CHOU YU-CHENG | 周育正

Molyneux 2014, painting installation, publication, etc.., 2 galleries Installation view, in solo exhibition “Molyneux", Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei 2014. ____________

During my 2013 residency in Manchester, England, I conducted a curatorial project with an open call for entries extended to local artists, which resulted in an exhibition at the Centre for Chinese Contemporary Art with 20 artists of various generations. One of the artists was Geoff Molyneux. After the conclusion of this one-day exhibition, I visited Molyneux in his studio, where I learned about his art journey thus far. Born in 1951, Molyneux began his art training at a young age in Liverpool, with a diverse set of skills acquired in various media, including painting, installation, land art, video, and performance. On the other hand, the art training I received in the 90s was based on a Western system common in Taiwan, and from which, I was exposed to countless Western art legends. An indescribable sense of transitioning movement of art and time was felt by me when I met this English artist, who was actively engaged in Western art in the 70s and 80s and did not succumb to the mainstream discourse; moreover, I also felt a unique resonance with him. Our meeting then inspired this collaborative idea to interpret and recreate Molyneux’s art and present it in the East. After our first collaboration at the experimental exhibition at the Centre for Chinese Contemporary Art, a sense of trust began to flourish between Molyneux and me, leading to him entrusting me to reinterpret his entire life’s oeuvre. We then communicated over e-mail when I returned to Taiwan. Our generation-crossing relationship began to take shape, and the collaboration took place in a cinematic setting adapted from real life, with me attempting to present this Western artist in an Eastern setting. The second phase of the collaboration then led to an unconventional retrospective, entitled Molyneux, presented at the Taipei Museum of Fine Arts. The project began as a structure based on an event embodying the relationships of reality and power embedded in the institutions of art, with me initiating an open call for an one-day exhibition curated by me. I then met Molyneux, one of the contributing artists, and followed by a studio visit where I further learned about his art practice in the past four decades. The experience then transpired into this idea of collaboration and reproduction. Issues pertaining to ownership and forgery then began to rise, and during my residency, I presented an exhibition entitled Geoff Molyneux with interpretations of his past artworks, including appropriating the images and elements from his art, incorporating symbols or altering the colors on them; nonetheless, several of the reinterpreted pieces were still shown with Molyneux’s name. This experimental approach gradually led to a collaborative model and a sense of trust between the artists, with the conventional practice of privatizing art production dismissed. The project ultimately landed in the Taipei Museum of Fine Arts. Reflecting back to the initial stage of this entire story with the parameter I had set for the open call for entries, it then led to the presentation of Molyneux, an artist under the Western art institution, in a different world through an ambiguous connection that could be regarded as both an institutional mechanism and an opportunity. The existing spatial features in the two exhibition spaces at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum were incorporated into the contextual layout. A biographical introduction of Molyneux was presented at the entrance of the first exhibition space and followed by unmarked paintings – my reinterpretations of Molyneux’s artworks, with aesthetic adjustments of overlapping and complex layers of the past and the present created through arrangements of color and presentation. The layout of the exhibition then directed the audience to the second space, where they first passed through a black light-lit area with some texts explaining how I met Molyneux. Based on the color blocks and the blue carpet in the second exhibition space, a similar perspective compared to the first exhibition space was realized, except this room was turned at a 180-degree angle. However, the artworks on display in the first room were missing in the second room, with one’s physical perceptions perhaps hit suddenly with a sense of detachment or temporality. The exhibition then concluded with two booklets placed under black light, with one cataloguing Molyneux’s actual artworks and descriptions of the past made today and the other presenting a recent project by Molyneux entitled Uniformitarianism. Under the image that dismissed individual creativity, methods, such as appropriation, citing, antithesis, and parallelism, were applied. I appropriated Western artist Molyneux’s name to respond to the Western art that I was taught throughout my own course of art training. I citied his past artworks and re-edited them into two-dimensional paintings, and through an antithetic relationship created with the reading sequence presented in the exhibition, the contents indicated by the artworks were constantly loosened. From the paintings that referenced to the tangible art practice of Molyneux to the intangible and sudden sense of perceptual detachment for life and time experienced on the site of the exhibition, or an intellect alluded scope that emerged from the parallelism observed in the arrangements of the project’s structure, these were all gradually shifting towards a realistic layer related to publicness, sparked by the notion of art of established concepts. Another Geoff Molyneux is a publication based on this project, and in addition to exhibition documentations, a letter that I wrote to Molyneux after the exhibition concluded is used to retrace the beginning and the ending of the project. Similar to how the artworks in the exhibition were gradually loosen, the term Molyneux also slowly turns from figurative to abstract in the letter. The letter begins with Molyneux’s arrival to Taipei for the exhibition opening and then traces back to how we met in England. It then explains the impacts Western art history had on me during my course of art learning and the original intent of the project. The conclusion uses the concept behind Molyneux’s recent project, Uniformitarianism, to recount this collaborative relationship, which extends into thoughts on the impacts that people have on each other.

