BAP Talk x Eskwela Public Lecture
Tuesday, September 10, 2019 at 7 PM – 8 PM
Bellas Artes Projects
Bellas Artes Outpost, 2/F The Alley at Karrivin, 2316 Chino Roces Avenue, Makati
Free and open to the public.
RSVP
The lecture gives an overview of the postwar visual history in Taiwan, with a focus on the avant-garde practices in theater, film, publications, and photography. Taiwan, located on the “Great Crescent,” a string of countries in the Pacific from Japan and South Korea to the Philippines designated by the American military deployment strategy as the frontline against Communism, has received a mixture of cultural influences since the late nineteenth century, including Chinese, Japanese, American, and European. The co-existing cultural heritage and imports along with the geopolitical complexities during the Cold War created a unique environment for artistic productions on the island, especially when martial law dictated every aspect of civilian life. The avant-garde artists featured in this talk—Huang Huacheng, Chuang Ling, Chang Chao-Tang, and Chen Yao-chi—emerged in the mid-1960s when modernist abstraction dominated the local artistic discourse. I will give context to their explorations by outlining the local conditions for creative activities and the broader development of postwar art in East Asia. My analysis will show that this group of artists was the first postwar generation to directly and fully engaged in their daily experiences in Taiwan in their artmaking while being attuned to international currents.
Ma’s lecture is part of BAP’s ESKWELA seminar under the topic “Asia Pacific: Visual Histories of War and Postwar.” Scholarships available to UP students and alumni. To apply, please email info@eskwelabap.com.
About Lesley Ma:
Lesley Ma is curator of Ink Art at M+, a new museum of visual culture in the West Kowloon Cultural District, Hong Kong. She heads the museum’s effort in collecting, exhibiting, and research on ink art since joining in 2013. In 2017, she curated the critically acclaimed exhibition, “The Weight of Lightness: Ink Art at M+,” and established a groundbreaking transnational framework for the subject. In 2013, she co-curated “The Great Crescent: Art and Agitation in the 1960s—Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan” at Para Site, Hong Kong, which toured to Tokyo and Mexico City. From 2005 to 2009, She was project director at artist Cai Guo-Qiang’s studio in New York and was curatorial coordinator at Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles from 2011 to 2012. A recipient of the Fifth Yishu Award for Critical Writing on Contemporary Chinese Art, Ma is published in Chinese and English and has written for artforum.com, ArtAsiaPacific, and other prestigious publications. Ma received a BA in history and science from Harvard College, MA in museum studies from New York University, and PhD from the University of California, San Diego. She is from Taipei, Taiwan.
