TKG+ (Taipei) is pleased to present Wu Tien-chang: Never Say Goodbye 2001–2015. During the same period, Tina Keng Gallery hosts “Wu Tien-chang: Divergent Paths to Reality 1980-2011”. The double exhibitions chronicle Wu’s 35-year art practice, delving into his three diverse approaches to art.
Deeply rooted in historical and cultural critique, Wu Tien-chang’s art practice plumbs the complexities of body politics and political lineages. The 80s marked the beginning of Wu’s budding career as an artist as he engaged oils in his Neo-Expressionist painting, capturing the sociopolitical landscape of that time in the “scar painting” movement, or the art of the wounded.
The 90s saw him shift toward the application of mixed media, before he segued into the realm of digital imagery in the millennium. Favoring the use of latex skin, mixed media, intricate mechanical devices, the cinematic technique of the long take, and postproduction technologies, Wu choreographed ensorcelling “fake imagery,” steeped in Oriental Mannerism and profoundly Taiwanese.
After the 90s, Wu’s dramatic, unnerving aesthetic vocabulary and Taiwan’s grassroots culture intertwined, elucidating the national character of sensationalism, as well as an inclination toward defiant aesthetics. Brusque, delusory artistic expressions articulated generations of collective memory of political turnover and ethnic migration since the late 19th century.
Wu staged scenes that deviate far from reality, yet simultaneously convey a sense of truth, delineating the island’s unique historical experiences, restrained and subdued national attribute, and the human condition.
Viewers are invited into the fantastical worlds Wu has carefully constructed, where gaunt, fretful families and enchanting, sinister youngsters dwell, where enormous bodies lie across the ground, where an endless path of willows stretches far and beyond. Beguiling the viewer are images of frail, epicene sailors, the flamboyantly clad blind loitering at night, or an idle finger almost submerged by the undulating waves.
Wu Tien-chang: Never Say Goodbye, 2001-2015
18.06.2016 – 31.07.2016
Images courtesy of Wu Tien-chang and TKG+
Discover: www.tinakenggallery.com
