After the post-war retrocession of Taiwan to the Republic of China, the country experienced a period of rapid industrialization. With this boom in industry came higher outputs of waste. Through the 80’s and 90’s, Taiwan’s place among the industrialized Asian Tigers exacerbated the island`s system for managing waste output, leading to an islandwide crisis that even garnered the country the epithet “Garbage Island” at one point. In response to this crisis, recycling and waste management reforms were enacted in 1998. These changes addressed the waste issues by implementing a system that galvanized a population towards conscientious management through education, taxed non-recyclable waste disposal, and initiated harsher penalties for corporations and manufacturers in regards to polluting. These reforms transformed the islands waste management crisis into an exemplary model. “It always returns to trash.” In thinking about trash, waste, junk, refuse, garbage, midden, whatever you may call it, there always seems to be something inescapable. As a presence in human history it has always orbited that which we call “life,” and when that word transitions into “contemporary life” it’s ubiquity grows with urgency, even when we turn a blind eye to it. It feels somehow connected to the old idiom, “Nothing is certain but death and taxes,” though It is perhaps hard to say whether it has more in common with the former or the later. “Death” would seem like the obvious umbrella to pile it under. Trash certainly has an “end of life” aura. We anthropomorphize our trash. Our broken toys are imbued with diminutive versions of a mournful loss. A landfill has a no-mans land quality that makes visitations feel like a trespassing. Even more curious is the line between treasure and trash. At which point in its lifecycle does an object move from utility and possession, to refuse and death? A dump would seem to be the graveyard-stage of production. And our role in this graveyard? Perhaps tyrant? Perhaps god? But “taxes,” has a contractual, legislative connotation, as if to say, to be part of modernity, to be part of our jungle, you must pay your due. There are many costs to having a society. Trash, apparently is one of them. We are prolific in our trash production. So prolific that it creations demand centralized, organized actions. Like taxes, our trash is region specific. What we produce, what we keep, at what cost, and in what way we negotiate it, are all little articles written in the contracts of our culture. Moreover, the appellation of these terms carry a heaviness that demand unpacking. When people, ideas, or cultures are deemed, unwanted, toxic, disheveled, untouchable, it often says more about those who assign such terms. What can be said, is that trash is something undeniably human. We make it, we assign it, we hide it, we burn it, persecute it, pay for it, reuse it. It is for this reason that we cannot escape its pull. In our history, it has traveled with us across continents, spilled in to our ocean, and cluttered our sky. But as it is a construct, it can be deconstructed. We can take apart this hurried notion of waste, and reassign it, resurrect it. We have the option to pull it back into the mortal coil, We are allowed to rewrite our social contract and glean what was left behind. In pluming the depths of our most undesired, dirtiest regions, we may find a means to improve our contracts. Yao Jui-Chung For the past eight years Yao Jui-Chung has been traveling around Taiwan photographically documenting hundreds of abandoned public facilities and publishing them across six volumes. These images, selected from across all six volumes, depict disused waste management facilities: compactors, incinerators, landfills, and recycling plants. What happens when the very infrastructure that deals with our