacement” as their method to explore

these ten exhibitions, external extensive “In Situ” displays, and an individual exhibition. By taking part in distinctive movements i n Ta i n a n , a l o n g w i t h t h e e x h i b i t o r s , t h e audience can construct a parallel universe with diverse understanding, observation, record and writing. The Next Art Tainan Awards 2020 will use the multiple interpretations of “Uneven” to present the connecting relationships between a microscopic scale to an enormous one, entirety to fragment, and soul to existing

antique dental chair, antique woodenwindow frames, steel rack, LED blue light,automotive lighting 2015 Photo Credits by I-Chen Kuo

matter, instead of two complete opposites. We hope to offer an experience of being the subjects mutually, accepting differences and being inclusive. Also, through the conversion of images, paintings, and materials, the contrasted layering of space and material is depicted, offering imagination and inspiration to the surrounding reality.

Kuo,I-Chen, Promise 45×45×9cm, Oil paints, leather wooden cushion, 2015 Photo Credits by I-Chen Kuo

About I-Chen Kuo 1979 born in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, lives and works in Taipei. Education: MFA in New Media Art, Taipei National University \ of the Arts. Through multiple media, including new media, installation, and video, Kuo creates his unique poetic artistic language. He concerns the floating state of human spirit and keeps searching for the disappearing belongingness in the modern environment. In the status of non-existence, he attempts to explore the essence of life. In 2005, Kuo

became the youngest artist ever to represent Taiwan in the Venice Biennial. He is the winner of Taipei Art Award in 2005 and the 6th Taishin Arts Award Top 5 Selection in 2008. In 2016, he published picture book “A Babytooth fallen out of the Universe,” and in 2017 he founded STUPIN, an artist studio swapping platform. Significant exhibition experience includes Taipei Biennial, Singapore Biennial, Sydney Biennial, Seoul International Media Art city Biennial, ZKM and other major museums across the world. His works keep inviting to various international exhibitions in recent years.

About Zi-yin Chen Born in Taipei in 1995, Chen is currently studying in New Media Art MFA of Taipei National University of Arts. Chen focuses on images and installations combining with space, light, and sound. She frequently uses scientific images provided by ‘ISS’ as well as her own imaginations toward the great unknown in universe. A question she has raised toward the reality is, “Can one truly understand the world with how we feel about it?”

Chen,Zi-Yin Texturing the Moon on the beach 80×45cm, Inkjet print, 2020 Photo Credits by Zi-yin Chen

Photography by Chung- Ping WANG

Photography by Chung- Ping Wang

ExtraOrdinary Human 19

Mu-Jen LU × Tsung-Yu Tsai × Shi, Jin

4/22 Wed. | 5/31 Sun.

artist’s subject and combines his own memories of promenade to launch his so-called "painting act ion". Fluidit y and uncer t aint y ar e not only the displayed characteristics in the creation but also the underclass life imprints of "nothing lasts forever" of the villagers he has encountered during the promenade in "San-Sui". We might find big areas of lines or color blocks in the artworks. TSAI uses them to create extremely odd shadows, sometimes with strokes from other blocks in strongly contrast colors beneath. It adds elements of danger and insecurity to the seeming bad taste humor. The cute and fun expressions of smiling or sticking one’s tongue out and so on therefore becomes more mysterious and unknown as if they are flippantly teasing what we think we have seen and known. In several of

his paintings, the presence of the shadow even becomes stronger than the subject itself because of the thick and heavy colors, which is like a manifesto that the deep subconscious is coming alive to toughly take over. On the other hand, LU surrounds the only character that is in the focus and placed in the middle of the frame with the lines and color blocks. It is the current status of the common people that matters instead of the promenade location referred by the fluid and unidentified background. LU further looks into how human holds the living gestures of being active or passive, dives into the connecting as well as isolating reality, and attempts to approach certain inherent human nat ur e t h r ough t he end l e s s i n t e rw e a v in g a n d conflicts of bodily feelings and rational logics.