____________ download >>> Another Geoff Molyneux.pdf / 68.5 mb

Chou Yu-Cheng's solo exhibition, Liszt, presented at the Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts (KMFA) uses a tortuous yet also straightforward rhetorical dualism to retrace the inspirations and formative experiences from the artist’s personal life with art, with the audience invited to engage in the analyses and depictions of his personal creative journey and state of mind. A possible cognitive path is initiated with Liszt acting as a metonymy. It is difficult to predict what kind of associations this pianist and composer known for his innovative playing would evoke in the audience, but it is clear that this Romantic-era Hungarian musician is a rather distant starting point for the local audience, because he is a character that transcends time, geography, culture, and is also usually not considered a member of the visual art domain. We learn about his music through his sheet music, but have no way of hearing the actual sounds of Liszt’s performances conducted prior to the invention of sound recording. Under different historical recounts, reproduction systems, interpretations, and imaginations, it is impossible for us to know how tangible or elusive the audience sees Liszt, but this is not imperative; however, the artwork, nonetheless, begins with him. This approach for opening up the subject matter is closely connected to some of the key concerns in Chou’s art, which are about figural creation and his distinctive rhetoric and aesthetic stance. The exhibition delicately unfolds throughout five galleries comprised of different spatial narratives and rhythms. Greeting the audience inside the first gallery are several in-house chairs from KMFA, and on top of each chair is a printed copy of Mumble Jumble on Things Irrelevant to Art, which is composed of autobiographical accounts of the artist, describing his developmental experiences with art learning. The second gallery resembles a three-dimensional portfolio showcasing the artist’s oeuvre, with visual indexes consisting of elements extracted from his major works. Different marking methods are applied by the artist to create playful triggers for reading these documents. The third space, which is in a major gallery, is the most spacious of all and has an elevated ceiling exposed to natural lighting. An automatic piano is placed in the room, as the computer operated instrument rotates and plays Liszt’s compositions in a precise and impeccable manner without human presence. Meanwhile, a janitor is nosily and repetitively vacuuming the carpet in the room with an industrial strength vacuum. The only route for the audience to walk through this exhibition space is via a passageway constructed with wooden boards, with clattering noises made with their every step. The mashup of these industrial sounds seems to have penetrated throughout every space in the exhibition. The fourth gallery is a dark room, and inside is a dimly lit security booth with the radio playing, which is a symbolic way to illustrate the artist’s father used to work as a security. Inside the last gallery is a grand piano under a white spotlight. Local students are invited to practice on this piano regularly, and the display is a metaphor for the lonely solitary state of mind that artists are in when learning and refining their craft. The spatial narrative is quite straightforward, with the symbolic settings used to describe the past and present of Chou’s life experiences and artistic journey. Additionally, specific (or multiple) figures as the representation of the artist and the future that he is anticipating or concerned about are also projected. Individual senses of physicality and bodily awareness of the moving audience are quite substantial and awakened, and as the simultaneous disturbances from the automatic piano and the noises from the vacuum are taken in, varying ambiances are formed by the deliberate lighting, with an adjusted level of visibility experienced. This approach utilizing spatial narratives and overlapping scenes is not derived from conventional installation art or site-specific manipulations, and it also differs from the perceptual immersion of the body observed in theaters or the collage effects projected by movie montages. A more intricate yet detached treatment is employed by the artist for the audience’s physical involvement and perceptual distribution in the spaces, and through the way the exhibition is presented, the transformational process for and the relationship with the figure from the audience’s physical perceptions and within the imaginative space are interpreted. The figure here is referring to both Liszt and Chou Yu-Cheng. To explain this in a more direct manner, an imaginative portrayal of Liszt is created figuratively through the reflections of his music, while the entire exhibition is a metaphorical self-portrait of Chou, as observed from the content presented. Through the gestures and essences distributed and flowing throughout the spaces the artist has created, the features, imprints of time, inner emotions, and states of mind from Chou’s personal art journey thus far are professed. Projections and reflections about the position of his art and the state that he is in are conducted through the unhindered self-enquiry, dissection, and revelation of the artist’s distinctive figure. Focus should also be placed on the use of rhetorical metonymy, and we can clearly see how metonymy is applied to the formation of this figure; however, the personal background, talent, innovative and dazzling way of playing, and stature of Liszt are not matters that can be associated from the content provided in the exhibition. It is difficult to perceive a further interpretation of Liszt from the computer generated mechanical performance and the less than perfect practices by the students. In other words, the distance and the twisting spatial relationship hinted by Liszt are of more paramount importance here, as they are the components emphasized by Chou’s distinctive rhetorical aesthetics. The maestro figure that he is summoning may lead to a tilted understanding, and the level of inclination for this approximately equal formula of Liszt=Artist ≈ Chou Yu-Cheng will be dictated by the audience in accordance with their perspectives of art history. Upon closer inspection of the formation of the figure in this self-portrait, it is observed that its composition is not a pure form of idealistic inference nor is it simply shaped by graphics or visual art language. It is established through the blending of abstract social relationships, and the subject’s understanding of the sensible structure that is facilitated through dialogues between the exhibition space and the audience, confrontations between art institutions and monologues, and other various social relationships found throughout the course of life. Chou is not the sole creator of this figure; its formation is further shaped by the overlapping understandings or misconceptions that the audience may hold, which are propelled by the audience’s own cognitive systems and also existing institutions. Referencing Jacque Rancière's “regime of the sensible”, we can further explain such aesthetic approach and politics are observed in the methods of imagery rendering and production throughout Chou’s former works, and by shifting between different systems, the interconnections and replacements have resulted in the visibility of value, labor, production, exchange, and other matters. Chou develops a set of parallel art production system to rethink and illustrate the figural in contemporary art to represent the social fluctuation of the abstract and the immaterial, and during the process of figural formation, attempts are made to connect with the emotions involved and to question ways of seeing in the contemporary setting. On exhibit at KMFA at the same time is Molyneux, another solo project by Chou, which presents another layer of possibilities for reading. A way to review the developments and the evolution of modern art is presented based on the works created throughout several decades by Manchester-based artist Geoff Molyneux. Chou has recreated monochromatic versions of this artist’s works to address the problematic of historiography between the past and the present under the framework of this pseudo retrospective in the name of Molyneux. Chou's paradoxical rhetoric has opened up another passageway, as he combs through modern art history with an approach that redesigns and rearranges. He also uses this approach to sort through the lineage of his personal art language and to attempt to spark new crossover possibilities. It is even observed that Chou has decided not to create new imageries for this large-scale solo exhibition, with him only appropriating existing works by Molyneux. The leap in contemporary seeing captured in this exhibition is not constructed visually; it is created through shifting and propelling new impacts on exhibition formats, corresponding relationships with space-times, art history writing systems, and institutions. Furthermore, from Molyneux’s art that transcends conceptual art, land art, installation art, and others, we can reflect on this crossover figure and the approach derived from interconnecting art contexts. Chou is utilizing this abstract manipulation to construct this nonvisual figure and for it to reveal itself under the halos of history. The most challenging and also the most interesting aspect with reading Chou’s art is perhaps due to his approach that incorporates art techniques and concepts, which can also be considered an excessively heavy load laden with modern art history developments. He has inherited and can aptly apply various art lingos yet rejects conventionalism. This principle and self-awareness have encouraged him to relentlessly challenge the limits with different ways of seeing and methods for figural production through the art he has created in the recent years, regardless of the chosen subject matter. Visibilities, frameworks, and logics found in existing institutions are either enhanced or concealed by him through his chosen techniques, as the endeavors prompt for new creative realms that denote the spirit of the contemporary times. This parallel project consisting of these two exhibitions can be regarded as an attempt to organize the creative vernaculars he has used in the past years. The artist’s personal creative position is investigated and confirmed, with art history as the backdrop and his comprehensive art context presented unrestrictedly. This is especially observed with Liszt, a grandiose gesture to de-contextualize his previous works and to exhibit them as documents. However, this body of work is then effortlessly incorporated into history, as the artist forces himself to stride forward in a setting that is perhaps as desolate as the scenes he has depicted, which is also forcibly mixed with loud clattering noises. History can be overwhelming and disparaging, and it can also push forward individual achievements. New figural possibilities and agencies for the artist and art history are simultaneously presented through the interconnections between the foregrounds and backgrounds of these two exhibitions, with Chou using history to capture the figure of his own artistic presence and with light shed by history on the perpetual questions and contemplations on art. To ask what is being created in contemporary art or how it affirms its engagement and correspondence with zeitgeist, it is for certain that hidden within are skills and redistributions of the sensible for negotiating with the contemporary society and also the aesthetic stance that the artist holds in the course of history. Through his continuous negotiations with history, institutions, and contexts, Chou has rationally speculated a penetrating seeing. As subject matters embedded or hidden in the fabric of contemporary society are transformed into precise and innate figures via his distinctive art language, the dominating logics behind them are also revealed and evaluated, including capitalism and institutions for art production. This is the ethical stance Chou has chosen as he responds to the public realm and the politics of aesthetics in contemporary society. His figural production involves the reestablishment of the framework for critical ways of seeing and also his own personal aesthetic belief and practice. His reflection on art has driven him to relentlessly turn his aesthetical attitudes into forms and to actualize his questioning, exploration, and active pursuit of visual art. In the midst of the alternating realities of the visible and the invisible, his departing point is based on the understanding of the sensible, as the subjectification informed by times is engineered and refined. Text: Esther Lu

Liszt 2014, autopiano, cleaners, guard booths & radio, students performance. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Liszt", Kuohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, Kuohsiung 2014. _____________

____________ download >>> On Things Ir(Relevant) to Art or Liszt and ____.pdf / 47.5 mb

A Working History - Lu Chieh-Te 2012, installation, a temporary worker Mr. Lu, booklet, pattern painted on wooden deck, 500 x 500 cm, News Paper’s Ad. Installation view, in exhibition “Taipei Art Awards", Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei 2012. ___________

In previous projects by Yu-Cheng Chou, the artist subjects the origin and distribution of resources in a series of economic discussions as the method of his creative pursuits, questioning issues related to institutions, enterprises or art galleries. The recent project "Working History" is implemented via similar concepts by working with "people" instead. By acting as the intermediary and holding an economic approach to the project, a realistic plan which reveals hidden economic realities is thus activated. At the beginning of the project, the artist employed a near sixty-year-old temporary worker through a newspaper advertisement; another anonymous text worker was simultaneously appointed to collaborate in the project. After gradually earning the temporary worker's trust through constant communication, the three finally began their interview work together. A simplistic and realistic writing style was used for the compilation of the temporary worker’s entire working history, from the very beginning to the transitional stages, until the end——the story commences with agricultural work in Southern Taiwan, and proceeds as the protagonist moved to Taipei due to economic factors, initiating a period of coping with temporary employments, working in the catering services, facing the processes of socialization, enduring business failure, emigrating to work in the Mainland, gambling, turning to alcoholism, all the way to his current short-term work life....Taiwan's former socio-economic situations and alterations were slowly delineated and culminates as descriptions of the man's working life also reaches an end. The second stage regards the output of the project; the artist employed the temporary worker with the exhibition budget whereupon he is asked to appear at the site of the exhibition in the identity of a security guard. Therefore, the exhibition of the project took form as the publication "Working History" and also the physical presence of those involved. The exhibition of the "Working History" project displays the interdependence between opportunity and work, thus the reemergence of the temporary worker in "future" exhibitions may suggest an undertone for the recurrence of implicit contradictions and uncertainties (or/ unemployment). The clothing pattern often worn by one of the parties during the interviews was adopted as the visual scheme for the exhibition display, which may be transformed into a low platform or bookcase according to the spatial conditions of various sites.

