ART COLLABORATION KYOTO 2024

Each Modern
Booth GC13 with Tomio Koyama Gallery 1–3 November 2024 Kyoto

Press Release

Tseng ChienYing (b. 1987 in Nantou, Taiwan; currently based in Taipei) is one of the most representative Taiwanese contemporary ink artists. His paintings and sculptures, abstract and figurative, are capable of impressive transfiguration, nurturing individual and collective identity, transformation, celebration, and the importance of reclaiming the narration traditions. Tseng’s works, like his beatific posed figurative paintings done in traditional mineral pigments and ink, condense pseudo-classical elements to create characters or fables that appear contemporary; like in a buddha’s hand, a cloudy spirit, or a Janus-faced totem. In his paintings, swirling patches of colors, which lean into a near blooming abstraction, might be read as symbolic landscape backdrop for these contemporary figures’ quixotic and telling expressions. By using materials and motifs unmistakably tied to traditional Chinese and religious painting to present his subjects, pulled from Tseng’s subjective experiences or imagination, these creatures and personalities are rendered within a cultural aesthetic that echoes in the artist’s present.

In his 2024 works, Tseng brings together his signature artistic themes: in several paintings of hands and feet, he focuses on close-up depictions of their postures. Although the narrative conveyed by human faces is removed, we can still infer emotions of benevolence or violent desire through the appearance of the hands and feet. The two flding screen pieces are both paintings and installations, where the figures in the paintings are more dramatically opposed due to the three-dimensional space. The story of Bromance (2024) comes from the extraordinary friendship of two Tang Dynasty monks, while Smoking Room (2024) draws from the cramped yet alienated human state inside a sealed smoking room. Gust (2024) uses Hellenistic Buddhist art techniques to depict the appearance of a plastic raincoat blowing in the wind. Bodysuit (2024) transforms the body directly into armor-like clothing, portraying the artist’s observations on contemporary interpersonal relationships.

Tseng divides his clay sculptures into two aspects: “Silhouette” and “Contour.” “Silhouette” focuses on materializing two-dimensional linear thinking in three-dimensional space, placing the concept of line from painting into sculptural works. “Contour” emphasizes the tactile visuality, where the artist forms the clay’s contours through touch, allowing the viewer’s vision to extend into tactile perception.

Tseng’s recent solo exhibitions include “Skin Depth” (2022) at Each Modern, Taipei; “Cacotopias” (2020) and “The Daydream of Delusions” (2017) at Red Gold Fine Art, Taipei; Group exhibitions include “Vitalis Violentia” (2024) at Podium Gallery, Hong Kong;“Here, Where, There?” (2024) at Almine Rech Gallery, Shanghai; “IMAGRATION” (2023) at Gallery COMMON, Tokyo; “Retrograde” (2020) at Galerie du Monde, Hong Kong; “Taiwan Biennial: Subzoology” (2020) at National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, Taichung; “Spectrosynthesis II” (2019) at BACC, Bangkok, Thailand in 2019. In 2017, Tseng was awarded the 2017 Asian Cultural Council fellowship.

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