Ministry of Culture-Performance Venues & Architectural Heritage

As part of the Ministry's Emerald Initiative, an international partnership program with Southeast Asia, Thai artist Namfon Laistrooglai showcased her textile works in Taiwan from March 22 through April 27.

Namfon Laistrooglai, an assistant professor at Silpakorn University in Bangkok, specializes in prints, visual arts, textiles, and couture. She has previously studied in Austria, France, and the United Kingdom and is currently a columnist for two fashion magazines — "Surface Asia” and "Casavive.”

Her month-long "Fibers Illusion” exhibition was held at Art Stock 20, an art village that was repurposed from an old train station in the central Taiwanese city of Taichung.

"Shifting Realities,” one of her textile artworks that wasdisplayed at Art Stock 20, uses an unique silk-screen printing technique to presents flowers as different stage of life — namely birth/budding, vitality/blooming and passing/withering.

The Emerald Initiative aims to boost the number of cultural exchanges among people from Taiwan and Southeast Asia. Under the program, organizations are encouraged to invite Southeast Asian professionals to Taiwan to hold exhibitions, perform, write, preserve cultural assets, conduct fieldwork and research, make news reports and films, or engage in community development.

The program offers grants of up to NT$500,000 (US$16,708) for each cultural exchange and collaborative project selected by the Ministry, and each participating Southeast Asian professional will be able to stay in Taiwan for up to six months.