Curating “Modern Life” and Architecture in Taiwan
如需阅读本文的中文版，请点击此处。This is the first part of a two-part conversation about an exhibition organized at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum last year. Co-curated by Wang Chun-Hsiung, Wu Kwang-Tyng, and Wang Tseng-Yung, the exhibition highlighted thirty-two architectural projects built in Taiwan between 1949 and 1983 as evidence of the dramatic changes that has taken place in Taiwanese society amid rapid economic development and cultural transformation. Cole Roskam recently spoke with Wang Chun-Hsiung and Wu Kwang-Tyng to discuss the exhibition, its public reception and broader significance, and their thoughts on Taiwan’s architectural history and contemporary architectural production.
Cole Roskam: Last year, you both were part of a curatorial team responsible for the exhibition “Modern Life: Taiwan Architecture, 1949-1983.” I want to use the exhibition to talk more broadly about the current state of architectural discourse and culture in Taiwan. But let’s start with the exhibition itself and the feedback you’ve received regarding its contents—for example, from the public, the government, and/or the architectural discipline. What has been the response?
Wang Chun-Hsiung: The Taipei Fine Arts Museum reports that the exhibition has garnered significant media attention, including coverage by YouTubers, architects, artists, magazines, newspapers, and travel publications. Social media data has been helpful in identifying the most popular works in the exhibition, including the Jingliao Saint Cross Church (1960) and the former main library of National Cheng Kung University (1959), and the San Sin High School of Commerce and Home Economics, a.k.a. the Wave Building, which was designed by Chen Ren-He and completed in 1963 in Kaohsiung City. The four-story classroom structure of the Wave Building is renowned for its undulating balconies and floor plates, which helped to ensure unimpeded sight lines in the classrooms while making the building’s exterior distinctive. Approximately 20,000 people expressed interest in the event, suggesting that such work strongly resonated with the public (Figure 1).
Figure 1. San Sin High School of Commerce and Home Economics (Wave Building), Chen Ren-He, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 1963. Photograph by Chang Wen-Jui.
Public interest in architecture has grown significantly since the late 1990s, and is completely different from what I experienced during my university years in the 1980s. Back then, interest in architecture was generally limited to the profession of architecture itself. People believed that if you studied architecture, you would become an architect, and though it was difficult to pass the licensing exam, it was perceived that once you did, you would earn a lucrative salary. However, from the 1990s public perceptions of architecture gradually broadened, as it increasingly came to be understood as a form of cultural expression—large-scale art, with a close connection to everyday life.
The most obvious milestone to mark the beginning of this architectural enthusiasm in Taiwan is the Eslite Forum. Cole, perhaps you have heard of or visited Eslite before? It’s a bookstore chain founded in Taiwan in the mid-1990s. In 1997, Eslite started holding forums open to the general public. Architecture was one of the discussion topics in these forum events, and quite a few people began to show interest in architecture from that point onward.
At first, the Eslite Forum primarily focused on sharing well-known works by international architects, with little concern for Taiwanese architecture. Professor Wu can correct me, but I believe that around 2005 or 2006, the trend gradually shifted toward Taiwanese architecture. Domestic and international architectural comparisons were popular and often discussed as well.
In 2008, I organized my first architectural exhibition in Taiwan. The exhibition’s success indicated to me that Taiwanese society had started to take an interest in and care about local architecture and its links to our everyday lives. It was a turning point for people's understanding of architecture beyond the idea that architecture was the physical product of artistic genius, but rather as a system of spaces and environments closely intertwined with our daily lives. What do you think, Professor Wu?
Wu Kwang-Tyng: Yes, there were very few exhibitions in the past, especially architectural exhibitions. The earliest architecture exhibition that we know of was a relatively large-scale and purposeful architecture exhibition organized by the Taipei Fine Arts Museum in 1985, called “The Beauty of China.” Architecture exhibitions have become a common means of exploring buildings as a cultural phenomenon in Taiwan. They have also helped us in determining or positioning key trends or directions in our architecture—both foreign architectural exhibitions and local Taiwanese exhibitions. I feel that exhibitions have become a trend since the 1990s, and are very important to Taiwan’s professional design community as well as the general public.
Cole Roskam: That’s useful context. Given the range of buildings and projects included in your “Modern Life” exhibition, how much could be considered new to the general public? I imagine that this was the first time much of this work and its history was made publicly available.
Wang Chun-Hsiung: In my opinion, about one-third to one-quarter of the projects were new to the audience. For instance, the exhibition included works such as the Kaohsiung Branch of Taiwan Bank (1947), Chiang A-Hsin’s Mansion (1949), National Cheng Kung University’s old Main Library (1959), St. Pius X Seminary (1962), Siong-im Hall (1963), Tsengwen Youth Activity Center (1978), the Beitou Branch of Hsing Tian Kong (1965), Zhongxing New Village (1957), Minsheng Community (1964-1970), Chia Hsin Building (1967), and Wannien Building (1973). At least 12 of them were displayed for the first time. In total, we had 33 projects on display, with more than a third being newly presented to the public (Figures 2 and 3).
Figure 2. Chiang A-Hsin Mansion, Beipu Town, Hsinchu County, 1946. Courtesy Chiang A-Hsin Mansion’s official Facebook page.
Figure 3. Exhibition model, Chiang A-Hsin Mansion, Beipu Town, Hsinchu County, 1946. Courtesy of Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Taiwan.
