Taichung Art Museum (TcAM) hosted a joint opening ceremony on 16 May for Horizon Ablaze and The Covenant of Dadu: A Diplomacy of Things between Mountains and Seas. Spanning five exhibition rooms, these works merge international contemporary perspectives with localized research, exploring how climate, history, and infrastructure shape the human condition across time and geography.

This milestone further realises the museum’s mission championed since its December 2025 inauguration. Situated within Central Taiwan’s landmark Taichung Green Museumbrary—designed by the Pritzker Prize-winning architects SANAA—this joint opening brings TcAM’s ambitions into sharp focus. It reinforces the institution’s role as a vital nexus where global discourse meets regional context, offering a profound framework for rethinking art’s engagement with place in a globalized world.

Horizon Ablaze is an international exhibition featuring 33 artists from 16 countries, developed through a transnational curatorial collaboration between Nobuo Takamori (Curator), Tessa Maria Guazon (Head Curator, University of the Philippines Jorge B. Vargas Museum), and the Museum of Contemporary Art of Panama’s Juan Canela (Chief Curator) and Jennifer Choy (Curator). Starting its international tour in Taichung, this exhibition redefines “heat” beyond temperature, framing it as a vital cultural force. By transcending typical climate anxiety tropes, it highlights tropical lived experiences where heat molds bodies and knowledge systems—tracing a lineage from colonial histories to the restorative power of local healing practices.

Highlights of Horizon Ablaze

- Neli Ružić (b. 1966, Split): It’s Too Late to Give Up, a light inscription rendered in Chinese, is situated in the Taichung Green Museumbrary lobby. By connecting past and future imaginaries, the installation serves as a beacon for TcAM’s new journey, signifying an era of resilience and deepened public participation.

- Donna Conlon & Jonathan Harker (b. 1966/1975, Panama): Renowned for dissecting geopolitics through satire, their works are included in the collections of institutions such as Tate and Guggenheim. Drinking Song applies Panamanian beer bottles to play the US national anthem, critiquing the complex ties between the two nations, whilst Tropical Zincphony captures the rhythmic journey of mangoes falling onto zinc roofs.

- Liao Jui-Fen (b. 1968, Taichung): In Summer Morning, the artist projects her youthful uncertainty whilst studying in Japan through the figure of a woman. Using cool grayish blues and purples to evoke a hesitant atmosphere, the work captures the essence of an expatriate student. This work is a premier example of contemporary Eastern Gouache in the TcAM collection.

- Buen Calubayan (b. 1980, Manila): The project Poetic River dialogues with Filipino artist Guillermo Tolentino’s archives, translating the Tagalog word for “yes” (Oo) into a lemniscate (∞). This symbol traces the trajectory of thermal energy during a fever, framing the body as a cosmic mirror—as above, so below—to re-examine the relationship between the self and the world.

- Ciou Zhi Yan (b. 1985, Miaoli): Takasago Stag Beetle features insect specimens and samurai armour modelled after beetles. The work reveals how entomological research in Taiwan under the rules in the Japanese colonial period was permeated by ideology, reflecting Taiwan’s complex historical identity.

- Chihhung Liu (b. 1985, Hsinchu): Drawing from research into Japanese heat-relief remedies and memories of heatstroke, A Sweltering Dream intertwines sericulture-inspired installations with herbal-pigment paintings, bridging historical cooling rituals with a feverish summer dream.

- Edgar Calel (b. 1987, San Juan Comalapa): A prominent Central American artist with growing international recognition. Aq’on—Q’ojom Musical Medicine, developed during the residency in Taichung, transforms stones—Mayan symbols of knowledge—into a sensory site of vibrating marimba melodies and rising heat.

- Working Hard (Kuo Po-Yu & She Wen-Ying, b. 1989/1989, Taipei): The Banana Frequency features realistic banana trees and a mock radio broadcast by Taiwanese chanting (liām-ko) performer Lô Sū-thiat. It reconfigures the imagery of tropical crops to reflect the volatility of global trade and a yearning for salvation.

- Esther Yi-Chun Lin (b. 1990, Nantou): Burning Stones: Hot Archives employs heaters and warm-toned lighting to create an immersive experience, exploring how thermal energy triggers molecular changes in the human body.

- Verónica Navas (b. 1995, San José): The Healing Power of Nature employs cabuya fibres and boiled gourd vessels to translate herbal recipes into embodied knowledge, illustrating the restorative process between humanity and nature.

The Covenant of Dadu: A Diplomacy of Things between Mountain and Seas is the culmination of a two-year art history research initiative. Its name honors the Dadu Plateau—a symbolic highland that has witnessed Central Taiwan’s historical transformations. Curated by art historian Shen Yu Chang and featuring works by 55 artists, the exhibition introduces the concept of “a diplomacy of things.” It proposes that the urban fabric is formed through continuous negotiations between land, infrastructure, ecology, and human agency. By mapping artistic developments across railways, harbours, craft traditions, and agricultural systems, the exhibition redefines Central Taiwan not merely as a geographic region, but as an evolving site of cultural production.

Highlights of The Covenant of Dadu

- Suiba Kunishima (b. Nagoya): A pioneer of satirical manga in Taiwan under Japanese rule in the early 20th century. His Taiwan Manga Chronicle is displayed in its entirety for the first time in years, alongside 12 selected pieces that serve as a thematic guide to the exhibition’s narrative.

- Yen Shui-Long (1903–1997, b. Tainan): Dedicated to Taiwanese arts and crafts, his Bamboo Living Room Chair integrates modern geometric lines into traditional local craftsmanship, elevating bamboo furniture to a modern aesthetic.

- Chen Hsia-Yu (1917–2000, b. Taichung): Known for his signature rounded female forms, the artist offers a rare study of the male figure in Laborer. Part of the TcAM collection, the sculpture poignantly freezes the transition between a moment of rest and the imminent return to work.

- Lin Chih-Chu (1917–2008, b. Taichung): An important Taiwanese Eastern Gouache painter. His masterpiece, Taichung Park, captures the iconic Taichung Park Mid-Lake Pavilion and the lines of vegetation, evoking the city’s unique cultural atmosphere in the 1980s.

- Wu Tsan-Cheng (b. 1973, Yunlin): Part of his ongoing Taiwan Sound Map project (est. 2009), Shadow of Time interweaves field recordings from central Taiwan’s mountains, basins, and plateaus to explore how people and land transform through time, shaping the environmental soundscape of Central Taiwan.

- Ting Chaong-Wen (b. 1979, Kaohsiung): Murder Case: The Erlin Incident — Reinvestigation restructures a sensational criminal case in Taiwan under Japanese rule, exploring how the incident has been reinterpreted across various media—including songbooks, radio dramas, and television series—to scrutinize the narrative structures formed through continuous retelling.

- Lin An-Chi (Ciwas Tahos, b. 1989, Taipei): The Aquarium draws inspiration from the Qing Dynasty land boundaries known as “Earth Ox Trenches” (Tu-niu-gou) and “Earthen Mounds” (Dun). Like silt in a current, people repeatedly converge and scatter along these lines, leaving behind intangible yet indelible imprints of existence.

- Li Wen-Hao (b. 1989, New Taipei): Daylight Come And We Want to Go Home uses a Jamaican folk work song Day-O (The Banana Boat Song) to examine the relationship between music, dessert culture, and history across political eras in Taichung.

Situated within the Taichung Green Museumbrary, TcAM is dedicated to becoming a sanctuary where environment, knowledge, and art converge. With the launch of its summer season, the museum solidifies its role in curating local art history whilst fostering international dialogue. For more information, please visit: https://www.tcam.museum/en