____________ download >>> A Working History LU Chieh-Te.pdf / 55.5 mb

Monochrome, A Working History - Lu Chieh-Te 2013, acrylic on canvas, monochrome painted by Mr. Lu, a layer per day, 140 x 290 cm, with signature behind canvas. Installation view, in the exhibition “Are We Working Too Much?", Eslite Gallery, Taipei 2013 ___________

____________ download >>> A Man of Showa Era.pdf / 48.5 mb

A Man of Showa Era gives an account of the shift and distance between work and retirement. He again uses interviews to record the life of Wu Chao-nan, who was born during the late years of Japanese rule. Because Wu's family background, to this day he is still a stickler for Japanese-style living habits and upbringing of the younger generation. In regard to life, work, and his attitude toward the things he treasures, Wu maintains a characteristically Japanese strictness and optimism. Wu Chao-nan worked as a compositor in a print shop. He began as an apprentice at the age of 15, and worked in the same occupation for 30 years, which gave him a personal experience of the rise and fall of the printing industry, as well as the effect of changing times on traditional industries. One very interesting thing is the relationship between the protagonist of this story—Wu Chao-nan—and the artist Chou Yu-cheng: Chou's father once worked in a type foundry in Taipei's Wanhua District, which had many printing shops. After the traditional printing industry suffered the impact of the times, there were many similarities in the difficulties faced by Chou Yu-cheng's father and Wu Chao-nan, and the way that they dealt with them. Accordingly, apart from exploring how the industrial structure changed with the times, Man of Showa Times also represents an attempt by the artist to record the story of his own father's times.

A Man of Showa Era 2013, installation, tatami on desk, gouache on silk, 30 x 40 cm, booklet (Chinese), slides, sound and objects provided by persona. Installation view, in the exhibition “Are We Working Too Much?", Eslite Gallery, Taipei 2013 ___________

"Things" derive their status and meaning from their context and the practices that reproduce and uphold them. They become identified through recognizable signs - just like in the social world, it is through language, gestures and style that we reveal our membership in particular milieus. But if detached and taken out of context, these signs and gestures lose their fixed meanings and identity. It is through the method of de- and re-contextualization that Yu-Cheng Chou plays with the relation between source and product, meaning and materiality. In his work, he uses strategies and "tricks" of design to achieve subtle displacements of meaning, such that produce moments of wondering, of surprise, and initiate a reflection on the frames that define what we see and know. His work for the Taipei Biennial consists of three such displacements and interventions. The first piece entitled "Aurora" is a cooperation with a company based in Taiwan that holds a world-renowned collection of Chinese antiques. From this collection, a group of objects is shown in the Biennial exhibition - but it is presented in a display quite different from the way "antiques" are usually presented - those displays that underlie their status as "treasures from the past". In Chou's display, to the contrary, the antiques are "spectacularized", placed in a post-modern designed vitrine under moving lights. How is value produced through context and aura, and what means the evaluation - and de-valuation - of the past in the present? These questions are further enhanced by the content of the vitrine, figurines of types (such as servants) credited as archeological grave-goods meant to service the dead in the afterlife. Another work by Chou also highlights and subverts the role - and spatial "grammar" - of the gallery and the institution of the museum, as he places everyday objects such as bottles of drinks - as if left by construction workers - on the metal tubes of the air-condition, one of the recent additions to the TFAM gallery in the 1st floor. HIs third contribution is found in the upper floors, and consists in the placement in two similar architectural spots of two similar-looking sculptures by artist Yang Po-Ling found in the TFAM collection.

AURORA ® / Forgotten Kao Er-Pan / Mr. Yang Po-Lin and his copper sculptures 2012/Han dynasty (206 B.C. - 220 A.D.), pottery figurine, / bottel of drink / 2 similar architectural spots of 2 similar-looking sculpturesInstallation view, in exhibition “Taipei Biennial", Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei 2012 ___________

Flowers for Opening 2011, 8 tubs of flowers for opening, from 8 art foundations, variable dimention. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Rainbow Paint", Kuandu Museum, Taipei 2011 ___________

“Flowers for Opening”, a project aiming to highlight that besides the traditional dignified relationship between an artist and a museum, there exists an embedded ecology chain. Chou invited quite a few prominent art institutes to send flowers to the exhibition to celebrate its opening. While the flowers are displayed on-site to present the viewers a list of exhibition sponsors, they show us Chou’s thoughts in regard to responding to a network of resources. For a long time, Chou has tried to transform the solid concept of an “art museum” or “sponsor” into a fluid form. An existence which seems so appropriately located in a museum may well be a result of the connection and transportation of several resources, tracing how the structure of the art industry accumulates and forms.

TOA Lighting ®2010, site-specific installation, lighting equipment sponsored from TOA Lighting. Installation view, in solo exhibition “TOA Lighting", Hong-Gah Museum Taipei 2010 ___________

“TOA Lighting” is a project specially developed to be displayed in Hong-Gah Museum and La Chambre Gallery. In the project, the artist, Yu-Cheng Chou, addresses the formation and the termination of an exhibition from his own specific economic position, reflecting on both the source and destination of resources in a given environment. He considers the exhibition site at Hong-Gah Museum to be a single object, and submits a new proposal regarding the lighting equipment and contemporary plastic arts. The proposed lighting is then produced and installed through and by the artist. For the purpose of attracting sponsorship for the lighting equipment from a private enterprise, the artist turns the title of his art into an alternative form of business advertisement by using this company’s identification symbols in exhibition-related ads. On the site of the exhibition, the lighting pieces are the only objects in place and are evenly installed. After the exhibition ends, the ownership of the lighting has been transferred to the Museum as its property. Another phase of this exhibition starts in La Chambre Gallery two weeks after the beginning of “TOA Lighting”. Here at a commercial gallery, the artist re-presents his museum exhibition in a large-scale painting, with the title of “Hong-Gah Museum”. Through the “transfer”, “variation”, “discrepancy” and “feedback” in this project, the artist highlights the existence of himself, the private business, the museum and the commercial gallery, along with their comparative economic positions. What is shown is that the business, the museum and the gallery have all become participants of an art project. They have, respectively, received the benefits or potential benefits disposed by the artist, while meeting needs of their own – advertising, lighting equipment and potential transactions of artistic production. 1) Relation of Lighting to Current Exhibition Sites “Picture lamp” lighting is the standard lighting for almost all exhibitions in Taiwan. Undoubtedly, the yellow spotlight serves best for painting and sculpture in the category of plastic arts from the past, as its yellow and warm features set the standard tone for traditional and classic pieces of art. However, as plastic arts embarks on diverse paths of development, most exhibition sites in Taiwan still tend to equip all forms of exhibitions with the standard picture lamp lighting and have not adopted the fittest lighting for modern plastic arts. As a result, a gap between the lighting and certain forms of modern art may emerge. This issue of the relation of exhibition sites to their lighting is a subject the artist wishes to highlight through his project. 2) The Source and Destination of Resources in a Project During other artistic activities prior to this project, the artist turned some social resources he obtained as an artist into third-party resources. In other words, these resources have been transformed into other types of social resources through the operation of art, and specific economic positions are created at the respective ends of the resource chain. 3) Title of Exhibition and Advertising The artist chooses not to entitle the exhibition based on his own concepts. Instead, he wishes to create more derivative value through the titles. In the end, the two titles of the two exhibitions indicate the source and destination of project resources, and how important they are to the project itself. Advertisement expenses for “TOA Lighting” (first phase) at Hong-Gah Museum are paid by the Museum, while those for “Hong-Gah Museum” (second phase) at La Chambre Gallery are covered by the Gallery. 4) Production after Operation – Painting or Post-documents In the exhibition at La Chambre Gallery, viewers perceive the absence of creative images and artistic styles. What is present, instead, is a careful painting made by the artist. He does not seem to be concerned about the lacking of content, because the content and images to be portrayed and captured have long been created by him, as they are the metaphoric objects in still life. These objects are presented in compliance with the manipulation through the project. Therefore, the painting becomes a conceptual piece of art, a production document, and its chosen form inclines toward the attribute of the exhibition site, which is a commercial gallery.

Rainbow Paint ®2011, site-specific installation, pure white paint sponsored by Rainbow Paint, 192 pails, 12 box, fluorescent lamps. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Rainbow Paint", Kuandu Museum, Taipei 2011 ___________

Chou Yu-Cheng disputed chromatism with Kuandu Fine Arts Museum by arguing that there are two distinct types of white box in Taiwan. One is pure-white, and another lily-white. He also emphasized that the neutral pure-white is of special significance to contemporary art spaces. In such choosy aesthetics lies exactly Chou’s crafty plot. He “smuggled” Rainbow paint (a well-known brand of paint in Taiwan) into the exhibition venue when he was disputing with the museum. What Chou “smuggled” was obviously not only a reference color, but also a brand, a corporation, and a resource chain. Paint is as significant as fluorescent tubes. They collectively actualized numerous exhibitions with their quiet existence in museums. However, the idea that they respectively represent a complete industry seldom comes into our mind. In fact, the industries they represent consist of manufacturers, factories, orders, and distribution channels. Together with the museum/gallery system, they developed a thriving art industry. After the end of this exhibition, Chou donated the pure-white paint to another art space that was willing to use it, where a painting in Andy Warhol’s style clearly reflected that Chou’s project granted the ready-made a new life.

