Time: 2019/12/7 (Sat.) 14:30-17:30

Venue: TFAM Library

Introduction

The 2019 Venice Biennale opened on May 11 this year and came to a successful close on November 24. Taiwanese artist Shu Lea CHEANG 's scheme for Taiwan Pavilion entitled, 3X3X6 received rave reviews and was named by several international media as one of the most original and arresting shows. To share the experience with the public who were not able to attend the Biennale in person, Taipei Fine Arts Museum is hosting a retrospective seminar, 2019 Venice Biennale Taiwan Pavilion Experience Sharing Event on the afternoon of Saturday, December 7, 2019. Invited speakers include: members of TFAM's Taiwan Pavilion task group and this edition's intern docent from the "Art Administrative Talent Development Program" to describe their experience in organizing an exhibition overseas, chief editor in culture Hsiao -wen Wang from collaborating media, The Reporter and brilliant playwright Pao-chang Tsai to share the preparation for their special report and live stories; movie and art critic Ming-han HSU and one of the nominating committee member and eminent curator Chao-sheng HU to talk about show highlights and their observations.

The event's title, We're All in It, alludes to imagination and response about the Venice Biennale and Taiwan Pavilion. The theme of the Biennale this year is May You Live in Interesting Times, while Taiwan Pavilion's exhibition, 3x3x6, touches on the relationships between personal identity and the ever-watching eye in the contemporary life. Both themes examine the idiosyncrasy of our times and possible responsive strategies for those who live in it. In today's super-flat world of globalization where everything is interlinked, can we possibly stay on the sideline as an observer? Or perhaps regardless of our role, position or viewpoint, none of us can be spared from being involved? In this sharing event, we look to embark on a journey of imagination, understanding and dialogue through the different lenses of "practice" and "observation".

Registration

Registration deadline: Two days before the day of event
Registration website: https://reurl.cc/Ob6en7
 

Organizer: Taipei Fine Arts Museum No. 181, Zhongshan N. Rd. Sec. 3, Zhongshan Dist., Taipei City
Media partners: ARTouch, Artco

AGENDA

Staging 3x3x6: Shaping up Taiwan Pavilion at the 58th Venice Biennale
Wei-fen LEE

TFAM has served as the organizer for Venice Biennale Taiwan Pavilion since 1995, and the planning strategy has been constantly realigned to adapt to the times over the last two plus decades. The strategic realignment at each stage responds both to the current state of development in contemporary art and gauging of Taiwan's own artistic strength. For the first time in 2015, a committee nominated one single artist to be represented at the pavilion, and further strategic refinements were made in 2017 and 2019. 3x3x6 is an original work co-presented by 2019 participating artist Shu Lea Cheang and curator Paul B. Preciado addressing the historical context of the site of Taiwan Pavilion, Palazzo delle Prigioni, which is a former penitentiary. The work is a mutli-interface immersive installation that turns the palace into a high-tech surveillance space; it includes a rotating projection tower inspired by the "panopticon", 10 short "trans punk" sci-fi films, a control center referencing the control room of a playboy's opulent home, real-time CCTV images of the venue and an interactive network soliciting audience participation. Key curatorial concepts and the unique spatial and visual lexicons will be shared in this talk.

Towards Broader Audiences and Perspectives: Marketing and Promotion of Taiwan Pavilion at the 58th Venice Biennale

Yu-mei Song

The biannual Venice Biennale is a large-scale event that brings together artists from around the world. In organizing the ten plus editions of Taiwan Pavilion, TFAM has continuously realigned its strategies in an effort to attract the limelight during the preview and opening in front of all the art professionals and hence create a snowballing word-of-mouth effect, and further reach broader audiences in general during the rest of the Biennale and galvanize interest and discussions. The media planning strategy, promotional campaigns and achievements of Taiwan Pavilion at the 58th Venice Biennale will be shared at this talk.