Statement by Yuan Ta Hsu&Yung-Wei Tung In 2020, the pandemic of Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has completely disrupted and rearranged the orders of life and of the world. The exhibition of "ExtraOrdinary Human" held by Absolute Space for the Arts under such circumstances, aims to return to the art creation, rethinking the "fei chang" (abnormal/unusual/ extraordinary) within, a term which might seem more ambiguous in the context of Mandarin. In the creation of the three artists participating in the exhibition, we may be able to unfold three interpretation aspects of "ExtraOrdinary Human", creator him/herself, the creatures in or of the artworks and the audience. First, creators see the external from the internal or receive stimulation from the surroundings to inspire the creation. The extraordinariness is not referred to their distinctive talents or creativity as artists, but led by their double identities as both human-beings and creators, embodied in the respective point of view and position. In addition, it implies the fact that each individual has to face the norms from both sides. As a humanbeing, he or she cannot help but compromise on disciplines to some degree in order to survive and make ends meet, while seeking cracks to diverge from the perfect way of life expected by t he s oc iet y. On th e o th e r h a n d , w h e n art creation has become a way to express oneself, to transform one’s energy or to escape, as TSAI Tsung-Yu plays other social roles yet internalizes painting into a way of breathing, as a creator, he or she dooms to be trapped into a stalemate and

battle against the legitimacy of arts. One is forced to encounter the exclusion of the long history and tradition of the medium, and the environment interplayed by contemporary art, the discourses, and the capital. TSAI has been continually searching for the "inappropriate fighting stance" at the edges of both territories, consciously keeping distance from the current norms of painting, art institutions and the broader reality as the first fighting move of assaulting and provoking. He has especially involved himself in water painting to amplify the vocabularies to his so-called linguistic system. While escaping from the mainstream, he has been taking examples or developing moves such as "Dempsey Roll", which he reveled from his last solo exhibition in Absolute Space for the Arts. Inspired by the "unusual" body of the family member, SHIH Jin has departed from the normal viewpoint of drawing and has constantly explored the multidimensional profiles of humankind. To quest for the true human’s being, the "ExtraOrdinary Human" has then formed one unrealistic "ExtraOrdinary Human" image from another through all kinds of strage, twisted figures and straightforward, unconfined strokes, including creatures with heads of human and bodies of animals, the headless, disproportionately elongating and bending bodies, simple facial expressions in dotted lines. The "ExtraOrdinary Human" might be associated with surrealism, which regards the elements from the everyday life out of ordinary and re-develops the deep senses and rhythms in life. TSAI focuses on the daily matters of ordinary people, and turns them into extraordinarily major issue in arts. LU Mu-jen Lama Moltis reconnects the first level of

1.Tsung-Yu Tsai,Houseleek 41×31cm,Oil painting, Acrylique,2017 2.Tsung-Yu Tsai, Cub 35x27cm, Oil painting, Acrylique, 2017. 3.Tsung-Yu Tsai, 半暝拜天公 27.5×19.5cm,Watercolor,2019 Photo Credits by Tsung-Yu Tsai

SHIH focuses on such field of power and e n e r g y, t o o , b u t l o o k s f o r a n o t h e r d y n a m i c equilibrium from the external. While expanding a new dimension from Leonardo DA VINCI’s ideal human body proportions, the unusual lies between the two perfect spots on the vertical line and the horizontal one become more threedimensional. It is not merely represented by the body figure itself, but with the depth of time and other external forces being concerned as well. Moreover, such direction leads to the final aspect through the reverse of the power, including the ordinary audience into the category of "ExtraOrdinary Human". SHIH invites them to step on the "health mat" made of more than three hundred head self-portraits sculpted by the artist herself. The facility which could be seen in everyday life overturns the divinity while the

ordinary people trample on the scared faces (also symbolizing prestige) and artworks with their filthiest feet, the bottom of one’s body. Meanwhile, it keeps vaguely stabbing at the audience. The social viewpoints and doctrines gi ven by di fferent " faces" from the dai l y l i fe hereby transform into sensible pain. The three artists begin with the "ExtraOrdinary" being, position or heal themselves through creation, and supplement the usual with the unusual, or enlighten the ordinariness with extraordinariness. Together, they show deep thoughts about the "ExtraOrdinary" meaning of art production for themselves, and even extend it into art institution to create "ExtraOrdinary" relationship with the audience. As fragmented records of what one sees, the artists have no intention to include everything, but leave the

