Taishin Bank Foundation for Arts and Culture

I Live Within Myself: HUANG Yu-Chih Solo Exhibition

Dates: September 23 to October 18, 2019

Text / Phebea Chun-Yi SHEN

For Yu-Chih Huang who employs organic forms to create her work, crochet is a physical means and method to sublimate her thoughts, state of mind and situations in life into a metaphysical exploration, materializing invisible emotions while embodying her inner self.

The creative context of the new works featured in this exhibition can trace back to a series of site-specific works Huang created when conducting an artist residency at the Vermont Studio Center in the United States. Back then, the feeling of solitude led her to create seven pieces of teardrop-shaped objects, utilizing the technique of “single-strand crochet” with bronze wire in the same color as the window panes. The number of the objects “seven” was not only an odd number but also a prime number. The objects woven with single-strands permitted light to shine through and allowed one to see the scenes behind, incorporating the windows to form a layered inner landscape of that particular year. Afterwards, crochet teardrop-shaped objects has accompanied her through various stages in life with changing colors and evolving forms, even conveying new (inner) narratives. In 2019, this series adopts a well-rounded quality, gradually assuming a life-giving maternal form. After entering motherhood, Huang has slowly developed her inner strength while gaining more life wisdom. When letting go of those trying people in life, her heart has also seemed to be cleansed. Observing dandelion planted by her child that sprout from cracks of the cemented ground near her house windows and door as well as red berries found in the wilderness, she has seen beauty in these small things in life for their unyielding vitality. This series is dedicated to those who have shared this period of life with her.

Aritst / Yu-Chih Huang

Due to her love for unfurling three-dimensional forms, Yu-Chih Huang started using metal as her material since she was a student of the Craft Division of the Department of Art and Craft, National Hsinchu Teachers College. Later, she employed the technique of “wire crochet” to break free from the restraints of instruments and sites. In 2001, she was awarded the Selected Award of the Taipei Art Awards, and has gradually internalized the metal-crochet technique and transformed it into her artistic language. Through crochet, Huang transforms stiff metal into soft, lightweight thread, and uses multi-strand crochet to create soft sculptures filled with a sense of life, which freely exist in space and generate a multi-angled, interactive and organic relation with time and the spectator.