waste is itself waste? These entries remind us first of the resources poured into making waste invisible, and secondly attest to the infeasibility of that aim. We are fundamentally ill-equipped to handle the rate at which modernity churns out waste. These facilities remain as monuments to this, like temples of trash. James Ming-Hsueh Li When does trash become trash? James Ming-Hsueh Li’s previous project, Boundary, captured one of these moments: expiration. For this project Li assembled groups of objects with the same expiration date and arranged them into a work of installation. His work shows us that for objects death is scheduled in advance yet happens all at one moment. The absurdity of this sudden passage into obsolescence is fundamental to the circulation of commodities, and is thus responsible for the disproportionate amount of waste that this circulation produces. Li’s current project, Trash Can & Rubbish Being, continues where Boundary ends, and reincorporates leftover packaging materials into a performative countdown that invites viewer intervention through a transaction of commodity, trash, and art object. Chen Bo-Zheng & Yeh Wei-Li Can we venture into the underworld like Orpheus and recuperate what is lost to us? Or is trash destiny irreversible? In this new iteration of his R&D project, Yeh Wei-Li reaches across the threshold separating trash from non-trash and restores discarded objects to life as commodities. He collects objects from around his studio in Shuinandong, and repackages them as if to be sold. By doing so he inserts these objects back into the system from which they were expelled, rescuing them from their fate as rubbish. Curatorial Team Shrimp Chips is a curatorial team formed by master degree students of Critical and Curatorial Studies of Contemporary Art at National Taipei University of Education. Over the years each of the members has been engaged, individually and together with curation, art writing, art creation, and art research. Each of the member has a very different educational and professional background, ranging from literature to engineering, from a dancer to a writer, and is interested in trash. With the diverse perspectives and collective academic credentials, A Maiden’s Prayer was conceptualized and shaped through the continual conversations with artists and contributors. Shrimp Chips`s members are Akari Yamasaki, Arie Han, Cullen Pitney, Mei Yueh Tan, Sean Wang Gaffney, Shih-Hsuan Chou, and Sita Spada. “終究歸於垃圾” 想到垃圾，排泄物，廢料，它們總是顯得如此的不可避免。在人類的歷史進程中它們總是環繞著所謂的“生活”，而當那字眼演變成“當代生活”時，它的無所不在也愈趨迫切，即便我們對它視而不見。 這使人想起一句俗語：“死亡與稅務無可避免，”但很難說它究竟是比較像前者或是後者。 “死亡”似乎是更為直白的歸類法。垃圾本身有著個“生命結束”的光環。我們將垃圾擬人化。對壞掉的玩具我們總會給予些微小的哀愁，掩埋場如同古戰場般給人生人勿進的感受。更有趣的是寶物與廢物的界線。在一個物品的生命週期中它從何時從實用與擁有，轉變成廢棄與死亡？垃圾場好似生產週期的墳墓，而我們在此又扮演了什麼角色？暴君？亦或是神？ 但“稅務”有著契約，法律上的層面，似乎是說作為現代性的一部分，作為都市叢林的一份子，你必須做出貢獻。擁有社會需要付出許多代價。垃圾，則似乎是其中之一。我們產生了大量的垃圾，躲到它需要集中，組織性的對策。如同稅務，我們的垃圾與地域不可分割。我們生產了什麼，花費了多少，如何處理它們，都是我們文化中必須的法規條文。 不但如此，這些名稱攜帶者各自的深意與包袱。當人，概念，或文化被歸類為不需要，有害，不淨，或不可觸時，也讓我們透析了使用這些名詞歸類他人者。 不可否認，垃圾就是如此有“人性”。我們創造它們，歸納它們，隱藏它們，燒它們，壓迫它們，為它們付出，將它們回收利用。一次我們無法逃脫它們的掌控。縱觀我們的歷史，它隨著我們跨過大陸，散落大海，並遮蓋了天空。 但既然它是被造物，那就能被拆解。我們能將廢棄物這過度倉促的概念分解，轉換，再造。我們能將之帶回人世間。我們能重寫我們的社會契約並拾荒落下的事物。通過沖洗我們最厭惡，最污穢的區域，我們或許能找到改進契約的方法。 姚瑞中 八年來姚瑞中走遍了台灣各地，拍下了上百間被閒置的蚊子館並將它們彙整出版整整六冊。這些影像節選於那六冊中，展示了各類閒置的垃圾處理設施：壓緊機，焚化爐，掩埋場，及回收工場等。但當處理垃圾的設施本身成為垃圾時人們又該如何是好？這些影像不但指出了為達成“眼不見為淨”而浪費的資源，而且顯示了那目的是如此不可持續。在現代性反芻而出的廢棄物面前我們根本上的缺乏準備。這些設施便是這事實的紀念碑，如同獻給垃圾的神殿。 李明學 垃圾何時成為垃圾？李明學的前一作品，Boundary 邊界 捕捉到了其中的一瞬間：保質期。在此作品中李明學收集了一系列擁有相同保質期的商品並將它們化為裝置。他的作品顯示了這些物件早已注定且同一瞬間發生的死亡。而商品流通卻建立在這荒唐的淘汰之上，進而造成了這流通所生產的大量浪費。李明學的新作 Trash Can & Rubbish Being 擴展了“界限”所探討的主題，將用剩的包裝材料化為一演出式的倒計時，並邀請觀看者參與到這商品，垃圾，藝術品的交易中。 陳柏爭 和 葉偉立 我們能像希臘神話中的奧菲斯那樣走入冥界找回我們所丟失的事物嗎？又或者垃圾的命運就是如此不可逆轉？在這次古董級垃圾研發公司的新版本中，葉偉立突破了分割垃圾與非垃圾，的界限，並將廢棄物回收再造成了商品。他在位於新北，水湳洞的工作室附近搜尋各種武平，將它們包裝後再與販賣。藉此他把物品帶回了曾拋棄了它們的系統，將它們從成為垃圾的命運中解救而出。