space within the frame for only one subject or one surrounding. Even when they portray landscapes with no people, they also leave out the details of each building’s space and construction. TSAI mentions that he has drawn inspiration from other media such as cinema. More than being a style, the spirit of minimalism is embraced after re-realizing the limits of the medium of painting nowadays. They have pursued the suspension of "not to do" from "what it cannot do", refusing the construction of knowledge system in the field of contemporary art. By abandoning the actuality of the whole and refusing to obey the paradigm, the characters or the scenes displayed in the artworks could not only refer to what the names of the works imply but all living creatures. Elsewhere is within here. Due to the collateral and two-way circulation of life and creation, the "ExtraOrdinary Human" hold up and advance the distinction between ordinariness and extraordinariness. Under such dynamics, the "non-ordinary" might thus be able to evolve themselves into the "ExtrOrdinary" or known as "human human" (since the term, "fei chang" could be implied as the adjective, "extraordinary" or the adverb, "extreme"), just as "the branches grew from the chink in the wall”, in TSAI’s description. Mu-Jen Lu Yiyou se prépare aller en mer pour attraper du homard 100×70cm, Acrylique, 2020. Photo Credits by Lu,Mu-Jen

AboutMu-Jen Lu He graduated from Tainan National University of the Arts with a master's degree in Graduate Institute of Plastic Arts in 2005, and National Taiwan University of Arts in 2001. The way back to the original may be achieved by some kind of practice, a way back to the original ... I remember floating in the air, wearing dark clothes, not remembering the details of the shape, I could create materials out of thin air, of course I was just a beginner, in the human world, may be called a magician. After coming to Earth, I vaguely remember as a child that I was not used to this material system, I thought I could walk through walls and control myself to become a transparent life form. For a long time, I longed t o return to that time and space. It was a boundless spiritual world. Mu-Jen Lu Mamie à bosse portant un paquet de médicaments chinois sur le chemin du retour 100×70cm, Acrylique,2020. Photo Credits by Lu,Mu-Jen

The Diamond that is Raindrops

About Jin Shi

SHI Jin was Born in Kaohsiung, Taiwan in 1993, she graduated from Taipei National University of the Arts with a master's degree in fine arts creation, majoring in sculpture, and now lives in Taipei, Taiwan. She mainly focuses on observing the relationship between human beings and themselves, exploring the unique characteristics of human beings as a biological species, and embodying the concept of life in his creations. The main media used in her works are wood and metal, and she uses installation to present elements of human emotions, states of consciousness, experiences, encounters, bodies, fantasies, physiological reactions, etc., in her life journey. This compulsive secondary viewing provokes a sympathetic experience between the viewer and the creator.

Jin Shi, Healthmat 550×50×13cm, Cement, Wood,2013 Photo Credits by Shi,Jin

About Tsung-Yu Tsai Tsung-Yu Tsai, Chick, 27.3×39.4 cm, Chinese ink painting, 2020

Tsung-Yu Tsai, 《扛手轎》, 27.3×39.4 cm, Chinese ink painting, 2020.

He graduated from National Taiwan Normal University with a doctor’s degree in art criticism, and Tainan National University of the Arts with a master's degree in Graduate Institute of Plastic Arts. He uses painting as his main form of creation. Tsung-Yu TSAI's paintings present various perspectives from life with expressive brushstrokes. His works depict different subjects, but most of them are fragmented records of daily life, in which things around him or sensory events are expressed in an intuitive and highly sensual way with a quick brushstroke. His works have a straightforward, subjective and instantly reflective character, and his contrasting colors create tension in his images. His works are a bit anti-establishment compared to other painters who came from the same academy, and his disregard for certain painting norms has given his paintings an anti-elite inner quality.

Ya-Hui Wang Solo Exhibition 6/10 Wed. | 7/19 Sun.

