Sub-zoology：2020 Taiwan Biennial

DURATION: 2020-10-17 ~ 2021-02-28
OPENING: 2020-10-17 18:30-PM
VENUE: National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts 101-108, 202 Gallery, Lobby, Gallery Street, Museum Outdoor Area

Curator：姚瑞中YAO Jui-Chung Subzoology: 2020 Taiwan Biennial The full list of the 49 participating artists/artist groups (listed according to the genres) The First Genre: Sacrifice and Salvation LIN Ju, WU Chi-Yu, CHI Kai-Yuan, ZHANG XU Zhan, TAN Kian-Ming, Meuko! Meuko! & NAXS Corp. The Second Genre: The Sub-history of Wildlife Trade HSU Chia-Wei, LU Yu-Jui, CHU ChunTeng, LO Sheng-Wen, Sheryl CHEUNG, LI Yi-Fan, LUO Jr-Shin, CHUANG Pei-Xin, CHENG Hsien-Yu The Third Genre: Portrait of Unknown Hero: LEE Li-Chung, AU Sow Yee, OU Jing-Yun, WU Chuan-Lun The Fourth Genre: Laboratory/Operating Room/Specimen Room KU Kuang-Yi, Paul GONG, WEI Ze, CHEN Mao-Chang, PENG Yi-Hsuan, CHANG Chen­Shen, TOU Yun-Fei, CHEN Sheng-Wen The Fifth Genre: Festivals/Sandbanks/Green Coverage Ratio Jeff Chien-Hsing LIAO, YANG Shun-Fa, PENG Yi-Hang The Sixth Genre: Beast Mimic/Tortured Beastnoid LAI Chiu-Chen, KENG Hao-Kang, CHANG Teng-Yuan, HSU Yin-Ling, CHEN Yu-Kai, Martin TOKÁR+SUN Yi-Jou, WU Ping-Sheng The Seventh Genre: Habitat/Zoo/National Park HSIAO Sheng-Chien, HUANG Ko-Wei, SUN Pei-Mao, PAN Hsin-Hua, TSENG Chien-Ying, YEN Yu-Ting Performance & Live Art/Multimedia Installation & Performance: WatdanWuma, YEH Tzu-Chi, SUN Yi-Jou, FU Ya-Wen+CHOU Shu-Yi, Ghost Mountain Ghost Shovel, River LIN ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Information pertaining to the Satellite Event and the Collateral Events Satellite Event Venue: VT ArtSalon, Taipei Duration: 26 Sep. – 21 Nov. 2020 Curator: YAO Jui-Chung Participating Artists: Paul GONG, KU Kuang-Yi, Meuko! Meuko! & NAXS Corp. Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/VTARTSALON Collateral Events Post-Anthropocene Venue: Zit-Dim Art Space, Tainan Duration: 17 Oct. – 14 Dec. 2020 Curators: André CHAN, Erica Yu-Wen HUANG Participating Artists: CHANG Ken-Yao, CHEN Han-Sheng, South HO, Bosco LAW Ka-nam, Kit LEE, LIN Yin-Chieh, LIU Sing-You, PENG Yi-Hang, PENG Yi-Hsuan, Stephanie SIN, Frank TANG Kai-Yiu, Eason TSANG Ka-Wai, Nicole WONG Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Zit.Dim.Art.space Biàn-Tài Routes Venue: Acid House, New Taipei City Duration: 22 Oct. – 22 Nov. 2020 Curator: CHEN Kuan-Ying Participating Artists: LEE Min-Ju, WU Chun-Hui, CHANG Chen­Shen, CHEN Shiao-Chi, CHEN Jun-Yu X Taiwan Performance Art Lab Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AcidHouseDingxi Technological Metamorphosis Venue: Henan 8, Kaohsiung Duration: 23 Oct. 2020 – 03 Jan. 2021 Curator: LAI Hsiao-Ying Curatorial team: WNAG Yu, KE Yung-Chien, CHANG Hsin-Ray Participating Artists: WANG Young-Hsiang, LEE Ting-Ju, HE Yu-Chi, WU Po-Kuei, Rico GRAUPNER, LIN Zhe-Zhi, SUN Chih-Hsing, KAO Fan, CHEN Yi-Gun, CHANG Chih-Chung, CHANG Nien-Wei, CHANG Ching-Ying, TOMIZAWA Daisuke, HUANG Chih-Li, TSAI Shih-Hsiang, TSAI Chi-An, HSIEH Hsin-Jung, YEN Gang, LU Yu-Jui Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/henan8 Zoo of Inverted Forms: The Ultimate Other for Imagining Humanity Venue: Waley Art, Taipei Duration: 24 Oct. – 15 Nov. 2020 Curators: CHU Feng-Yi, PENG Tsai-Hsun Participating Artists: LIN Pei-Ying, WU Sih-Chin, YAO Jui-Lan, TOU Yun-Fei, CHANG Teng-Yuan, AMUSE (LIN Chien-Yo, LIN Wei-Yo, SU Jia-Xian), Marina FOMENKO Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/waleyart ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Launched in 2008 by the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, the Taiwan Biennial will convene for the seventh time this year. In contrast to the international edict of the Taipei Biennial, the Taiwan Biennial focuses on investigating