Absolutely Impure, POSTNews / Art Against Black Box; Tainan/Tokyo Exchange Project

Looking back at the day of March 18, 2014--the beginning of the Sunflower Student Movement’s occupation of the legislative chamber, we were faced with a kind of absolutely impure starting point towards art creation. The production of a movement is more similar to producing a movie but absolutely different from the making of traditional music, painting, dance, and literature which serve in a single, pure substantial interface as their artistic starting point. Unlike going to the gym or playing baseball—sports activity that focuses on a single physical exercise or closed game rules, the art, created under the influence of the social and political movement, was formed under the premise of breaking all the existing social norms. They were expressed through the alternative production of putting together people, organizations, equipments, subject issues, critiques, site selection, mobilization for promotion in order to create the purest moment that has never existed—the moment of the birth of an entirely new thought or idea. The Sunflower Student movement in Taiwan has created an experimental exchanged mode of tasks and responsibilities, which fully expressed the concept of “One Person Multitasking / Multiple Labor Exchange”. The artists were acted as students or common people, independent or collaborative force to strengthen the occupation, the promoters of the movement, as well as the bridge of communication between organizations or creative artistic collaborations. The concept not only transcended the economical operations of neoliberalism or capitalism that we have been familiar with, but it also created a movement pattern that is entirely different from Occupy Wall Street.

Based on the experience of the movement above,“Absolutely Impure East-Asia Forum: PO News/Art Against Black Box—Tainan/Tokyo Exchange Project” is formed with the hope of continuing the exuberant energy of the artists' participation in the student movement through the forum based project. Inviting artists, curators, movement activists, critics from the region of Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, and Hong Kong, the scope of the movement is expanded by pursuing a more comprehensive dialog in the topics of the democracy under neoliberalism, free trade, land commercialization, gentrification, East Asian issues, and the art forms of the movement. The forum will be held in June 2014, 21-22, through Tainan absolute space, and a visual arts exhibition will be held in Tainan correspondingly.

Gong Jow-Jiun

Curators Gong Jow-Jiun, Chihiro Minato Artist Kao Jun-Honn, Liao Chien-Chung, Chihiro Minato, Inaba(Fujimura) Mai, Chan Kim-Ching, Lee Chun-Fung, Kim Kang, Kim Youn Hoa, POST News