Statement by Ya-hui Wang I really like a passage in Shih-t’ao’s Friar Bitter-Melon on Painting: “Life in nature consists in the ink-wash expressing the concrete forms of hills and rivers and things, seen from the front or the back, from the side and on a slant, scattered or clustered together, distant or near, external or internal, solid or empty, continuous or broken; they have layers and sections and falling aspects; they have charm and elusive expanse. Thus all nature presents its soul to man and man has the power to control its vitality and culture.”When we see

the scenery of mountains, what we actually see is not just the mountains but different layers of connections from a personal perspective. Some of these connections appear as scen-ery, while some as subtle atmosphere. If one can sense these qualities, it means that there is something corresponding in his or her heart. For example, when a person sees the barren tree branches in the midwinter at some particular moment, and thus feels a special resonance inside; then at this moment, the world appears as another existence. This

Checkerboard#2 43×43×4.8cm, Wood panel,Clockwork, Acrylic and Ink, 2020.

Checkerboard#1 49×49×4.8cm, Wood panel, Clockwork, Acrylic and Ink, 2020. Photography by Hsin-Yu Liu

About Ya-hui Wang Light Year 93×65.04×20cm Art paper framed with aluminum plate, Solid wood shelf, Glass cup, Water, Two clock

Sea 112×86.35×20cm Semi-gloss photo paper framed with aluminum plate, Solid wood shelf, Glass cup, Water, Two clock calibers,

calibers2020 Photography by Hsin-Yu Liu

2020 Photography by Hsin-Yu Liu

kind of moment is like the world that children capture with intuition. It is wonderful and real, yet usual. I have always been trying to capture things in these moments. Images to me have always been like fables: it is what it is yet it isn’t so. This seemingly unsolva-ble contradiction (yet unnecessary to be solved) actually has very deep meanings inside. In this exhibition, I started along the tim eline and gradually picked out the imagery that was originally hidden behind my lives. I returned time back to a single picture in another way. I often feel this different-yet-juxtaposed time and space in my mundane life. Big and small; distant and near; light and heavy; fast and slow. These different qualities have always been

alternating bright and dark in my heart. The other day, I picked out a poetry collection by Shuntarō Tanikawa from my book-shelf by chance. I bought it in Japan many years ago and all the poems have Japanese and English translation side by side. When I flipped to the page that was copied from his original notebook, there seemed to be some feelings emerging from this book that I had read for so many times. Therefore, after a few days in my studio, I put the book with this page open on the black tablecloth that had not been cleaned for a while. A wonderful scene showed up, where time became a loop, and suddenly I understood another poem of the poet. That’s right. The Diamond that is Raindrops.

Ya-hui Wang was born in 1973 in Taipei and currently lives and works in Taipei. She graduated from Taipei National University of Arts with a master's degree in Arts and Technology . Her creative forms include video, installation, photography, and painting. The use of video media has always been concerned with the boundary of the viewer's vision, and from the overlap between reality and video, she raises many questions about reality/ virtuality, inner/outer space, the nature of video, and the viewing experience. The theme focuses on the relationship between human and the world and the way of thinking in the Eastern philosophy of nature, and explores the possibility of re-incorporating this way of thinking through the experience of contemporary life. Thus, her video works are not about creating or describing a landscape, but about the dynamic experience of how a landscape

is constructed. In the past, she has participated in international residency programs in New York, Paris, and Finland, and her works have been exhibited and screened in many international exhibitions, such as the Taipei Biennale in 2002, the Shanghai Biennale in 2008, the International Film Festival in Rotterdam, and the Pompidou Film Festival in 2008. In 2010, she was commissioned by the Taipei Biennial to create a large spatial installation as an artist's cinema for the screening of other artists' works. Recently, she has held solo exhibitions at the New Art Association and Eslite Gallery in Kissen, Germany, and collaborated with the Children's Art Center of the Taipei Fine Arts Museum to exhibit his works in the "Where is the Time" educational program. She has been awarded the Taipei Fine Arts Award and the National Giant Technology Award.

Landscape Remains

Jo-Mei Lee Solo Exhibition 7/29 Wed. | 9/6 Sun.

Statement by Jo-Mei Lee Trees wrap time.