Meeting Table - MOCA, Taipei 2011, wood, acrylic, 210 x 85 x 75(H) cm (each), Commissioned by exhibition “Live Ammo" Installation view, in the exhibition “Rainbow Paint", Kuandu Museum, Taipei 2011. permanent installation, in meeting Room of Moca Taipei. ___________

The project is one of the ongoing site-specific projects of Museum of Contemporary Art Taipei. It is proposed and executed by the artist after contemplating its interior space and consulting with the museum staff. During the exhibition period, two sets of tables were made, and one of them was on display. (Six tables to a set) After the exhibition, one was stored in a conference room for future use, and the other set was put on sale in a commercial space. The existence of these two sets of tables is thus able to form a certain contrast. The amount and size of these tables are based on the space of the conference room, the production budget, practicality for future use, and the museum’s characteristics. The financial sources came from exhibition budget, museum budget, and the curator and artist’s own expense. For this exhibition, the artist will present one set of tables owned by the artist and two black-and-white photos depicting the conference room before and after the tables are installed.

Another Geoff Molyneux.pdf 68.5 mb

Gradient 2.pdf 62.7 mb

The Act of Seeing.pdf 590 kb

A Man of Showa Era.pdf 48.5 mb

Monochrom Gradient.pdf 83.9 mb

On Things Ir(Relevant) to Art or Liszt and ____.pdf 47.5 mb

1 Manager with 3 Artist + 3 Companies.pdf 7.7 mb

Refresh, Sacrifice, New Hygiene,…, Album.pdf 46.2 mb

Refresh, Sacrifice, New Hygiene,…, Album.pdf 101.7 mb

A Working History LU Chieh-Te.pdf 55.5 mb

Re(Inter)views.pdf 2mb

Re(Inter)views

CHOU Yu-Cheng was born in Taipei, Taiwan in 1976, he graduated from the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts de Paris and the research program - La Seine. Working across a wide range of mediums from installation, publication, performance to painting, the artist investigates the interrelationship between society and aesthetics through a minimalist yet thoughtfully choreographed skill set of knowledge and aesthetics that allows him to reveal the peculiarities of art, object, and space. Chou Yu-Cheng has exhibited internationally, including solo exhibitions at the TKG+, Taipei (2018); Edouard Malingue Gallery, Shanghai (2017) and Hong Kong (2016), China; Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin (2015); Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei, Taiwan (2014); Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, Kaohsiung, Taiwan (2014); and Museum of Contemporary Art Denver, Colorado, U.S.A. (2008); as well as group exhibitions at the Lyon Biennial, France (2019); Performa Biennial, New York (2019); Liverpool Biennial, U.K. (2018); Art Basel in Hong Kong (Encounters sector) (2018); The Great Ephemeral, New Museum, New York (2015); Queens International, Queens Museum (2013); and Taipei Biennial (2012). Awards and recognitions include the Taipei Art Awards, Taiwan (2012) and Taishin Arts Award, Taiwan (2011). 周育正，1976年出生於台北，畢業於法國國立巴黎高等藝術學院與塞納河文憑後研究學程。他通過多元媒介，包括裝置、出版、表演與繪畫，處理社會與美學的相互關係，塑造出一套簡潔但精心策劃的知識與美學技巧，最終展現藝術、物體和空間的特性。近期個展於台北TKG+（2018）、馬凌畫廊香港（2016）與上海（2017）、柏林貝塔寧藝術之家（2015）、台北市立美術館（2014）、高雄市立美術館（2014）、美國丹佛市當代美術館（2008），聯展於里昂雙年展（2019）、紐約表演雙年展（2019）、利物浦雙年展（2018）、香港巴塞爾藝聚空間項目（2018）、紐約新美術館（2015）、皇后雙年展（2013）、台北雙年展（2012）。榮獲獎項包含台北美術獎首獎（2012）與台新藝術獎年度視覺藝術大獎（2011）。

Kiang Malingue | 馬凌Hong Kong / Shanghai

TKG+Taipei

Kate MacGarryLondon

Molyneux 2014, painting installation, publication, etc.., 2 galleries Installation view, in solo exhibition “Molyneux", Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei 2014.

Sedimentary Gradient 2022, Acrylic on paper, paper mounted on linen. Installation view of solo exhibition “Sedimentary Gradient”, GWBJ2022, Beijing 2022.

Couplets, Mosquitoes, Feng Shui Stone, Fumigate, Provocation, De-coincidence, Fruit, Family, Dehumidifier, Poster, Disease, Proprietary2016, couplets, insecticide, feng shui stone, fruit, dehumidifier, poster, flower, incense burne ect.. Installation view, in the exhibition “De-coincidence", National Taiwan University of Arts, Taipei 2016.

Refresh, Sacrifice, New Hygiene, Infection, Clean, Robot, Air, Housekeeping, www.ayibang.com, Cigarette, Dyson, Modern People 2017, 6 air purifiers, 4 robot vacuums, fiberglass, Acrylic and wooden structure, Acrylic on canvas. Installation view of the exhibition “Refresh, Sacrifice, New Hygiene, Infection, Clean, Robot, Air, Housekeeping, www.ayibang.com, Cigarette, Dyson, Modern People”, Edouard Malingue gallery, Shanghai 2017.

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. 2015, stainless steel, incense burner, ashes, acrylic on canvas, 280 x 600 cm.Installation view, in solo exhibition “chemical gilding, keep calm, galvanise, pray, gradient, ashes, manifestation, unequal, dissatisfaction, capitalise, incense burner, survival, agitation, hit, day light", Kunstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin 2015.

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. II 2016, stainless steel, acrylic on canvas, fruits, plaster, neon etc..,1200 x 280 cm. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. II", Edouard Malingue Gallery, Hong Kong 2016.

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. III 2016, remove gallery’s floor and re-flooring, stainless steel, acrylic on canvas, fruits, plaster, etc.. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. III", Project Fulfill Art Space, Taipei 2016.

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. V 2018, galvanise panels, tires, coins, acrylic on canvas. Installation view of the exhibition “The Extre Extra Ordinary”, MCAD, Manila Philippines 2018.

Refresh, Sacrifice, New Hygiene, Infection, Clean, Robot, Air, Housekeeping, jackercleaning.com, Cigarette, Dyson, Modern People. III 2018, Handmade Noodle, Smoke machine, Wooden structure, 6 air purifiers, 4 robot vacuums, 3 Cordless vacuum cleaners, Fiberglass, Acrylic and wooden structure, Acrylic on canvas, Publication. Installation view of the exhibition “Refresh, Sacrifice, New Hygiene, Infection, Clean, Robot, Air, Housekeeping, jackercleaning.com, Cigarette, Dyson, Modern People”, TKG+, Taipei 2018.

Goods, Acceleration, Package, Express, Convenience, Borrow, Digestion, Regeneration, PAPREC Group2018, 250 tons recycled cardboard. Installation view of the exhibition “Lyon Biennial”, Fagor Factory, Lyon 2019.

Origami 2022, Acrylic on paper, paper mounted on linen. Installation view of solo exhibition “Origami”, Kate MacGarry, London 2022.

TOA Lighting ®2010, site-specific installation, lighting equipment sponsored from TOA Lighting. Installation view, in solo exhibition “TOA Lighting", Hong-Gah Museum Taipei 2010

AURORA ® 2012/Han dynasty (206 B.C. - 220 A.D.), pottery figurineInstallation view, in exhibition “Taipei Biennial", Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei 2012

