Ugly Beauty and Boy’s Love: Is There Gender in Ink Wash Painting?
Artist: Xiang Yi WONG(Malaysia), Chien Ying TSENG(Taiwan)
According to XIE He’s “Six Principles to Consider When Judging A Painting,” the six principles are vital resonance, bone method, correspondence to the object, accordance to type, arrangement and construction, and transmission and transfer. Will there be new perspectives if we evaluate the “male body” with the six principles? Will the above-mentioned six principles still have a chance to be extolled by the descendant if XIE He is homosexual? The above questioning does not tend to be a historical reversal. Instead, it seems that the establishment of new aesthetics is actually a re-examination of the standards and creative state accumulated in the past by asking questions. The above is the proposition put forward by the curatorial team to the artwork of participating artist, WANG Yi-Jan, when the curatorial team curated “Survival of the Exceptional” in 2020 - Is it true that the ink wash painting seems to be irrelevant with gender awareness?
To respond to the question, the curatorial team takes “Ugly Beauty and Boy’s Love: Is There Gender in Ink Wash Painting?” as the theme for the online exhibition. The Taiwanese artist TSENG Chien-Ying and Malaysian artist WONG Xiang-Yi are invited to discuss more the practice of ink wash paintings in the context of modern pop culture and gender awareness. As a talented contemporary artist in Taiwan, TSENG Chien-Ying is not limited by “ink wash” in his artworks; instead, the artist uses Eastern materials as his manifesto and medium to express himself. Gouache in heavy color is widely used in his paintings. In his recent solo exhibition “Cacatopias,” the artist represents the observation of his own current life, and how the artist was nourished and opened up new aesthetics by the travel experience in Dunhuang. WONG Xiang-Yi comes from Malaysia, she owns a bachelor of art degree from The Chinese University of Hong Kong and a master's degree in Fine Arts from Taipei National University of the Arts. In her artworks, the composition of figures and atmosphere has been influenced by the linear style from Japanese manga, and recently the artist has also integrated decorative icons with Middle Eastern and Persian elements. These eastern materials are being applied by the artist, and the scenario of boy’s love has gradually transformed from the recipient of influence to the principal of application and creation.
The words “Ugly Beauty” and “Boy’s Love” come from Taiwanese pop culture and Japanese subculture respectively.[1] These words both contain uncertainty in definitions, and they somehow establish specific cultural fields individually. The exhibition “Ugly Beauty and Boy’s Love: Is There Gender in Ink Wash Painting?" aims to get rid of the debate of the definition of contemporary ink wash from the creative context of the artists TSENG Chien-Ying and WONG Xiang-Yi. Meanwhile, taking the text of pop culture and subculture as the reference, the exhibition discusses how artists face their brush and ink individually and look after their current situation in life through their practice in arts. By putting the issue “gender politics” forward, the exhibition expects to review or outline whether the two artists’ growth background and creation process have ever converged and generated.
Gender awareness has been lacking in the discussion of ink and wash in contemporary. In this online curatorial project, the curatorial team tries to ask: Is there a chance that gender awareness is the possibility of contemporary ink wash painting? If it is possible, what kind of expression and creative state will it be like?
[1] “Ugly Beauty” comes from the Taiwanese pop singer Jolin TASI’s song “Ugly Beauty”. The song is recorded in the album Ugly Beauty and describing the process of an individual from hoping for others’ recognition to self-identity. In the same album, the song “Womxnly” is inspired by the YE Yongzhi incident, which expresses the concern of human rights including LGBT rights and gender equality. “Boy’s Love” comes from the word “Yaoi” in Japanese. Yaoi was used to against Naturalism literature and referring to an alternative literature style in early modern Japan. Later the word has been used by BL (boy’s love) manga in the Japanese manga community. Hence the definition of Yaoi has been expanded to refer to all kinds of beautiful males, and the romantic relationship between males without the issue of reproduction. Eventually, it has also become one of the pronouns for gay manga.