A Poem 109×73.05×20cm Semi-gloss photo paper framed with aluminum plate, Solid wood shelf, Book 2020 Photography by Hsin-Yu Liu

Several years ago on a winter evening, among the mundane scenery I came across two coconut trees—two royal palm shadows cast by sunlight on the buildings’ walls. The four-story-high tree shadows were displaced as the sunlight moved upon the trees. At times since the trees shook vigorously or due to a piece of cloud passing, a dynamic gray-scale scene appeared on the buildings’ surface. Landscape Remains contains the ambiguity between the coconut trees and the tree shadows . My obsession with the natural forms is just like what Tateishi Tetsuomi once said: “Rather than being emotionally connected to trees, I was more attracted to the inter-

Template, 340 ×145cm, Iron, palm tree, wood, 2020 Photo Credits by

lacing of trees and the arrangement of leaf veins. There was a desire inside my mind to attempt to collect those feelings….” Therefore, I kept on drawing and left the strokes of labors. A few weeks ago, those five coconut trees that grew straight up outside the window of my place were cut down due to the typhoon prevention policy in summer. Those trees had been my greetings to the sky every early morning, but they turned out as the waste abandoned on spare land. What

remain are the tree shadows, the coconut trees in the botanic garden that suffered during wartime, the wood that lies on the ground, the fallen leaves that sweep the ground in ordinary daily lives, the massive tree bark that hangs off the trunks because of metabolic activities.… With the series of works I want to dive into objects, portray the nature, and evoke the scenery with still lifes. In order to capture the differences, I keep copying the conditions of time fading away.

A scene from the Landscape Remains exhibition. Photo Credits by Jo-Mei Lee

About Jo-Mei Lee Born in 1985 in Taipei, Taiwan. Graduated from Master Degree of Department of Fine Art, National Taiwan University of Arts. Lives and works in Taipei. The creation of Lee, Jo-Mei mainly comes from the personal experience of daily experience and its transformation, from the ordinary texture of things and details of the gaze and repeated painting, looking for a touch of the memory landscape. She is good at using different techniques and materials to record and transform, so as to change these accustomed things, slip out of the original order, and reshape the possibility for them to be seen again. Her works have a special poetic quality. In the past, he exhibited in Kuandu Museum of Fine Arts, Eslite Gallery and Crane Gallery. She has also been invited to France, Japan, Thailand and Australia to participate in joint exhibitions and artist in residence.

JNovember 10th, Sherbrook Forest Walk 240×230×6cm, Wood, wood veneer, charcoal, pastel, 2016. Photo Credits by Jo-Mei Lee

Template, 340 ×145cm, Iron, palm tree, wood, 2020. Photo Credits by Jo-Mei Lee

Journal of Visited Light

Artists

9/19 Sat. | 10/25 Sun.

Po-Yen Wang × Tzu-Huan Lin × Tzu-An Wu

Curator

Jhen-Kai Wang

Statement by Wang,Jhen-Kai On June 21, 2020, under the sky in the spread of the plague, the world as if to rest, the people on the street look up to the same direction. They are in the process of observing the solar eclipse, the collective behavior appeared in the documentary, “ Le Moulin”, to reproduce the historical fragment, after hundreds of years, still the light of the sun through the pupil. What are we really looking for from the spectacle? Light, which human beings strive to pursue throughout their whole life. Only when the individual breaks away from the matrix and comes out of the water in the direction of light.

Po-Yen Wang

The Blue Room 80 x 100 cm,2019 － 2020

Photo Credits by Po-Yen Wang

We could lead to the western paradise by following the light of Buddha at the junction of life and death. In Plato's cave, the primordial people chose to leave the darkness and struggle to open their eyes in order to look directly at the sun, the symbol of truth. It is the same as the audience in the white cube, all looking for the work where the light sources converge in the space, or in the black box. Staring intently at the film light projected on the screen. Absolute space for the Arts in this annual festival is honored to invite three video artists: Po-Yen Wang, Tzu-An Wu, Tzu-Huan Lin. They have lived in New York for a long time, good at individual three-dimensional computer animation, experimental film and video art. All three of them are light seekers, who have a keen insight into the changes of time and space in the process of movement. In addition, using the dynamic image as the creation medium, they also transform the elements in the image into flat paintings and installations in the space. The light in the works is both the form and the content, both the subject and the object. In this very period of global border closures, by the annual exhibition of the three works of artists exhibition, to reflection the inner meaning of “ 觀光 (Guan Guang)” : sightseeing, it points to not only the behavior of human to travel to visit, also is the human eye for observation and measurement of visible light. To use “ 記 (Ji)” as concatenation means, with image as a writing tool, just like the past literati with calligraphy and painting while traveling. T h e “ J o u r n a l o f Vi s i t e d L i g h t ” s e e m s t o spread out the travel notes of the three artists. The light expanded from them and penetrated through the spaces. Turning into an Aura could be seen by the audience and reflected into mind.