____________ download >>> Refresh, Sacrifice, New Hygiene,…, Album.pdf / 46.2 mb

The progression and transition of modernization plays a subtle yet vital role in shaping people’s perception and values. In this complex process, “hygiene” as the key word for the new phase comes from a Taiwanese slang “without knowledge and without hygiene” (referring to someone dumb, dirty, and without standards). Compared with knowledge, hygiene seems to be a rather abstract yet feasible standard for modernization which leads to new social rules. While a capitalist framework seems perfect for the above-mentioned phenomenon, Chou Yu-Cheng evades the epistemological approach in this exhibition, not expounding the history and economic benefits of hygiene in a modern context. Instead, the artist reinterprets plastic arts through the notion of hygiene, in a multidisciplinary approach that expands aesthetics beyond conventional perception.  Refresh, Sacrifice, New Hygiene, Infection, Clean, Robot, Air, Housekeeping, jackercleaning.com, Cigarette, Dyson, Modern People. III is the third phase of Chou Yu-Cheng’s ongoing project. The title of this project — a group of keywords — references hashtags on social media described by the artist in a subjective or objective way. This particular naming method originated with the 2015 project Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light, which opened a new path for his creative process. In a more diverse and complex form of production, the artist disregards a linear linguistic logic, and attempts to reinvent his personal approach to plastic arts, interwoven with a few threads from his past practice.   Following the launch of the first and second phases of the project respectively in Shanghai and Hong Kong, this exhibition unveils the artist's new conceptions, including sculptural work Cloud, Mist, and Field for Sun Dried Noodles (2018), a collaboration between the artist and traditional noodle makers. The title of the work comes from "Green hills and clear water breed good noodles," a slogan hung on the gate of a traditional noodle factory in Shiding Town, New Taipei City, which highlights the inseparable relationship between the environment and food. A special publication also debuts in this exhibition, titled Refresh, Sacrifice, New Hygiene, Home, Washing, Chou Yu-Cheng, Acrylic, Rag, Scouring Pad, Canvas, Image, Album. With a title that suggests a hybridity between housekeeping and artistic media, this publication serves as a memento for the exhibition. Comprising painting, sculpture, performance, and publication, the exhibition blurs the boundary between art forms through an adroit deployment of brands, machines (robots), apps, and traditional handicrafts, while resonating with the artist’s past body of work, evidently in the use of found objects, brands, publication, and manual labor. This exhibition also serves as an attempt to create “a gallery with the best environment,” with the use of Dyson Pure Cool Link air purifiers, which automatically remove 99.95% of pollutants and allergens as small as PM0.1, as well as through the Jackercleaning app that provides housekeeping appointments, along with the use of Dyson Cyclone V10 cord-free vacuums, which remove 99.97% of pollutants and allergens as small as 0.3 microns. The environment becomes a key element in this exhibition. In this way, found objects not only manifest themselves in their physical forms, but are also allowed the chance to demonstrate their functions, transcending their original hackneyed notion. Known for his deft manipulation of aesthetics and social issues, Chou Yu-Cheng is deeply concerned with the working process behind visual arts, as well as alternative operational and thinking modes in existing mechanisms, corresponding alternative interests in atypical collaboration, and problematic established facts. His practice involves diverse mediums, where he acts as the mediator who integrates the individual as “subject,” the enterprise, and the institution, while through a working process that entails the act of transition or transferal, or the difference in time or locale, yielding specific results of a particular project, thereby creating a dialectic between the source and the outcome.

Molyneux 2014, painting installation, publication, etc.., 2 galleries Installation view, in solo exhibition “Molyneux", Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei 2014.

Liszt 2014, autopiano, cleaners, guard booths & radio, students performance. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Liszt", Kuohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, Kuohsiung 2014.

Flowers for Opening 2011, 8 tubs of flowers for opening, from 8 art foundations, variable dimention. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Rainbow Paint", Kuandu Museum, Taipei 2011.

TOA Lighting ®2010, site-specific installation, lighting equipment sponsored from TOA Lighting. Installation view, in solo exhibition “TOA Lighting", Hong-Gah Museum Taipei 2010.

Re(Inter)views 2022.pdf 2mb

Molyneux 2014, painting installation, publication, etc.., 2 galleries Installation view, in solo exhibition “Molyneux", Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei 2014. ____________

Liszt 2014, autopiano, cleaners, guard booths & radio, students performance. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Liszt", Kuohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, Kuohsiung 2014. _____________

Flowers for Opening 2011, 8 tubs of flowers for opening, from 8 art foundations, variable dimention. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Rainbow Paint", Kuandu Museum, Taipei 2011 ___________

TOA Lighting ®2010, site-specific installation, lighting equipment sponsored from TOA Lighting. Installation view, in solo exhibition “TOA Lighting", Hong-Gah Museum Taipei 2010 ___________

Molyneux 2014, painting installation, publication, etc.., 2 galleries Installation view, in solo exhibition “Molyneux", Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei 2014.

Liszt 2014, autopiano, cleaners, guard booths & radio, students performance. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Liszt", Kuohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, Kuohsiung 2014.

A Working History - Lu Chieh-Te 2012, installation, a temporary worker Mr. Lu, booklet, pattern painted on wooden deck, 500 x 500 cm, News Paper’s Ad.Installation view, in exhibition “Taipei Art Awards", Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei 2012.

Monochrome, A Working History - Lu Chieh-Te 2013, acrylic on canvas, monochrome painted by Mr. Lu, a layer per day, 140 x 290 cm, with signature behind canvas.Installation view, in the exhibition “Are We Working Too Much?", Eslite Gallery, Taipei 2013.

AURORA ® / Forgotten Kao Er-Pan / Mr. Yang Po-Lin and his copper sculptures 2012/Han dynasty (206 B.C. - 220 A.D.), pottery figurine, / bottel of drink / 2 similar architectural spots of 2 similar-looking sculptures Installation view, in exhibition “Taipei Biennial", Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taipei 2012

Flowers for Opening 2011, 8 tubs of flowers for opening, from 8 art foundations, variable dimention. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Rainbow Paint", Kuandu Museum, Taipei 2011

TOA Lighting ® 2010, site-specific installation, lighting equipment sponsored from TOA Lighting. Installation view, in solo exhibition “TOA Lighting", Hong-Gah Museum Taipei 2010

Rainbow Paint ® 2011, site-specific installation, pure white paint sponsored by Rainbow Paint, 192 pails, 12 box, fluorescent lamps. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Rainbow Paint", Kuandu Museum, Taipei 2011

rooms

bio

docs

❝

mail

works

books

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light.2015, stainless steel, incense burner, ashes, acrylic on canvas, 280 x 600 cm. Installation view, in solo exhibition “chemical gilding, keep calm, galvanise, pray, gradient, ashes, manifestation, unequal, dissatisfaction, capitalise, incense burner, survival, agitation, hit, day light", Kunstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin 2015.

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. II 2016, stainless steel, acrylic on canvas, fruits, plaster, neon etc..,1200 x 280 cm. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. II", Edouard Malingue Gallery, Hong Kong 2016.

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. II 2016, stainless steel, acrylic on canvas, fruits, plaster, neon etc..,1200 x 280 cm. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. II", Edouard Malingue Gallery, Hong Kong 2016. ____________

Even before entering Edouard Malingue Gallery, the unusual title of Taiwanese artist Chou Yu-Cheng’s solo exhibition prompts intrigue. The exhaustive title, “Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. II,” teases viewers with themes of the exhibition that are hidden throughout the eclectic configuration of objects, materials and paintings. The concept of daylight, as referred to in the exhibition’s title, is recalled immediately upon seeing three ombré paintings installed in the gallery. Soft spectrums of color ranging from blues to pinks to yellows are the artist’s interpretations of daylight, the darkest of which is culled from his childhood memories. The gentle monotony of the two brighter canvases is interrupted with the exhibition title written in bright white on each of the surfaces, and a single plaster ball that is glued in the lower left corners. Additional white balls are placed around the gallery floor, bridging the gap between the viewers’ physical environment and the works on display. In stark contrast to the minimalist presentation of the paintings is the only other work in the show, a neat yet chaotic installation that takes up nearly the entire width of the back wall. At first glance, the amalgamation of objects, which range from white plaster casts of household items and neon tubes to raw fruits that have been left to naturally decompose, seem completely unrelated to one another. Here, the title of the exhibition is presented again on more spectrum paintings that act as backdrops for the various objects of the installation—its presence acting as the link throughout the show. All of these mixed and contrasting pieces are displayed on sterile metal shelves, which seem much more at home in a laboratory, and evoke the scientific, chemical aspects of his mysterious exhibition title. The words “galvanise” and “hit” perhaps draw the most immediate connection to a large-scale sheet of corrugated metal, similar to those used on roofs, which visually dominates the overall installation. This work is taken directly from Chou’s 2015 show of the same title, in which the audience was encouraged to pelt the same sheet of metal with rocks. This piece of metal was then reused for this second installation, which also explains why “II” is amended onto the title of his exhibition at Edouard Malingue. To work through the rationale behind the title—“Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. II”—one must take its advice to keep calm, and perhaps even pray for those so inclined, and further examine the more technical aspects of the installation: namely, its neon graphs and painted charts. The bright, jagged neon lights not only draw the eye, but also provide commentary with their representation of graphs of Taiwanese housing market trends. Seeing that they are paired with pie charts displaying government censuses on the happiness of the Taiwanese people (a startlingly small slice of the pie represents “happy” people), the decision to include the more nebulous and conceptual words in the exhibition title, such as “Dissatisfaction,” “Agitation,” “Survival” and “Unequal,” becomes clear. The data of Taiwan’s economy, housing and happiness, when viewed together with the casts of household objects and slowly-decomposing fruit, prompt viewers to turn their speculative gazes inwards, to evaluate their own happiness. In Chou’s unique manner, he not only prompts a dialogue between the works themselves, but also between the objects and the viewers. Mimicking the dichotomous and cryptic title, the exhibition is both calming and discomforting, orderly and chaotic, static and fluid. Walking among the pieces, in an attempt to draw the intended connections between the works and the title, each viewer embarks upon a unique journey resulting from Chou’s artistic decisions and their individual life experiences. Quote: Asia Art Pacific / AMELIA ABRAMSON

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. II 2016, stainless steel, acrylic on canvas, fruits, plaster, neon etc..,1200 x 280 cm. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. II", Edouard Malingue Gallery, Hong Kong 2016. ___________

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. III (part 2) 2016, remove gallery’s floor and re-flooring, stainless steel, acrylic on canvas, fruits, plaster, etc.. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. III", Project Fulfill Art Space, Taipei 2016.