Take Chiang A-Hsin’s Mansion, for example, was one of the most popular works in this exhibition. In previous exhibitions, we were less likely to explore this part of history, as it is a work from the pre-war period, a transitional phase between Japanese colonization and the post-war era.
Cole Roskam: And as a result, I imagine that many of these projects inspired questions that have previously not been asked about the modern history of architecture in Taiwan.
Wang Chun-Hsiung: Yes, the most interesting feedback I received was from younger visitors who were very surprised to see so many Chinese elements in architecture from the post-war period. Some even suggested that this part of history shouldn’t be included in the exhibition because they felt it was irrelevant. I find this very interesting. This history, particularly the influence of Chinese ideology, was certainly significant to my upbringing. People of my generation all experienced the native literature movement in the late 1970s, which helped to induce a certain Taiwanese consciousness which did not exist before that time. However, the younger people born into a society where Taiwanese consciousness was already established did not experience this shift in awareness. Therefore, when they saw our exhibition, they were surprised by how much we focused on Chinese retro and Chinese modern themes, which accounted for two of the exhibition’s six major organizing themes.
Given Taiwan’s historical experiences, I believe it is entirely appropriate for China-related topics to take up one-third of the exhibition’s overall display. Those who view history from a contemporary perspective may disagree with me, thinking that I am exaggerating China's influence on Taiwan. However, I don’t feel it’s an exaggeration. Moreover, we also emphasized that the China we presented was, in fact, a kind of imagined China—one constructed by the Kuomintang Government after they arrived in Taiwan. It was not the real China. This understanding accommodates the development of both a popular, retroactive Chinese aesthetic and the existence of a modern Chinese architectural language, each of which can be viewed from a different perspective (Figure 4).
Figure 4. Former National Taiwan Science Center (now National Taiwan Craft Research and Development Institute, Taipei Branch), Lu Yu-Jun, Taipei City, 1959. Courtesy of Ministry of Agriculture, Taiwan.
I think this was the most interesting question I encountered in this exhibition. Professor Wu, what do you think?
Wu Kwang-Tyng: In addition, with regard to the notion of a modern Chinese architecture and modernizing society, we included several previously underappreciated examples, such as the Minsheng Community that Professor Wang just mentioned, and the Wan Nian Commercial Building, etc., especially Wannien Commercial Building, which is still a very important gathering place for youth subculture in Xi Men Ding, Taipei City. Buildings like the Wannien Commercial Building have never been noticed or valued in our architectural history. To be honest, it is just seen as a commercial building where we would go as students to shop, and perhaps watch a movie. It is a very ordinary commercial building. Our exhibition helped to cast its significance in a new light, and aroused a number of responses from visitors. It still exists today, and it continues to influence the current subculture of young people. Many people noted that they were surprised by the building as a kind of cultural phenomenon (Figure 5).
Figure 5. Wannien Commercial Building, Tsai Puo-Fuon and Chen Chao-Wu, Taipei, 1973. Courtesy of Taipei Fine Arts Museum.
Wang Chun-Hsiung: I would like to elaborate on Professor Wu’s statement. In fact, none of my friends studied architecture, but some of them, after reading my book Rustic & Poetic—An Emerging Generation of Architecture in Postwar Taiwan, told me: “Oh, so this building is also part of your exhibition! I used to hang out there when I was a kid!” In other words, they are very familiar with this topic, just not necessarily in a scholarly way. I believe this reflects an interesting phenomenon: in terms of architectural exhibitions in Taiwan, there is no clear boundary defining “architecture”—it is an open-ended concept. People do not see the inclusion of popular, publicly accessed buildings in the exhibition as a problem. In other words, even ordinary, everyday buildings can be considered important subjects for discussion in architecture. They do not question this idea; rather, they find it fascinating and relatable. This is the first key point I observed.
Secondly, a key reason people feel a sense of familiarity is our ability to highlight the connection between these buildings and their socio-cultural context. For example, the development of the Wannien Commercial Building is closely tied to the rise of capitalism and a commercial culture in postwar Taiwan, particularly the emergence of department stores and shopping malls in the mid-1960s. In other words, our modern experience with department stores was important to the capitalist transformation of Taiwan itself. Therefore, in our curation, we placed office buildings and department stores together with the intention of sparking reflection and discussion on the emergence of a new way of life through architecture in Taiwan.
Wu Kwang-Tyng: Real estate also had similar effects.
Wang Chun-Hsiung: Yes, real estate as well. In other words, by this time, people had gradually settled into a fixed, middle-class lifestyle—living in apartments, shopping in department stores, and working in office buildings. This way of life became firmly established and formed the three primary living spaces of postwar Taiwanese society. This might be what has resonated with people.
Cole Roskam: Ah, I see. And I can imagine how the exhibition has prompted people to reconsider how architecture affects their lives, both historically and today.
Wu Kwang-Tyng: Our exhibition was not a serious academic architectural exhibition, but we did hope to bring a sense of historical seriousness and also to enable ordinary citizens to "feel something" as Professor Wang just said, namely, that architecture is something closely related to everyday life.
Citation
Cole Roskam, Wang Chun-Hsiung, Wu Kwang-Tyng, Curating “Modern Life” and Architecture in Taiwan,” PLATFORM, June 30, 2025.