Po-Yen Wang New Moon I 80 x 100 cm,2019 － 2020 Photo Credits by Po-Yen Wang

About Po-Yen Wang Po-Yen Wang holds two Master of Fine Arts degrees from the School of Visual Arts in New York City with a major in Computer Art, and Taipei National University of the Arts with a major in New Media Art. He won Gold Medal Award in New Media Art (National Art Exhibition, Taiwan), Paula Rhodes Award for Exceptional Achievement in Computer Art (School of Visual Arts, New York), Asia Digital Art

Award (Fukuoka, Japan), and he completed the Artist in the Marketplace Fellowship (NY, United States) in 2018. His solo exhibitions include The Black Sun, Taipei Digital Art Center, Taiwan (2020), Atlas Portal, Taiwan Academy, Los Angeles, United States (2018), An Obscure Silhouette, Flux Factory, NY, United States (2018), and Saudade, National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, Taichung, Taiwan(2016).

A view of the exhibition. Photography by Pei-Shan Yen

About Curator-Jhen-Kai Wang Jhen-Kai Wang is now the manager and curator of Absolute space for the Arts, and also serves as the director of Taiwan Film Critics Society. He has been writing art and film reviews for a long time. His works can be seen on such platforms as Funscreen, The News Lens, E-reading of National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, and Unitas Lifestyle, etc. The first cross-domain book will be published at the end

of this year, with the theme of Chuan Mei Theater. He has served as a judge for the Golden Horse Award Asian Film Observer Mission and served for the AICA. During this period, he has co-organized many exhibitions. As a curator for the first time, “ 觀光記 (Guan Guang Ji), Journal of Visited Light” aims to draw out a unique curatorial poetics based on the cross-media focus on image and writing. Po-Yen Wang Crossing Two-Channel 3D computer animation(12 min/ HD /Color),2018 Photo Credits by Po-Yen Wang

About Tzu-An Wu Tzu-An Wu makes experimental films. He likes to manipulate heterogeneous images, sounds, and texts, to question the construction of the narrative and the selfhood. In recent years he mainly works with Super 8 and 16mm film techniques, while he is also interested in the intersection of analog and digital image production. He holds an MA in Media Studies from The New School, New York, and a BA in Gender and Cultural Studies from National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan. His works have been shown

About Tzu-Huan Lin Tzu-Huan Lin– (b. Taipei, 1986) His work centers around personal experience as an immigrant, adapts to connect different subjects or stories to address the phenomena. He received an MFA in Digital Arts at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn. Lin’s work has been included in international group exhibitions such as "The 6th International Video Art Exhibition", "ADAF 14th Athens Digital Arts Festival" and solo exhibitions at Taipei Fine Art Museum, Kuandu Museum of Fine Arts.

worldly, including BFI Flare (London), IFFR (Netherland), CROSSROADS (San Francisco), EXiS (Seoul), KLEX (Kuala Lumpur), Xposed Film Festival(Berlin), MixNYC (New York) and more. He was awarded the jury prize at Festival of Different and Experimental Cinema (Paris). Exhibitions include Taiwan Biennial, Metropolitan Museum of Manila, and Taipei Artist Village, etc. Also, he is a member of The Other Cinema, a collective dedicated to experimental cinema and the moving image.