contemporary art in Taiwan in reflection and response to the global contemporary art context through local and indigenous perspectives. The curatorial mechanism has developed from the inaugural thematic exhibition, to an exhibition format which surveyed the ecology and diversity of Taiwan`s contemporary art. The Biennial revisited establishing a curatorial theme in 2016, where a collaboration between in-house and guest curators broke through existing frameworks of national exhibition to develop more exuberant, liberating, and agile exhibition formats and narrative vistas. This year, the Taiwan Biennial has made a further stride to experiment with a different artistic experience and exhibition method by inviting guest curator, artist YAO Jui-chung. We anticipate that he will engage in a more intimate dialogue with participating artists through his curatorial practice that is both a creative endeavor as well as methodology, which is informed by his abundant and multifaceted artistic dynamism: in the areas of creativity, curatorship, critique, and authorship; by his commitment to advancing the development of contemporary art in Taiwan; and through his artistic practices that combine contemplations of location and history. In the post-pandemic era, the ostensibly provocative theme of “SubZoology” for the 2020 Taiwan Biennial is a concerned response to international issues that explore the relationship between humans and animals through science, art and philosophy. The curator uses the Buddhist theological concepts of the Animal Realm from the Six Realms of Existence, as a point of entry to reflect on bestial qualities of humans as a subcategory of the animal kingdom. Differences between “human animals” and “non-human animals” are explored as a response to discussions on long-established dichotomies and commonalities that exist between humans and beasts. At the same time, in light of this post-pandemic era when symbiosis and homology between humans and animals are reality, and when viruses spill over their original host organisms for mutual transmission between humans and beasts -- as one of the Earth`s species, human beings have become profoundly aware of the crises and possibilities for coexistence with other organisms. As the audience moves through the zoo-like exhibition space, they have opportunity to reflect on human dominion over other lifeforms through the variety of organisms and ecologies constructed by artists as a response to and as an extension of ecological and environmental issues of the Anthropocene – a topic of focus in recent biennial exhibitions around the world. Some 49 artists and collectives with Taiwan experience have been invited to participate and exhibit at the 7th Taiwan Biennial. Through their creative themes, these emerging new-generation artists invite the audience to further imagine and discuss contemporary art and social issues through diverse exhibition formats including visual art, sound art, and live performance, on a scale that far exceeds past biennials. In addition, the exhibition arena will extend from the Museum itself to the Taichung Museum of Marine Ecology and the Daan Matsu Cultural Park on the outskirts of Taichung. And, for the first time, the biennial will collaborate with external spaces beyond the central Taiwan area in “satellite events” (VT Artsalon in Taipei) as well as “collateral events” (Waley Art in Taipei, Acid House in New Taipei City, Zit-Dim Art Space in Tainan, and Henan 8 in Kaohsiung). With the NTMOFA as a core, this new curatorial format seeks to link local artistic actions and practices from across Taiwan. Artistic creativity is taken out of the museum context to broaden the interdisciplinary domain and perspectives of the Taiwan Biennial to proactively develop local art in Taiwan.