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. III (part 2) 2016, remove gallery’s floor and re-flooring, stainless steel, acrylic on canvas, fruits, plaster, etc.. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. III", Project Fulfill Art Space, Taipei 2016. ___________

Synthetic Leather, Regular Motion, Society, Cotton Yarn, Collapse, Tea Stain, Response, Rose Gold, Profanity, Rehearsal Room, Small Solid Happiness, Diffusion, Bridge, Restlessness (I) Esther Lu The project titled by Chou Yu-Cheng as Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanize, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalize, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. is unusually long. It is not in a sentence form and consists of 15 characters in Chinese and 19 words in English. It is impossible to comprehend the connection and the meaning between the words upon first glance, making it quite puzzling. The first message provided by this exhibition is assembled with these nouns, verbs, and adjectives, sparking different ways of associating the words in a meaningful way: 1. As keywords, suggesting ways for comprehending certain situations in the perceptual world or in reality; 2. As configurations with a dialogical nature, to be connected with each other and are mutually responsive; like musical notes, for them to be played in harmony requires the gestures of a performer; 3. As specific signifiers, to be connected with the objects on display and to result in outputs of consensual significance; 4. As a string of words and not a phrase, presenting the relationship based on a formal language with the grammar or perhaps the forms of the objects on display. These clues hint at possible directions, opening up ambiguous, complex situations, imaginative extensions and empty spaces and clearly straying away from the artist’s customary creative context. Chou usually opts for a more direct and clear approach with his artwork titles (e.g., TOA Lighting, Liszt), employing a set of logic to meticulously position the artist’s role in certain institutions or mechanisms, which unsettles the path for value recognition, exchange, labor, and production, seeking to construct possible creative space and functional role for the artist in society. If the issues the artist has always dealt with are regarded as a skill for engaging and negotiating in the contemporary society, as he breaks away from the relationship built on dominance principle with different institutions, spaces, domains, and even the history of life to bestow new meaning and possibilities for seeing and figuration, Chou, then, has in the past few years persistently created a distinctive approach to perspective, providing visual forms to invisible relationships and logics, resulting in provocations or interventions in the core issues dealt with in each of his projects. With this understanding for Chou’s art, we can take a further step to examine and look back on the different transitions he has been through on his creative journey. From his artworks such as TOA Lighting to Taken from Society / Give Back to Society, it is observed that he focuses his creative ambition on the substantial transformative power that an artist can spark in society, seeking to understand what “can” the artist do and what can be done. When Chou began collaborating with others, such as Lu Chief-Te and Geoff Molyneux, he began contemplating further on issues associated with bio-politics, dealing with a wide range of identity issues in areas including labor, institution, personal history, and art history, which have prompted more self-reflection and speculation. These projects seem to hold the intention of self-questioning, asking what “should” by conveyed by the artist? What role should the artist play? What relationship should the artist have with art history? These internal psychological factors are then transformed into different considerations and arrangements in the final expressive language applied in his artworks. Where is this creative consideration revealed in his latest turning point heading? Under this elaborate title, what are the issues and the inner world confronted by the artist? If we were to understand this under a hypothetical premise and alter the exhibition title to: Synthetic Leather, Regular Motion, Society, Cotton Yarn, Collapse, Tea Stain, Response, Rose Gold, Profanity, Rehearsal Room, Small Solid Happiness, Diffusion, Bridge, Restlessness, is the artwork still valid? Has it taken on a different shape and form? Has its original objective been shifted? Would this approach have the same capacity demonstrated by Chou to empty out the gallery floor and dig vigorously to unveil the aesthetic interior of his latest creation, meanwhile seeking to investigate and explore the significance behind this creative transition? ( to be continued )

Couplets, Mosquitoes, Feng Shui Stone, Fumigate, Provocation, De-coincidence, Fruit, Family, Dehumidifier, Poster, Disease, Proprietary 2016, couplets, insecticide, feng shui stone, fruit, dehumidifier, poster, flower, incense burne ect.. Installation view, in the exhibition “De-coincidence", National Taiwan University of Arts, Taipei 2016.

Couplets, Mosquitoes, Feng Shui Stone, Fumigate, Provocation, De-coincidence, Fruit, Family, Dehumidifier, Poster, Disease, Proprietary 2016, couplets, insecticide, feng shui stone, fruit, dehumidifier, poster, flower, incense burne ect.. Installation view, in the exhibition “De-coincidence", National Taiwan University of Arts, Taipei 2016. ____________

Couplets, Mosquitoes, Feng Shui Stone, Fumigate, Provocation, De-coincidence, Fruit, Family, Dehumidifier, Poster, Disease, Proprietary 2016, couplets, insecticide, feng shui stone, fruit, dehumidifier, poster, flower, incense burne ect..Installation view, in the exhibition “De-coincidence", National Taiwan University of Arts, Taipei 2016. ____________

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. III 2016, remove gallery’s floor and re-flooring, stainless steel, acrylic on canvas, fruits, plaster, etc.. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. III", Project Fulfill Art Space, Taipei 2016.

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. III 2016, remove gallery’s floor and re-flooring, stainless steel, acrylic on canvas, fruits, plaster, etc.. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. III", Project Fulfill Art Space, Taipei 2016. ___________

Synthetic Leather, Regular Motion, Society, Cotton Yarn, Collapse, Tea Stain, Response, Rose Gold, Profanity, Rehearsal Room, Small Solid Happiness, Diffusion, Bridge, Restlessness Esther Lu (I) The project titled by Chou Yu-Cheng as Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanize, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalize, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. is unusually long. It is not in a sentence form and consists of 15 characters in Chinese and 19 words in English. It is impossible to comprehend the connection and the meaning between the words upon first glance, making it quite puzzling. The first message provided by this exhibition is assembled with these nouns, verbs, and adjectives, sparking different ways of associating the words in a meaningful way: 1. As keywords, suggesting ways for comprehending certain situations in the perceptual world or in reality; 2. As configurations with a dialogical nature, to be connected with each other and are mutually responsive; like musical notes, for them to be played in harmony requires the gestures of a performer; 3. As specific signifiers, to be connected with the objects on display and to result in outputs of consensual significance; 4. As a string of words and not a phrase, presenting the relationship based on a formal language with the grammar or perhaps the forms of the objects on display. These clues hint at possible directions, opening up ambiguous, complex situations, imaginative extensions and empty spaces and clearly straying away from the artist’s customary creative context. Chou usually opts for a more direct and clear approach with his artwork titles (e.g., TOA Lighting, Liszt), employing a set of logic to meticulously position the artist’s role in certain institutions or mechanisms, which unsettles the path for value recognition, exchange, labor, and production, seeking to construct possible creative space and functional role for the artist in society. If the issues the artist has always dealt with are regarded as a skill for engaging and negotiating in the contemporary society, as he breaks away from the relationship built on dominance principle with different institutions, spaces, domains, and even the history of life to bestow new meaning and possibilities for seeing and figuration, Chou, then, has in the past few years persistently created a distinctive approach to perspective, providing visual forms to invisible relationships and logics, resulting in provocations or interventions in the core issues dealt with in each of his projects. With this understanding for Chou’s art, we can take a further step to examine and look back on the different transitions he has been through on his creative journey. From his artworks such as TOA Lighting to Taken from Society / Give Back to Society, it is observed that he focuses his creative ambition on the substantial transformative power that an artist can spark in society, seeking to understand what “can” the artist do and what can be done. When Chou began collaborating with others, such as Lu Chief-Te and Geoff Molyneux, he began contemplating further on issues associated with bio-politics, dealing with a wide range of identity issues in areas including labor, institution, personal history, and art history, which have prompted more self-reflection and speculation. These projects seem to hold the intention of self-questioning, asking what “should” by conveyed by the artist? What role should the artist play? What relationship should the artist have with art history? These internal psychological factors are then transformed into different considerations and arrangements in the final expressive language applied in his artworks. Where is this creative consideration revealed in his latest turning point heading? Under this elaborate title, what are the issues and the inner world confronted by the artist? If we were to understand this under a hypothetical premise and alter the exhibition title to: Synthetic Leather, Regular Motion, Society, Cotton Yarn, Collapse, Tea Stain, Response, Rose Gold, Profanity, Rehearsal Room, Small Solid Happiness, Diffusion, Bridge, Restlessness, is the artwork still valid? Has it taken on a different shape and form? Has its original objective been shifted? Would this approach have the same capacity demonstrated by Chou to empty out the gallery floor and dig vigorously to unveil the aesthetic interior of his latest creation, meanwhile seeking to investigate and explore the significance behind this creative transition? [if gte mso 9]> Normal 0 false false false EN-US JA X-NONE

