CHEN CHUN-HAO

Since 1997 Chen has experimented with the use of industrial materials in his work, such as thumbtacks. For the works of Mosquito Nail Shan Shui Chen carefully “copies” landscape paintings found at the National Palace Museum, Taipei and abroad, by placing diminutive mosquito nails on canvas. After precise calculations, for his first completed piece, Early Spring for the Mosquito Nail (2010), Chen used a specially designed nail gun to place as many as 400,000 stainless steel mosquito nails on canvas. Enlarging the original Early Spring (1072), he then carefully replaced the ink of the scroll with the mosquito nails, which emerge about 1cm from the surface of the canvas. Each nail is therefore thought to be “profound,” as it punctures the surface of the canvas and gives texture to his two-dimensional source works.

Chen Chun-Hao has participated in numerous exhibitions, including at the Today Art Museum, Beijing, China (2009), the Taipei Fine Arts Museum (2001, 2006), the Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei (2005), and the Headlands Arts Center in San Francisco, California (2002). His solo exhibition includes Mosquito Nail Shan Shui - the Artworks of Chen Chun-Hao, Tina Keng Gallery, Taipei (2011), The Way of Nailing, VT Art Salon, Taipei (2011), and Aura Beyond, Taipei Fine Arts Museum Taipei (2001).

Courtesy Tina Keng Gallery