Taishin Bank Foundation for Arts and Culture

Comments on the Finalists

CHEN Ting-Jung’s solo exhibition at the Digital Art Center, Taipei – Wind Arrows On A Corner Side starts from her previous work, You Are the Only One I Care About (whisper), which is based on the Beishan Broadcasting Wall in Kinmen, and more deeply discusses “sound” as a highly penetrating and infectious medium, how this medium has been effectively used as a “soft weapon” informed by a feminine quality, as well as its imperceptible influence on individual, national and cultural memories. On the other hand, the artist’s arrangement of sound narrative designed for this small exhibition venue further highlights the power of sound on disciplining human actions, thinking, and ideologies. (Commentator / WU Chia-Hsuan)

Artwork Introduction 

Wind Arrows On A Corner Side is based on CHEN Ting-Yung’s field study interviews on the“sonic memory” of Kinmen residents, who experienced the Cross-Strait Propaganda period (1959-1991), along with her research on historical material from this specific period. Chen transforms the collected soundscapes and materials of studies on the site into a kinetic sound installation, various sculptural elements, as well as rearranged and adapted archives, unfolding a complex, immersive spatial installation that connects with the audience through a strong physical and sensory experience. Using a rather pictorial title, Chen investigates the counterpoint relations between territories and collective bodies, involving tension of confrontation, elimination/fusion, and defense/attack, as well as examines thoughts on discipline, the writing of history, presence and absence, memory, interpretation, and identity in the power structure. 

About the Artist

CHEN Ting-Jung (b. 1985) first studied philosophy in Taiwan, and later learned to practice art in Hamburg, Germany and Vienna, Austria. Her creative engagements relate to historiography, and cultural and political semiotics, focusing on collective memories, appropriation, and processes of empowerment. By reproducing artifacts of the culture industry, representations of ideology, and their relationship to human beings, Chen explores the representations and transformations of memory, appropriation, empowerment and political identity in society, and draws the overlapping culture mingling into a spatial and acoustic atlas.

Production Team 

All works exhibited in the exhibition are created and composed by Ting-Jung Chen.

The following support and technical assistance made this exhibition possible:

Mechanical motion and writing robot programming: I-Yeh Wu

Sound Engineering (live-recording, playback and feedback control in the venue): Clock Li-Xue Zhong

Whistle recording assistance: Yu-Tian Zeng

Jinmen Daily News’ historical archives and texts provided by: Cheng-Feng Chen (artist’s father; author of the serial love novel "Fire Phoenix") and Jinmen Daily News

Exhibition installation and technical drawing: Watering the Tree Studio

Exhibition technical support: Jerry Zhe-Yu Lin

Curatorial consultant: Hsiang-Wen Chen

Press and video: Jyun-Jie Wang

Exhibition Photography: Anpis Wang

Exhibition Videography: Ho-Cheng Lin