Artists on the Threshold: the Signification of Artists’ Motion in Modern East Asia

Session Submission Type: Organized Panel Proposal Application

Abstract

The creative fields and self-orientation of artists are often fluid and multi-layered. This phenomenon is especially evident when looking at modern East Asia. Current art history identifies post-World War II artists primarily by their nationality; however, in doing so this fluidity and resultant layers are easily overlooked. Happenings outside the scope of their nationality are looked at as mere interludes in their artistic careers or as appendages to that nation’s art history. Nevertheless, if we look at Tateishi Tetsuomi (1905-1980) who was born in Taiwan and continued creating works about Taiwan folkways after the war; or Wang Yi-yun (1894-1981) who was born in Fujian, studied in Japan, taught in Amoy Art College, then after the war moved to Taiwan; or even artists from the independent artists association that came to Taiwan to hold touring art shows, we can see that they moved between many lands in East Asia and experienced changing identities. This allowed them to actively explore traditional and modern styles, or to sense their task in spreading artistic thought. From this viewpoint, artist boundary-crossing in East Asia was not only over natural or manmade borders, but also over traditional and modern lines, as well as the delineation of writing traditional art history.

Area of Study

• Northeast Asia

Session Organizer

• Chia-chiu Tsai, National Taiwan Normal University

Chair

• Chuan-ying Yen, Academia Sinica

Individual Presentations

• Ocean as a Bridge: the Art of Wang Yi-yun, Chen Cheng-po and Their Friends - Jessica Tsaiji Lyu-Hada, Kyushu University & Fukuoka University

• The Art of the Uprooted: Tateishi Tetsuomi, a Nisei from Taiwan - Han-ni Chiu, The University of Tokyo

• A Study of the Traveling Exhibition of Independent Art Association to Taiwan in the 1930s - Chia-chiu Tsai, National Taiwan Normal University

Discussants

• Fang-cheng Wu, National Central University

• Fang-mei Chou, National Central University