Double Square 双方藝廊

“Dream-Image” represents an artist’s reorganization of his inner world. He evokes the lurking subconscious scenes and demonstrates them at the present, thereby blurring the boundary between realities and dreams, that is, making us unable to distinguish the former from the latter.
—Tao Ya-Lun, 2016

Tao Ya-Lun’s creative practice has long been revolved around light and shadow as well as the virtual and the real. Double Square Gallery is pleased to host Time Panorama—Tao Ya-Lun 2016 Solo Exhibition from 15 October to 27 November. By reference to his previous creative concepts as well as the lighting components, projection lenses and screen images he used to adopt, the artist created a brand new VR kinetic installation which adds the temporal dimension to the exhibits and ergo brings his latest series of artworks to the four dimensional domain. This exhibition features the artist’s manipulation of the overlaps and contrasts between physical space and virtual reality, prompting the visitors to indulge in philosophical speculation over the relationships between light and shadow as well as the virtual and the real. As an artist, Tao has harbored a consistent and concrete ambition for breakthrough in terms of discourse and technique, which has been exemplified by his attitude toward life that transcends the confines of all the frameworks and systems. In other words, he sticks to his philosophy of life without any hesitation and carries it out in his oeuvre.

As technology improves every day, the re-composition and representation of images transcend their technological limitations. Images gradually drift apart from physical entities, making an image seen no longer an image being. It implies that “vision” does not represent real entities anymore and “senses” do not tell us anything about the essential core of substances. In this exhibition, the visitors admire the virtual images of the venue. Their bodies are situated in the physical space of the venue, while their senses are not. With these works, Tao makes it hard to distinguish the real from the virtual, offering the visitors a unique spatial experience. Tao conveys the essence of his discourse by ingeniously utilizing the contrast between real and virtual elements. In this latest series of artworks, the real is little more than the virtual. The situations created by these works are every bit as fantastic as the realm of dreams. “The visitors may enjoy the dream-like experiences, perceive the constantly expanding ‘temporal dimension,’ and, in this way, feel the great visceral thrills given by Time Panorama,” the artist said.

Born in Taipei in 1966, Tao Ya-Lun earned his master’s degree from the Graduate Institute of Plastic Arts, Tainan National University of the Arts. He used to be an artist-in-residence in Boston, Helsinki, Hong Kong and San Francisco. Since graduating from the Department of Fine Arts, National Taiwan Normal University in 1993, Tao has staged more than 10 solo exhibitions and taken part in more than 50 joint exhibitions. In addition to being collected by Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts and Kuandu Museum of Fine Arts, his artworks have been exhibited in Taiwan, Hong Kong, the United States, Finland and Austria. Tao had taught as an associate professor at Taipei National University of the Arts from 2007 to 2014, and has served as a faculty member of the College of Communication, National Chengchi University since 2014.