Hong-gah Museum has been devoting to the research of Beitou local community for several years. Through lectures of artists and scholars from different disciplinary, art projects based in Beitou, and collaborations with local institutions, the museum is hoping to discover Beitou through methods of the arts, and to propose new perspectives toward the place that we’ve known for long. In 2019, Hong-gah Museum presents “Beitou Local Flavors Collecting Project”, continuing the experimental spirit by adding senses of smell and taste. What would be possible when talking about the features of a place? Flavors, which contain our memories to a places and its people, might help us to form imaginations. Describing flavors through the arts can be challenging and inspiring at the same time, it can also remind us to pay more attention to the environment where we are. Join us to experience the unknown Beitou through flavors!

Hsian Jung Chen opens his studio to the public, presenting a series of works made durin his time as an Artist in Residence at FAC.
Inspired by common experiences shared by people in daily life, Hsian has created a range of
ceramics alongside a large-scale found object installation. The works look at millennial depression
and the effects of capitalism with specific reference to Fremantle.
The Asialink Artist Residency is an innovative, flexible program that promotes cross-cultural dialogue
by providing Australian and Asian artists with opportunities for reciprocal exchanges with artists from Taipei Cultural Foundation, Taiwan. FAC has been involved with the program for eight years.
This residency project is a partnership between Asialink, AIR Taipei, and Fremantle Arts Centre, City
of Fremantle.

The Ice & Juice Bar series draws its inspiration from Taiwan's traditional ice and fruit juice shops (冰菓室). The geometrical bulks of vividly coloured sculptures look just like fresh fruit cuts stacked and displayed in a typical glass fridge. Each piece is hand-built. Version 2.0 further combines and plays with these geometrical forms allowing them to grow like a living organism.

Gold & Green
is the collaborative project by the established Austrian ceramic artist Matthias Kaiser and the emerging Taiwanese ceramic artist Hsian Jung Chen. After chancing across some books about Chinese medicine, Kaiser became fascinated by the odd and unusual ingredients, like the organs of rare animals, and the kinky sounding remedies. The mysterious culture of traditional Chinese medicine sent him dreaming about other worlds. To Chen, Chinese medicine shops have a commonplace existence in his daily life, and he seldom ventures beyond their thresholds. From their different points of view and experiences, these ceramic artists re-interpret, through their individual visual languages, the dwindling and partly-lost culture of traditional Chinese medicine.

(Works above by Hsian Jung Chen)

金草中藥行
是奧地利資深陶藝家馬提亞斯・凱撒（Matthias Kaiser）與台灣新生代陶藝創作者陳向榮的合作計畫。凱撒多年前接觸到傳統中藥的相關書籍，奇特的藥材引起他的興趣，像是珍禽異獸的器官，如龍骨、龜板；或者帶有黑暗色彩的偏方，如童子尿、人胞(人類的胎盤)、人中白(人類尿液的沈澱物)。傳統中藥文化對於凱撒來說，神秘而引人遐思；而對於台灣土生土長的陳向榮來說，傳統中藥行即便是日常生活中習慣的風景，卻少有走進中藥行的經驗。凱撒對陳提出此計畫構想，透過兩人不同的觀點，藉由文本閱讀與田野調查，以中藥材及中醫文化為靈感，以土為主要媒介，用充滿個人風格的視覺語言重新詮釋漸漸失傳的傳統中藥文化。

(以上幻燈片作品的作者為陳向榮)

FOOD POSE

The pottery series “Ice & Juice Bar” is freshly made by Hsian Jung Chen in his studio. Chen often distills idea into pottery forms of no obvious utility, but yet they go in harmony with everyday life — a “rational irrationality”, as the artist puts it, that exists in life. The modestly glazed pieces carry the reminiscence of colors, forms and delights of many common fruits, and a certain tropical temperament in the nature that inspires the artist.

In Food Pose, Chen installs the food sets in the kitchen. The food and pottery duo reflects and interprets each other. 

Book Info
Hsian Jung Chen
28 pages
13 cm × 17.5 cm
Offset printing
According fold
Limited 800 copies
Published by nos:books
Taipei, Taiwan, 2016

食物擺態

〈冰菓室〉陶藝系列是陳向榮的創作計劃「向榮水果行」的新鮮出品。陳善於把意念純化，捏成各種造型獨特的陶器作品。它們雖無明顯用途，卻巧妙地融合於日常生活裡－－猶如生活中「合理的不合理存在」陳如此說。他的彩釉陶器，隱含各種常見水果的色彩與造形，明快俐落的意態，富有某種熱帶氣息，充滿生趣。

《食物擺態》裡，陳向榮在廚房裡為食物重新擺pose，讓食物和陶器彼此映照、互相詮釋。

資訊
陳向榮
28 頁
13 公分 × 17.5 公分
平版印刷，風琴折
限量 800 本
初版2016年9月
挪石社出版

Ice and Juice Bar
is  inspired from Taiwanese traditional ice and fruit juice shop. Geometrical bulks of sculpture look just like fresh and colorful fruit cuts stacked and displayed in the  glass fridge. Ideally, this series of work is priced and sold by weight.

冰菓室
彩色幾何塊狀的小雕塑，靈感來自台灣傳統冰菓室裡，堆疊在冰櫃中，鮮豔欲滴的水果切塊。此系列作品於展覽現場以秤重計價販售。

Coconut
Inspiration comes from the contrasting colours and textures of the hairy husk and inner shell of the coconut, which stores thirst-quenching water. All these images of coconut create a series of the imaginary of “containers”.

椰子
由椰子內外對比的顏色、球狀的殼內盛滿解渴的水為靈感的起點，創作出一系列對於「容器」的想像。

Your Empire is Empty
Hsian Jung Chen has collaborated with Taiwanese artist Son Ni. In the series “Your Empire is Empty”, he builds micro broken spaces by ceramics while Son Ni stacks or deconstructs each space by her drawing. Her iconic broken figures are limited in each space where reality and illusion overlaps.

消失的帝國
藝術家 Son Ni 與陶藝家陳向榮的合作作品。陳用陶搭建出破碎的空間，Son Ni  在其空間中堆疊或解構每個空間，其標誌性破碎的人型限制於每個真實與虛幻交疊的空間。這系列作品看似有用，實則難用、無用；有些被刻意扭曲、抹去功能性，形成未完整／半開放狀態，像是出土自未來的廢墟遺跡、殘骸。