Building an Imperfect Bridge: My Two-Month Experience at Taiwan Pavilion at the 58th Venice Biennale
Teng-wei Yu

Venice always brings to mind the image of the bridge. Yu Teng-Wei's internship record compares the role of the docent to "building a bridge". It just so happens that the very first intern in 2017 also penned a diary entitled, "If an art docent were a bridge", in which she defined the docent's role as a bridge between artwork and audience. However, two months of interpretation at Palazzo delle Prigioni has made it clear to Yu that the bridge built after each tour is actually an imperfect one. The background stories of the ten characters in 3X3X6, the images of the installation, the format of the character films and even the historical context of the exhibition venue encompass intricate and abundant information, requiring the docent to constantly tailor the interpretation to the audience while also taking into account their language skills. Even then, Yu still made every endeavor to build the "most appropriate" bridge during each session to bring the audience close to the artwork and into the artist's world.

We Find A Way to Reunite with Art within Taboos
Hsiao-wen Wang / Pao-chang TSAI

Echoing the theme of Taiwan Pavilion this year, The Reporter has invited brilliant theater director Tsai Pao-Chang to visit Venice in person to cast an artist's eye on the event and contribute to the magazine's special report entitled, "Total Surveillance". Watching at the former Palazzo delle Prigioni 10 film stories with the common narrative of falling under imprisonment on account of desire and sex bring one to ponder: can the prison really incarcerate the body and soul? If thoughts cannot be incarcerated, then what does the physical prison represent? While taking in the candid yet provocative work of artist Cheang Shu Lea, freedom and a liberating force are slowly being unleashed from within the viewer.

Walking into Taiwan Pavilion from the Venice Biennale
Austin Ming-han Hsu

The Venice Biennale is a biannual event that has spanned over a century and comprises 2 themed pavilions, 90 national pavilions and 20 parallel exhibitions (including Taiwan Pavilion). At the same time, there are over one hundred exhibitions being staged in galleries and art museums across the city, as well as performances and presentations ongoing in spaces leased by universities of art. Despite this plethora of exhibitions, Taiwan Pavilion was still ranked by ArchDaily among the top seven exhibitions to visit. What are the possible reasons? During the opening week, Hsu attended a conference held by University of the Arts Helsinki. He will share about the magazines, media and outdoor promotional events as well as the local geography and culture he was exposed to over the seven days and six nights he spent in Venice, as he examines the communication approaches, spatiotemporal motivation and thematic guidance underlying the spatial characteristics and theme of Taiwan Pavilion that helped shape the anticipation for this exhibition.

Art as Interesting as Its Times: Observations on the 2019 Venice Biennale

Chao-sheng Hu

The century-old Venice Biennale that is regularly staged as a major event provides a cosmopolitan view into today's world of art while also showcasing artistic ecosystems and development around the globe. It is both an encyclopedia of contemporary art and an annual world report. The theme this year, May You Live in Interesting Times, alludes with a sarcastic, ridiculing and unconcerned blessing to how people are selfishly minding their own business and either constructing relationships or compromising with others and the world after weighing their (self-serving rather than altruistic) interests in today's international situations and social milieus of the Internet era (God knows this world has never been peaceful!). The ambiguity and transposition of periphery/center, mainstream/fringe and justice/interest have caused the collapse and restoration of traditional values while at the same time instigate the forging of and conflicts about new perspectives. The world is a swirling mess of chaos. Just as the human civilization is taking a stride forward, we wake up only to find perhaps we have always been stuck in the same place or jolted back to a more distant past by the torrents of the times. As we look toward what is happening around us, will we really live in interesting times?

