Artist Statement for the "108 Day and Night" Series:
For four or five years after graduating from my Master's program, I stayed in the United States. During that time, I worked on the textual and visual editing and design for the "Mahavaipulya Buddhist Academic Journal." Illustrating articles for the journal was a frequent task. That period was my initial exposure to Buddhism. I gradually began to note down and collect texts I read that felt powerful, resonant, lingering, and aesthetically pleasing. Then, I paired them with images to create a special section in the journal. So, the texts usually came first, followed by casually capturing images in life that held unspoken meaning or intentionally designing and photographing images for specific texts. Originally, I intended to produce these as printed publications, even cards and posters. However, purely based on intuition, I always felt that this direction and content held the potential for new artistic exploration. The "108 Day and Night" series sprouted from this very soil.
As it turned out, after returning to Taiwan, I remained busy with other creations and performances. These texts and images lingered in a folder on my computer for over two decades. I continued to add to them and even experimented with some samples, but I found that relying solely on computer fonts and photographic output couldn't satisfy my sense of artistic merit and lasting quality. On the other hand, I never stopped thinking about and experimenting with the form of combining painting and text. Finally, during my "The Rocks Return to Soil Where the Heart Belongs" exhibition at the Taitung Art Museum in 2021, I experimented with integrating poetic text and painting, tentatively confirming that it could be a viable approach. The pieces "Self-Knowing," "Between Emptiness and Existence," and "Seeking Sentient Beings" in the "A Drop of Water from Caoxi" exhibition are the first public presentation of ideas I had been nurturing for over twenty years. They will continue to evolve, but I have already confidently taken the first steps. I am very pleased to record this. April 22, 2022.
《晝夜一百八》系列 創作自述
我在研究所畢業後留在美國四、五年，有段時間做的是「大方廣學刊」的文字、美術的編輯與設計工作，因此替刊物配圖是我經常要面對的問題。那段日子是我學佛的啟蒙時期，我慢慢開始筆記收集我讀過感覺有力量、有感覺、有餘韻、有美感的文字，然後替它們搭配影像，做為刊物裡的一個專區。所以，它們通常是文字先行，然後隨手抓拍生活中發現具有言外之意的影像或特意為文字設計拍攝一些影像。原本我是想把它們做在印刷刊物，乃至卡片、海報，但單純憑著直覺，我始終感覺這個方向與內容，在藝術上是可以有新開拓的。《晝夜一百八》系列，就是在上述的土壤裡發芽的。
結果，我在回台後一直忙於其它創作與展演，這些文字與影像在我電腦的資料夾一待就二十幾年，我持續增加文字與影像，也實驗出過一些樣本，但發現如果單靠電腦字體與攝影的輸出，其藝術性與雋永度就無法讓我滿意。另一方面，我對將繪畫與文字合在一起的形式一直沒有停止思考與嘗試，終於在2021年台東美術館做「石落心田 終歸大地」展覽時，實驗將詩性文字與繪畫結合在一起，初步明確是可以成立的。這次在「曹溪一滴」展裡的〈自知〉、〈空有之間〉、〈覓眾生〉是我孕育二十幾年想法的首次發表，它們仍會繼續演進，但我已經肯定邁出步伐了。很高興，特此一記。2022/4/22
For four or five years after graduating from my Master's program, I stayed in the United States. During that time, I worked on the textual and visual editing and design for the "Mahavaipulya Buddhist Academic Journal." Illustrating articles for the journal was a frequent task. That period was my initial exposure to Buddhism. I gradually began to note down and collect texts I read that felt powerful, resonant, lingering, and aesthetically pleasing. Then, I paired them with images to create a special section in the journal. So, the texts usually came first, followed by casually capturing images in life that held unspoken meaning or intentionally designing and photographing images for specific texts. Originally, I intended to produce these as printed publications, even cards and posters. However, purely based on intuition, I always felt that this direction and content held the potential for new artistic exploration. The "108 Day and Night" series sprouted from this very soil.
As it turned out, after returning to Taiwan, I remained busy with other creations and performances. These texts and images lingered in a folder on my computer for over two decades. I continued to add to them and even experimented with some samples, but I found that relying solely on computer fonts and photographic output couldn't satisfy my sense of artistic merit and lasting quality. On the other hand, I never stopped thinking about and experimenting with the form of combining painting and text. Finally, during my "The Rocks Return to Soil Where the Heart Belongs" exhibition at the Taitung Art Museum in 2021, I experimented with integrating poetic text and painting, tentatively confirming that it could be a viable approach. The pieces "Self-Knowing," "Between Emptiness and Existence," and "Seeking Sentient Beings" in the "A Drop of Water from Caoxi" exhibition are the first public presentation of ideas I had been nurturing for over twenty years. They will continue to evolve, but I have already confidently taken the first steps. I am very pleased to record this. April 22, 2022.
《晝夜一百八》系列 創作自述
我在研究所畢業後留在美國四、五年，有段時間做的是「大方廣學刊」的文字、美術的編輯與設計工作，因此替刊物配圖是我經常要面對的問題。那段日子是我學佛的啟蒙時期，我慢慢開始筆記收集我讀過感覺有力量、有感覺、有餘韻、有美感的文字，然後替它們搭配影像，做為刊物裡的一個專區。所以，它們通常是文字先行，然後隨手抓拍生活中發現具有言外之意的影像或特意為文字設計拍攝一些影像。原本我是想把它們做在印刷刊物，乃至卡片、海報，但單純憑著直覺，我始終感覺這個方向與內容，在藝術上是可以有新開拓的。《晝夜一百八》系列，就是在上述的土壤裡發芽的。
結果，我在回台後一直忙於其它創作與展演，這些文字與影像在我電腦的資料夾一待就二十幾年，我持續增加文字與影像，也實驗出過一些樣本，但發現如果單靠電腦字體與攝影的輸出，其藝術性與雋永度就無法讓我滿意。另一方面，我對將繪畫與文字合在一起的形式一直沒有停止思考與嘗試，終於在2021年台東美術館做「石落心田 終歸大地」展覽時，實驗將詩性文字與繪畫結合在一起，初步明確是可以成立的。這次在「曹溪一滴」展裡的〈自知〉、〈空有之間〉、〈覓眾生〉是我孕育二十幾年想法的首次發表，它們仍會繼續演進，但我已經肯定邁出步伐了。很高興，特此一記。2022/4/22
