Dear friends of Taipei Fine Arts Museum,

As Taiwan’s first museum of modern and contemporary art, in 2018 we enter a watershed moment unique in our history. After operating for 34 years, the museum building’s interior facilities have gradually aged and become inadequate for the uses of a new era. The pressing need to install a new air-conditioning system throughout the entire building and to refurbish our exhibition spaces has provided the museum with an opportunity for metamorphosis. At this time, we are pausing to address the evolving role of contemporary art institutions, and undertaking the largest renovation project since the museum was founded in 1983. Not content to simply imitate developing trends in Western culture, Taipei Fine Arts Museum has embarked on its own journey of self-learning. We are seeking to elevate our professionalism and improve effectiveness – from art administration and management, exhibition planning, and knowledge production to public service – to create a substantively local experience and write a completely new chapter in the history of Taiwanese museums.

In 2017, Taipei Fine Arts Museum held 19 exhibitions in Taiwan and abroad: Internationally, we presented Doing Time, the Taiwan Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, which captured the eyes of the world, as well as History’s Shadows and Light and Power, Haunting and Resilience, both of which considered Taiwan’s 30 years of martial law. At home, the major summer exhibitions Arena and A Space Andante generated the largest number of summer visitors in the last five years. As the museum temporarily closed in early autumn, we embarked on a program to renovate our facilities and restructure our services. In addition to maintenance of the air-conditioning and galleries, our collection warehouse, in use for over 34 years, faces the critical need to increase storage space and upgrade preservation conditions and equipment. Thus, in early 2017 we initiated the construction of new storage facilities, which are projected to be complete in 2024.

Equally exciting, Taipei Fine Arts Museum, with its abundant modern art and contemporary art assets, is currently embarking on an expansion plan, the Taipei Contemporary Art Park. Part of a major city government policy, this project is driven by a forward-looking vision: to make the museum a center for the permanent exhibition and research of Taiwanese modern and contemporary art. These new facilities will serve as a platform for cross-disciplinary experimental contemporary art exhibitions and performances. Incorporating and enhancing the spaces and services of the nearby Taipei Expo Park, TFAM is creating a green corridor integrated with landscape architecture, to revivify the life of our city’s people.

While we renovate, we do not rest. Right now as we reorganize both our facilities and our services, the museum’s doors are temporarily shuttered. Yet beyond our doors, we are creating a base for art that brims with imagination, transporting art beyond the white box. Our esplanade has become a grand courtyard where the art community can interact. Collaborating with an array of talents from the contemporary art world, we are unveiling two projects: Sanctuary, followed by La Camera Insabbiata. In addition, the Taipei Art Awards will for the first time relocate to the Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei, and the historical site that is its home. Our long-term program Art Education In-Depth, meanwhile, continues as a limited edition, presented directly in elementary schools.

In this stage of transformation, as we crouch down in preparation for a leap forward, we are truly grateful to each of you for staying by our sides and sharing the journey of Taipei Fine Arts Museum. In 2018 a series of exhibitions celebrating our reopening is already being planned. Please wait for the many surprises to soon come.

With wishes of peace and health in the Year of the Dog,

Ping Lin │ Director of Taipei Fine Arts Museum

February 12, 2018