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Overseas Taiwanese artists to tackle identity issue, homesickness in virtual exhibition

  • Date:2020-08-17~2020-08-23
Overseas Taiwanese artists to tackle identity issue, homesickness in virtual exhibition

UK-based Taiwanese artists Chen Yun-ling(陳韻玲), Chen Kuan-yu (陳冠伃), and Chiu Pao-chen (邱寶禎) will be showcasing their works discussing identity issues and homeland memories at the online exhibition "Where I'm Coming From" on the digital platform Guest Project Digital, on August 17-23.

Supported by the cultural division of the Taipei Representative Office in the U.K., the virtual exhibition is curated by Filipino artist Rhine Bernardino and London-based contemporary art curator Linda Rocco.

Through a video, Chen Yun-ling will present a series of installation. "This series explores the constituted relationship produced between human and object through language. It aims to disentangle the habitual and repeated link that humans instill between subjects and objects. By exploring theories that deconstruct the institutionalized approach to naming, to untie the assumed stable relationship between human and objects," according to the artist.

Under the theme "Invisible Marks of Pingtung," Chen Kuan-yu will showcase a video clip displaying the artist's affection toward her grandmother and childhood memories from Taiwan's southernmost county Pingtung through dance and narration. The artist said the art work was inspired by her childhood, and it shows "how memories are so connected to our primal instincts."

Currently pursuing a PhD in Fine Art at the London-based Royal College of Art, Chiu will bring the audience part of her ongoing moving image project, two video clips "Map" and "Belongings" depicting her fragmented memories of Taiwan. With personal stories narrated in Taiwanese dialect – a language she picked up at a young age, the artist examines the conflicting identifies confronting her since moving to the UK.

The four-week "Where I'm Coming From" virtual exhibition, from Aug. 3 to 30, is a project co-sponsored by British artist Yinka Shonibare's workshop and the Inventory Platform, a collaboration-based platform that showcases artists' works while aiding the co-creation of programs to engage communities in the urban and rural context. This project is dedicated to Filipino, Taiwanese, Hakka, Yoruba, Berber, and Yoruba – languages that are present and spoken by a significant portion of the migrant community actively working and contributing to the British economy and yet highly invisible, according to the curators. On Aug. 3-9, it is dedicated to Filipino; Aug. 10-16, Berber languages; Aug. 17-23, Taiwanese; Aug. 24-30, Yoruba.

To cast light on each cultural group's cuisine for viewers to possibly reproduce and engage in their own homes, "Where I'm Coming From" will have food sessions each Sunday during the exhibition period. On Aug. 30, a cooking show featuring London-based Taiwanese chef Chen Chia-bin (陳家斌) and artist Yang Jing-liang (楊璟亮) will be livestreamed from East London.

The session will see the duo make the famous scallion pancakes – a classic snack from Taiwan's Northeastern country Yilan, hoping to sooth the homesickness for Taiwanese living abroad and highlighting diversity and multiculturalism.

All the videos will be subtitled, with translations available from one of the languages to English, and vice versa. Visit here for the ongoing exhibition.