Tzu-Huan Lin Appearing is not the same as being see Woven tapestry 100% cotton with tasseled edges, 2019 Photo Credits by Tzu-Huan Lin

Tzu-An Wu Moon Phrases 16mm transfer to video( 1'44") ,2018 Photo Credits by Tzu-An Wu

Tzu-An Wu World's Odds and World's Ends Super8 / Digital Video,2015 Photo Credits by Tzu-An Wu Tzu-Huan Lin Hypothesis Voyager 16:9(19'01"), 2020 Photo Credits by Tzu-Huan Lin

Moonlight Over the Island Affects People Watching the Tong-Chiao Chuang Solo Exhibition 11/04 Wed. | 2/13 Sun. Statement by Jhen-Kai Wang To n g - C h i a o C h u a n g ’ s s o l o e x h i b i t i o n Moonlight Over the Island Affects People Watching the Sea is Absolute Art Space’s seventh highlight of the 2020 annual exhibitions. Connecting the artist’s statement, the context, and the spirit of Absolute Art Space, our institutional c u r a t o r J h e n - K a i Wa n g c o n c l u d e d f o u r major aspects and characteristics for this exhibition. First, the artist took his inspirations from the images of “mountains” and “sea” in Taiwanese landscape. Second, t h e e x h i b i t i o n ’s m a i n s u b j e c t M o o n l i g h t Over the Island Affects People Watching the Sea was actually taken from the name of a poem which the artist wrote in 2017. In other words, this created the intertextuality between the artist’s literary and artistic works. Third, The artist has been trained and been working as a curator as well. In this exhibition the artist’s professional thoughts in curating and creating can be seen con nected . Last bu t not l east, th e spirit of Absolute Art Space has a strong

interactive relationship with the works in this exhibition. In the poem Moonlight Over the Island Affects People Watching the Sea, the artist organized his observations and thoughts after he returned to Taiwan from France. B y r e p e a t e d l y b r i n g i n g u p t h e d i ff e r e n t climates between Europe and Taiwan, and comparing Taiwanese daily lives and food

with those in Europe, the artist emphasized a traveler’s searching and choosing between “home” and “elsewhere.” Naming this exhibition as the same topic of the poem is to respond to the exhibition’s lyricism, and to present the artist’s island-based viewpoint and his historical thoughts. Starting from the keywords such as “mountains,” “sea,” “island,” “fields,” betel nut trees,” “coconut trees” and “palm-family plants,” the artist aimed to explore deeper and further his identity toward “home” and “land,” and tried to figure out where exactly his own “dwelling,” or even spiritual “shelter” is. The exhibition takes advantage of Absolute Art Space’s long and narrow space. Starting

from the entrance lie the installation work Urban and Rural Tanks, and painting works Dwelling 06, Dwelling 07 and Everything Breathes Again 017. We hope the viewers to experience the cities, the mountains, the sea and the fields of the island. Next, in the middle and the space behind are the installation work Archipelago II, and painting works Dwelling 03, The Dream of Home 014, The Dream of Home 015, The Dream of Home 016, Spirit Temporary Shelter 05 and The Dream of Home 017. After showing the viewers the scenery of the outside world, we invite them to search deeper in mind their own imagination toward home.

Everything Breaths Again 017 Acrylic on canvas 117×80cm 2019 Photo Credits by Tong-Chiao Chuang

Dream of a House 14, Acrylic on canvas, 100×80cm, 2016. Photo Credits by Tong-Chiao Chuang

About Tong-Chiao Chuang Born in Ping-Tung in 1981, graduated with the Diplôme national supérieur d'expression plastique from the École Nationale Supérieure d’Arts de Paris-Cergy (ENSAPC). Recently lives and works in Tainan. The main subject of his creation is landscape, he believes that landscape can be the media for the notions and expression of “the connection between oneself the world”. He also follows the unique natural conditions and social customs of the island and ocean in Taiwan closely for these past few years, to abstracts and symbols the sight he’s seen and the body experiences he’s been, then displays these ideas by painting and concepts on the graphic works and spatial works.

He had had his personal exhibitions in Absolute Space for the Arts, MU MU Gallery, A Gallery, published his poetry anthology, and experienced curating in art museums.

Family Recipes: Mother's Forest Ping-Yu Pan Solo Exhibition

12/23 Sat. | 01/24 Sun.

