ITHACA, NY.- On July 14th, 1987 the order of martial law was lifted in Taiwan, ending a policy that had lasted 38 years and 56 days. The lifting of Martial Law (1987) was a turning point for Taiwan's progression toward democratization and openness. This year, on the 30th anniversary of the lifting of martial law, the Taipei Cultural Center of TECO in New York has organized special events including a contemporary art exhibition to memorialize this particular time in history. Power, Haunting and Resilience is organized by Taipei Fine Arts Museum, the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art at Cornell University and Taipei Cultural Center in NY. This show features the most representative artworks between the martial law period and 2014, which is on view through December 17 at the Herbert F. Johnson Museum.

During the period under martial law, politics and the operation of society in Taiwan were oppressed and restrained. From the imposition of martial law to the end of it, democracy’s influence has not only affected sociopolitical life but also arts and culture. Due to the transformation of the government system, artists were liberated from oppression and confinement, and allowed to become open and innovative. This freedom has helped nurture artistic potential. For the past few decades, contemporary art in Taiwan has sprung up like mushrooms, existing freely in all possible forms. Many artists have even been internationally acknowledged and highly acclaimed. Such a phenomenon undoubtedly goes hand in hand with the development of
democracy in Taiwan.

This exhibition is jointly curated by art history professor An-Yi Pan of Cornell University and senior TFAM curator Yung-Jen Liu. With the cultural lexicon of “martial law; lifting of martial law” as a point of departure, Power, Haunting and Resilience explores the lifting of martial law as an important demarcation and starting point for contemporary art in Taiwan, transcending temporal and spatial dimensions that span from 1975 until the end of 2014, issues of radical, dazzling, totemic, resisting, spirited, soul-searching, truthful, dialectical are expressed through a selection of representative works from modernist and contemporary artists.

Nineteen series of works by 14 Taiwanese artists have been invited to exhibit, including Yuyu Yang, Tsai-Chien Lee, Ming Ju, Su-Chen Hung, Dean-E Mei, Tien-Chang Wu, Shih-Yung Ku, Tien-Yu Hung, Jin-Hua Shi, Cheng-Tsai Chen, Chao-Liang Shen, Hung-Chih Peng, Chien Chi, and Hai-Hsin Huang; with a range of genres that includes painting, sculpture, video, photography, installation and multimedia, etc.