Speaker

Wei-fen LEE works at the Exhibition Department, Taipei Fine Arts Museum. She is responsible for the planning and execution of the exhibition at Venice Biennale Taiwan Pavilion. She received her graduate degree in Arts Administration, University of Oregon and interned at the Maryhill Museum of Art in Washington State and a private gallery in Oregon. She undertook the doctoral program in Museum Studies at the University of Leicester as part of the Ministry of Education fellowship program. She was responsible for international cultural exchange programs including visual arts at Taiwan's diplomatic office in New York in her post at the Ministry of Culture, and for curatorial research at the preparatory office of National Palace Museum Southern Branch. She also participated in the development of a Chinese version of the Getty’s Art & Architecture Thesaurus (AAT) for the Taiwan E-learning and Digital Archives Program with Academia Sinica. 

Yu-mei SONG works at the Marketing and Public Relations Department, Taipei Fine Arts Museum. She was tasked with the marketing planning for local and international media, cross-functional project management, media relations and media and VIP campaign organization for Venice Biennale Taiwan Pavilion. Prior to participating in the Art Administrative Talent Development Program for Taiwan Pavilion at the 57th Venice Biennale entitled, Doing Time, she was involved in the organization and execution of exhibitions and public art projects.

Teng-wei YU is a freelance writer and translator who is pursuing a master's degree at National Taiwan University. He is a translates for The Affairs and MOCA Taipei and a contributor to the magazine, Art Collection+Design.

Hsiao-wen WANG is the chief editor in culture for The Reporter. She received her bachelor's in foreign languages from National Taiwan University and master's in English literature from University of Toronto. She worked at CommonWealth magazine for ten years and has received the Vivian Wu Journalism Award and Excellent Journalism Award.

Pao-chang TSAI is the resident journalist assigned by The Reporter to the 58th Venice Biennale. He received his bachelor's in Drama & Theatre from National Taiwan University and a master's in Music Theatre from the Royal Central School of Speech & Drama, University of London. Between 2009 and 2018, he served as the co-artistic director in Tainaner Ensemble and performed in several works that received recognition by Taishin Arts Award. His play <Mulan: the Musical> was awarded the First Prize of Tainan Literature Award and was later re-staged at the National Theater in Taipei. In 2018, he ventured into a new realm by crafting the choreography for <Aller Simple > for Cloud Gate 2. He presented his first solo show <Solo Date> in 2016, represented Taiwan at Edinburgh Fringe Festival and was invited as the opening show of Ars Electronica in Austria and the San Francisco International Arts Festival. He was named "Future Young Leader" in the performance art category by CommonWealth Magazine. He also visited Harvard University and Moscow Art Theatre for further studies sponsored by the Asian Cultural Council.

Austin Ming-han HSU is an art and film critic based in Taipei, got his master degree of Cultural Study and Social Research in National Chiao Tung University, currently a PhD candidate at Taipei National University of the Arts and vice chairman of Taiwan Film Critics Society(TFCS). Former Chief editor of Film Appreciation Quarterly Magazine(2014-2017). Chief editor of the book Who's afraid of Ai Wei-wei?(2011). His curatorial projects include：“The Spine of Spectrum”(Dec 2014 in Kuandu Museum of Fine Art, nominated by 13th Taishin Arts Award), ”Mirage: Urban and Architecture Film Festival”(2015 in Treasure Hill Artist Village) and “Photoionization”(Sep 2016 in Taiwan Annual). He also participate the workshop hold by European Artistic Research Network in Kassel Documenta13, 2012, and the conference of Research Pavilion #3 hold by University of the Arts Helsinki in Venice, 2019.

Chao-sheng HU is the CEO of Hu's Art Company. He received his master's in Art Administration in Fashion Institute of Technology, State University of New York. He is a board member for JUT Foundation for Arts and Architecture, advisor for the Association of the Visual Arts in Taiwan, civic advisor for Taipei City Government, co-founder of VT Artsalon, co-founder and curator of Double Square Gallery, CEO of Hu's Art Company, director for 2018 and 2019 Nuit Blanche. He has served as curator for Fubon Art Foundation, director general of the Association of the Visual Arts in Taiwan, the director for Taiwan Contemporary Art Archive and adjunct lecturer at National Taiwan University of Arts.