Artist Statement

1.Landscape of the Island 001 Mix media Variable Dimension,2020

2 3

Photography by Jain-Hau Jaing 2.Dream of a House 15 Acrylic on canvas, 33×24cm, 2016 Photo Credits by Dong-Chiao Chuang 3.Dream of a House 16 Acrylic on canvas,33×24cm,2016

T h e a r t w o r k s b y Ta i w a n e s e a r t i s t P i n g - Yu Pan primarily revolve around the relationship between myths and contemporary life. The artist believes that the collective myths created by human beings are in fact the images composed of superimposed individual life stories. The archetype of these collective myths has been demonstrating a formal evolution that proceeds by a series of nuances, which calls for our awareness of the fundamental issues that the humanity faced. Such an evolving form is exactly the structure of the collective myths. Previous discourses on the myths mainly put universal interpretations on their archetype and emphasized the archetype’s reproduction. Pan, in contrast, argues that we can comprehend the meaning of the mythical structure only by capturing the nuances of its dynamics.

The mythical structure connotes that the structure of the archetype has transcended the formal confines through its evolution proceeding by a series of nuances, and therefore become a creative, dynamic structure as a whole. The formal evolution requires the creative participation and deduction of life to transcend the limitations of the archetype. Transcending the archetype (or transcending the paradigm) represents a hero’s odyssey. The myths inspired us by showing how to t r a n s c e n d t h e c o n f i n e s o f l i f e , r e a l i t y, o r paradigm, allowing us to be ourselves, that is, to be our own heroes. In other words, the mythical structure refers to finding our own archetypes and transcending them. Her series of works Family Recipes embody her thoughts about the mythical structure. In one of her experiences as an artist in

residence, she brought one of her mother’s recipes with her and started the longest and furthest journey she’d ever had. Exploring the art world in New York with great excitement, she had never expected the recipe in her suitcase to become the strong emotional connection to her home. The Family Recipes series not only talk about nostalgia through food, but also intend to explore the issues about family, history and culture through life experiences and cooking; since family dishes aren’t just delicacies but the embodiment of inheritance, emotions and culture. With family dishes as the clues of life stories, she talks about the different dimensions of a family story and how individual narrations become collective.

Apparently Family Recipes involves the inheritance and innovation of culture and traditions. In this series, she intentionally uses “the Arts and Crafts Movements” as the parallel issue. In an era of postconceptual art, craftsmanship can revive arts’ or visual arts’ ability to take control of multimedia languages, and provide the mindset of practical aspects for the “concept-media language-artwork” structure. This time in Tainan, Absolute Art Space exhibits four pieces in this series, including the 2020 new pieces Chang, Ling’s Kitchen, Mandarin Duck Cake (2019), Grandma Owl (2011-2020) and The myth of Lunar Eclipse (2016-2019), discussing the female roles in family.

About Ping-Yu Pan Works and lives in Taipei. Ping Yu Pan earned her degree from the Graduate Institute of Plastic Arts at Tainan National University of the Arts in 1998, and is currently an assistant professor at Taipei National University of the Arts (TNUA). She has received grants from Asian Cultural Council and ROC-US Foundation for Scholarly Exchange, won the 9th Asian Artist Scholarship offered by Vermont Studio Center, and participated in artist-in-residency Program hosted by Headland Center for the Arts, Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco/de Young Museum, etc. Pan possesses abundant domestic and foreign experience, and her work which consist chiefly of mixed-media sculpture or installations, explore

the relationship between myths and contemporary life. Her recent project Family Recipes, Pan seeks to explore diffident dimensions of a family story with family dishes as the clues because family dishes not only embody but also perpetuate affections and culture, and are therefore more meaningful than delicacies. Furthermore, she attempts to capture the common image of mythical archetypes in different culinary cultures. She has published two catalogues in 2009 and 2013, her work has been exhibited in many places in Taiwan, and among different international cities. Her work has also collected by Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts and Kuandu Museum of Fine Arts, Taipei National University of the Arts.

Chang, Ling’s Kitchen, 350×192×287 cm,10’00”, Fabric, Video, 2020 Photography by Sunhoophotography

Gramma Owl Dimensions variable Mixed-media,2011-2020 Photography by Sunhoophotography

Wei-Chen Chen I-CHEN Kuo Zi-Yin Chen Mu-Jen LU Jin Shi Tsung-Yu Tsai Ya-hui Wang Jo-Mei Lee Po-Yen Wang Tzu-Huan Lin Tzu-An Wu Tong-Chiao Chuang Ping-Yu Pan