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. III 2016, remove gallery’s floor and re-flooring, stainless steel, acrylic on canvas, fruits, plaster, etc.. Installation view, in solo exhibition “Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. III", Project Fulfill Art Space, Taipei 2016. ___________

“Refresh, Sacrifice, New Hygiene, Infection, Clean, Robot, Air, Housekeeping, www.ayibang.com, Cigarette, Dyson, Modern People” is an exhibition by the Taiwanese artist Chou Yu-Cheng, to be presented in November at Edouard Malingue Gallery, Shanghai. The name of the project came about from the juxtaposition of several keywords, referencing Jean Baudrillard’s interest in modern objects—especially new objects—in The System of Objects, while at the same time tending towards the poetic. With its multiple shifts and evolutions, modernization has impacted our cognitive faculties. From within such multifaceted and wide-ranging phenomena, “hygiene” becomes key, here referring to the Taiwanese slang phrase, “without knowledge and without hygiene” (referring to someone dumb, dirty, and with no standards). Relative to knowledge, hygiene is relatively abstract and yet seems to possess a yardstick by which to gauge modernization—and from there on works out new codes and protocols for objects and events. Though these can all be encapsulated by the analyses of capitalism, this project does not expound on the history and economics of modern hygiene epistemologically but rather borrows from “hygiene” to elaborate on and shape artistic expression: melding forms of tradition and of the contemporary, and even endeavoring to develop its aesthetics through more hybrid and plural forms. Different from a usual purifier, the Dyson Pure range of purifying fans powerfully projects and circulates airflow, simultaneously capturing gases and 99.95% of particles as small as PM0.1. Air becomes an apparent, but invisible, crucial presence in the exhibition since the artist believes he can produce better air through “machinery” and attempts to generate new ideas through readymades, at the same time making the image of the readymade conspicuous. Take the example of the gallery in the present day: a modern image and modus operandi provides the space in which to display artworks, while the adjustments and conditioning of air, cold and warm, clearly constitute an indispensable element of modernity. The ways in which the gallery has evolved in terms of its equipment or infrastructure have become a subject matter outside that of the artistic, all the while echoing and reflecting the broader surrounding phenomena of modernization. Chou Yu-Cheng is adept at the dual manipulation of aesthetics and the social. He focuses on the workflows undergirding visual production, paying attention to the ways whereby alternative modes of operation and reflection are generated within a pre-existing system of things. He creates corresponding alternative benefits in “atypical cooperation” while highlighting the problems with a given reality. His modes of creation range widely over all kinds of mediums but mainly center around “mix and match”—through his role as a “go-between” and through individuals, enterprises, and institutional structures he views as “subjects”. By manipulating “workflow”—such as diversions, transferrals, or disparities in time or place—the projected outcomes are generated, forming a reciprocal dialectic between origins and results. “Refresh, Sacrifice, New Hygiene, Infection, Clean, Robot, Air, Housekeeping, www.ayibang.com, Cigarette, Dyson, Modern People” has paintings, sculptures, and performances at its core. The use of brands, machinery (robot), and app operating systems (among others) shakes up formal boundaries while at the same time extends continuously from the tenor of the artist’s past oeuvre—such as the use of readymades and brands, paintings, on-site labor, among others, or the two-stage working model for the exhibition (where the first stage is the regular exhibition period, with the second stage lasting two weeks, in an empty gallery space, leaving behind only the cleaning equipment and the display of the cleaning service app). The project series initiated in 2015, “Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light.”, initiated for Chou Yu-Cheng a creative vocabulary at odds with his past oeuvre. With a more plural, complex form of output, a linear linguistic logic is disposed of; by maintaining a few threads from his past works, this endeavors to refurbish the artist’s individual intelligence in the plastic arts.

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. V 2018, galvanise panels, tires, coins, acrylic on canvas. Installation view of the exhibition “The Extre Extra Ordinary”, MCAD, Manila Philippines 2018.

Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. V 2018, galvanise panels, tires, coins, acrylic on canvas. Installation view of the exhibition “The Extre Extra Ordinary”, MCAD, Manila Philippines 2018. ___________

CHOU Yu-Cheng presents the latest series in his project Chemical Gilding, Keep Calm, Galvanise, Pray, Gradient, Ashes, Manifestation, Unequal, Dissatisfaction, Capitalise, Incense Burner, Survival, Agitation, Hit, Day Light. V (2018) at the front part of the museum. Through this installation, he reflects on speculative questions around the natural habitat, the built environment and survival, with Manila as backdrop and source of inspiration. Mundane objects, such as galvanised sheeting, a common building material articulated to hint the form and canton of a threatening wind chime, coins and large tires are laid out in the space, providing a sharp close-up of everyday fragments. He builds a performative stage where the presence of the audience as well as the surrounding objects, including new paintings inspired by shades of the city, are equally highlighted A generative reading on the immediate city life is deliberately and mindfully expressed in the foreground as a familiar yet new reference, replicating the external world inside the museum. The sentiment of the urban vibe is captured and channeled through his display and naming strategy for a formulated aura.

Three Liquid Stories: Water, Tears and Sweat 2021, Acrylic on paper, paper inlaid on linen. Commissioned by MoCA Busan for the exhibition "The Phenomenal Transition”, 2021.

Three Liquid Stories: Water, Tears and Sweat 2021, Acrylic on paper, paper inlaid on linen. Commissioned by MoCA Busan for the exhibition "The Phenomenal Transition”, 2021. _________

Three Liquid Stories: Water, Tears and Sweat2021, Acrylic on paper, paper inlaid on linen. Commissioned by MoCA Busan for the exhibition "The Phenomenal Transition”, 2021. ___________

The Story of Water: Just like today’s food or other products, one has to find an innovative element that corresponds to today’s environmental values in order to meet the needs of the new market. This work is no exception. Water is used as a medium, and the paint regarded as pollutant. When the two are mixed together, it becomes sewage. Then, imitating the steady flow of a river, the pollutants are left behind and deposited onto the paper. Repeated operations produce, as a result, paper tinted with a colour gradation, just as the pollution becomes more prominent as we get closer to the source of sewage discharge. This is an innovative product inspired by an understanding of pollution. The Story of Tears: To open a shop, one must find a busy place that brings in more customers. Even if the rent would be much more expensive, as the saying goes, people are the most valuable capital, one should look further ahead when making an investment. After I learnt that people were indeed capital, one day they suddenly stopped going out and stayed at home whenever they could. The rent did not lower a bit even as the number of people dwindled. Only then did I see that the landlords were the best investors. The Story of Sweat: Ever since my job has been replaced by automated machinery, I have been trying to find a job that machinery cannot replace. Delivery is not a difficult job, and machines can’t be roaming the streets, can they? One has only to receive the orders using the company’s app, follow the GPS navigation and ride the bike to pick up the goods, then follow the navigation again and deliver the goods to the designated address. Very soon, as I gradually master the skills for this job, I also begin to realise that it is my body that has replaced the machine.

Origami 2022, Acrylic on paper, paper mounted on linen. Installation view of solo exhibition “Origami”, Kate MacGarry, London 2022.

Origami2022, Acrylic on paper, paper mounted on linen. Installation view of solo exhibition “Origami”, Kate MacGarry, London 2022.

