Taishin Bank Foundation for Arts and Culture

Comments on the Finalist

WU Tien-Chang's Shock˙Shot combines photography, painting and drama. The combination of scenic elements, and characters in theatrical makeup, conveys magical realism and fake authenticity in amusing reconstructions. These images are presented like a series of production shots or movie stills. Their absurdity lies in the amalgamation of familiarity and strangeness, realism and surrealism, contemporary and folk tradition, high and low culture. In Shock˙ Shot perfection and imperfection as well as classical and kitsch reflect on each other in interesting ways. The various scenarios depicted in the tableaux explore the complex symbolism of life and death in Taiwanese culture. The artist expresses his serious beliefs in a light-hearted fashion. His affecting work reintroduces an element of humor that seems to have vanished in today's Taiwan.

Final selection jury: Christiane PAUL, Du HUANG, Tai-Song CHEN, Anita MATHIEU, Joseph SEELIG, Hiroko NISHIMURA, Liuyi LI, Yu-Pin LIN

Jury’s Comments for the Jury's Special Award

Among Taiwan's mid-career artists, Wu Tien-chang is both the most exemplary and most representative. Many artists of his generation tend now to maintain or emphasize their individual artistic styles. Wu has however consistently changed, exhibiting surprising transformations in core emotions and beliefs, while displaying an exacting artistic language and a matchless aesthetic. Early in his career, Wu used oil painting to present social and political issues. In his middle years he moved on to working with images, then changed to computer imaging techniques. He is a rare artist, who at mid-career has constantly delved deeply into new forms, never stopping at formal treatments but always integrating both profound feeling and a contemporary character into his works. He is fascinated by deformations and fringe elements, especially abnormalities of the human body, accessing them through an exaggerated theatricality that is fantastical, mannered and imbued with the style of staged drama. The works are at once utterly fabulous and incomparably moving. He begins from everyday men and women, the common folk, collecting what seem to be vulgar and trifling subjects for a direct examination of human nature and its great emptiness, a lament that also stubbornly refuses to let go. After not showing for many years, in this exhibition Wu's particular take on life and artistic temperament are fully and maturely expressed. Committee member: Wei-Jing LEE

Artwork Introduction

Tien-Chang WU's solo exhibition SHOCK.SHOT took place at the Main Trend Gallery from November 15 to December 13, 2008. On display were eight large digital images (240 x 343 cm) with retro settings, garish color and costumed heavily made-up actors that conjured up a gloomy atmosphere of performance in a theater of the mind.

Among the eight pieces of works, Day A Good That Is All Right, Never Relax Morning and Night, and The Blind Men and The Street were on display for the first time. Day A Good That Is All Right shows twin dwarf female scouts who carry an injured fat woman on a stretcher. Facing the camera, these three women smile. Such a situation seems true, but paradoxical.

Wu uses staged photography in his work. During the process, he is no longer the painter working in solitude, but becomes a director organizing a group of people, arranging details such as costumes, props, settings, and actors. The work also entails a combination of photography and computer manipulation. Each work begins with 50-70 snapshots and then these shots are digitally broken into small pieces, deformed, and then reshaped. In order for the imagery to look seamless, Wu uses his painterly concepts, plus his computer mouse, to connect these shots seamlessly and precisely.

About the Artist

Tien-Chang WU received his BFA from Chinese Culture University in 1980. Wu has exhibited widely around the world, including prestigious group exhibitions such as the Taipei and Venice Biennales and a solo exhibition titled Tien-Chang WU: The Introduction of Taiwan's Contemporary Art Vol. 2 at MOMA Contemporary, Fukuoka, Japan in 1997.

Over the past decade, Wu who was trained as a painter, changed his creative form and method from composite media to a combination of photography and computer design. Even though Wu adopts the tools of the new digital age, he strives to maintain a balance with creativity and aesthetics.