Origami 2022, Acrylic on paper, paper mounted on linen. Installation view of solo exhibition “Origami”, Kate MacGarry, London 2022. ___________

Each painting in Chou’s Origami series begins with a piece of paper. Layered with subtle gradations of colour and cut into shapes the paper evolves, very slowly, into a new form. Soft becomes strong, a flat surface becomes like a sculpture within a painting that appears so flawless it can’t truly be handmade can it? With the application of colour, paper shapes become three-dimensional in their appearance. Chou’s colours are inspired by rivers, not only the shades found in nature but the toxic shades of river pollution. The movement of a river runs through each painting. Mineral and organic (inorganic) pigments are mixed to settle like a river’s sediment into gradients of colour. Sometimes as heavy and dense as the floor of the river bed, in other moments the pigment becomes transparent and fluid as though echoing the flow of water. The tones are kept low and quiet. For the artist, this atmosphere evokes the sadness of the recent pandemic, when the world came to a standstill with entire countries shut away behind closed doors. Shades of grey and brown become sepulchral like a mourning for so much lost. Once coloured, the paper is carefully cut by hand into forms that are balanced and arranged to appear as a single complete structure within the finished painting: as in the ancient art of origami, when a sheet of paper evolves into an object, be it a butterfly, hat or dog. The techniques in origami are so versatile that they have become revolutionary technology: used to create NASA’s gadgets which unfurl like blooming flowers in outer space.

☹︎ moody

✄ origami

⚐ room

For Performa 19, Chou Yu-Cheng will examine systems of capital in building, construction and real estate against the backdrop of SoHo, a former industrial neighborhood and model for artist-led gentrification. Specifically, he is interested in urban renewal and real estate development in New York City, a place that is constantly rebuilding and undergoing revitalization. In a live, public performance at The Performa 19 Hub at 18 Wooster Street—formerly the Canal Lumber Co. and current location for commercial art gallery Jeffrey Deitch—Chou imagines an interior construction site complete with scaffolding just like any New York city sidewalk. A forklift operator and manual laborers will move construction materials such as sand, bricks, bags of cement and lumber into various meaningless and absurd formations that echo the ups and downs of stock market indices and property valuation. Chou explores the commodity through modes of production, class, and labor through what art critic Wendy Vogel calls his “administrative brand of conceptualism.” In conversations with companies, museums or factories, his work unveils strategies of exhibition-making and art production, and questions the generation of value in the art world. Titles for his works take the form of keywords or hashtags on social media, representing a laundry-type list of products and concerns in contemporary life. Refresh, Sacrifice, New Hygiene, Infection, Clean, Robot, Air, Housekeeping, agentbong.com, Cigarette, Dyson, Modern People (2017) at Art Basel Hong Kong in 2018 featured a live performance in which giant bowls, plates and chopsticks are cleaned. The act of cleaning the huge tableware was connected to the JackerCleaning app, a Taiwanese on-demand home cleaning service. Similarly employing an industrial work force as a mode of art production, Cloud, Mist, and Field for Sun Dried Noodles (2018) is a collaboration between Chou and Taiwanese traditional noodle makers. The work’s title is taken from the tagline "Green hills and clear water breed good noodles," as hung on the gate of a traditional noodle factory in Shiding Town, New Taipei City. Here, he connects the threads between the cultural imaginary, local production and the division of labor. Other works such as A Working History – Lu Chieh-Te (2012) reveals the 45-year working history of Lu Chieh-Te, a 60-year-old temporary worker. In this work, Chou conducted interviews with Lu, revealing economic realities and working conditions of precarious employment. Chou later employed Lu in the exhibition—who became well-known from the work—as a security guard alongside his autobiography, at once confirming and generating contradictions in the fickle nature of temporary work. Chou's performance for Performa 19 further explores this relationship between worker and machine in service to capitalism. Machinery will move in a choreographed manner, as if a mechanical ballet, to a specially-commissioned post-rock soundtrack composed and performed live by Ian Vanek (frontman of American pop collective HOWARDIAN, ex-Japanther). Through calculated yet graceful movements of quotidian tools, objects, and cooperative labor between human and machine, the performance becomes a sort of theater of everyday life taken from the streets of New York and transported to the interior of an art gallery. CHEMICAL GILDING, KEEP CALM, GALVANIZE, PRAY, ASHES, MANIFESTATION, UNEQUAL, DISSATISFACTION, CAPITALIZE, INCENSE BURNER, SURVIVAL, AGITATION, HIT is approximately two hours long. CREDITS CHEMICAL GILDING, KEEP CALM, GALVANIZE, PRAY, ASHES, MANIFESTATION, UNEQUAL, DISSATISFACTION, CAPITALIZE, INCENSE BURNER, SURVIVAL, AGITATION, HIT is curated by Wu Dar Kuen (Chief Curator, C-Lab) and Charlene K. Lau (Andrew W. Mellon Curatorial Fellow, Performa). Co-commissioned with Taiwan Contemporary Culture Lab (C-Lab), with generous support of the Taiwan Ministry of Culture and Taipei Cultural Center in New York. Chou Yu-Cheng's Performa Commission is part of the Taiwanese Pavilion for the Performa 19 Biennial.

Goods, Acceleration, Package, Express, Convenience, Borrow, Digestion, Regeneration, PAPREC Group2019, 250 tons recycled cardboard. Installation view of the exhibition “Lyon Biennial”, Fagor factory, Lyon 2019.

Often based on collaborations or partnerships with companies, Chou Yu-Cheng’s works reveal the strategies of public and private sector funding behind the modes of producing artworks and contemporary art exhibitions. The artist explores the processes by which aesthetic, symbolic, social and economic values are constructed and validated in the art world. For the Biennale, Chou Yu-Cheng did not seek to “produce” a new work requiring artisanal or manufactured production. Keeping his distance, he chose to act as an “intermediary” and to borrow, from a specialized recycling firm, bales of cardboard before they were processed into paper pulp. The artist used them as elements in the exhibition’s scenography. Stacked unchanged to form a wall, the bales acquire a temporary function, as they partition off an inaccessible part of the site. The artist’s act is devised as a reflection of the current challenges facing industry: cutting the cost of producing and processing raw material, while also adopting a recycling-based rationale that increases profits to benefit from a positive “green” image.

Sedimentary Gradient2022, Acrylic on paper, paper mounted on linen. Installation view of solo exhibition “Sedimentary Gradient”, GWBJ2022, Beijing 2022.

Sedimentary Gradient 2022, Acrylic on paper, paper mounted on linen. Installation view of solo exhibition “Sedimentary Gradient”, GWBJ2022, Beijing 2022.

Sedimentary Gradient 2022, Acrylic on paper, paper mounted on linen. Installation view of solo exhibition “Sedimentary Gradient”, GWBJ2022, Beijing 2022. ___________

Returning to Gallery Weekend Beijing in 2022, Kiang Malingue is pleased to present Chou Yu-Cheng (b.1976, Taipei) solo presentation "Sedimentary Gradient", showcasing ten paintings created in the last two years. Appearing for the first time in Beijing, is Chou’s "Moody" series of distinct abstract compositions conceived at the peak of the pandemic in 2020, and the consecutive series of "Bibiliotheque" and "Water, Color & Paper", dealing in ever sophisticated fashions with the nuanced equilibrium of matters and motion. "Moody" emerges directly from the global pandemic situation: facing extreme uncertainties regarding the future and filled with awe, Chou Yu-Cheng conceived the series that on an exceptional level pertains to subjective feelings, affect and sentiments. For the artist, the flawlessly rendered, highly digital surfaces speak less of continuation of life in the virtual realm, but more of rupturing and suspended experiences in everyday reality. Chou views the works as anthropomorphic entities, simulating facial expressions or human moods at critical moments of collapse. Working on "Moody" and ensuing series, the artist has to learn and take full control of flow in relation to gravity: the remarkably fine gradient patterns on paper mounted on canvas are all results of meticulous handling, as Chou Yu-Cheng balances torrents of contrasting acrylic paint, and ensures that on super-flat Italian Fabriano paper the mineral-based particles are strictly ordered and arranged. After the precise colouring process, Chou then plays with various compositions before collaging and mounting the shaped papers on canvas. Chou also draws an analogy between the singular painterly process and the notions of sedimentation and pollution: just as natural and human forces create riverbeds, layered geological formations, vast sites of waste and even visible air pollution in particularly the age of Anthropocene, Chou’s latest painterly practise demonstrates the ways in which irreducible material components insidiously shape the world in a painting. Departing from the technical and material aspects of "Moody" and playfully named "Water, Color & Paper", a new series in the exhibition of "Sedimentary Gradient" introduces rectangular shapes, and is in active conversation with the history of abstract art. For the artist, his recent painterly practises come closer to Cy Twombly’s mark- making than to Mark Rothko’s colour fields: by introducing elements that are apparently digital and arbitrary, and by placing emphasis on the individual signifiers, the multi-layered artworks invoke a renewed notion of mono-chrome, redefining what constitutes and differs a colour from another. In the monumental series of "Bibliotheque", Chou Yu-Cheng further systematises the rectangular shapes that are solemn in essence: taking as its starting point the quotidian quest of charting a nice-looking bookcase, the "Bibliotheque" series presents the audience with pseudo-private scenes that are unprecedentedly ordered, and chaotic.