Samples from the International Biennial Print Exhibit: 2014 ROC Exhibition (2014/08/16 ~ 2014/10/26)

One of the finest regular exhibits I try to see every two years is the International Biennial Print Exhibit. Since they allow photography (although just using my cellphone), I thought I would share some of my favorites from the exhibit in Taichung.

Andrea Serafini (Italy) Project to a Construction Site VIII, 2013. Etching, aquatint. Bronze Prize.
Although it appears to be a variation on modernist themes, the gauze-like construction barrier is rendered so as to suggest plans, thus working with the "project to" in the title. Thus its not just complexity of a high contrast building core under construction but a post-postmodernist antidote to cynicism: showing the papering of surfaces on the nitty-gritty of construction sites.


Here are some on ecological themes. Above, Lin Pei-ying (Taiwan) Overload, 2014. Below, Sawada Yuichi (Japan), Keeping in Touch with Pine Trees 2013-5, 2013, with an allusion to Buddhist ink paintings.

Certainly the most ambitious and striking among the eco-prints was Hugo U. Besard (Belgium), El Niño...la Niña...the Climatic Change and the Tears of Mother Earth, 2012. Detail right.  

Below, Paul Hawdon (UK), Sunset at Cadiz, 2012, which is one of the most playful prints in the show, though it appears very traditional (after William Blake).

 Magical and making good use of the print medium's capacity for layering, Tatiana Potts (Slovakia), Something Good Is Awaiting, 2012:  

Also deftly produced is Li Yan Song (China), Time Cross My Space, 2013 (below), which features a grid design that works well in prints that combine many prints (as did the Silver Prize, not shown on this blog). There were many great prints from China this year, though just six years ago one could not say that. I really admire the energy put into taking printmaking seriously and one can already say the printmaking village of Guanlan, with its international residencies, is the new New York/Paris of printmaking.  

Also from China is Zeng Zhao Yang, Hazy Behavior - I, 2013:

Two prints in particular, both from Poland, carried an antiwar message. Below is Krzysztof Hain, PPSh-41, 2013.

Below is Kamil Kocurek (Poland), Chamber, 2014, with detail. These are just a few of the many splendid prints.

Don't miss the show--I did four years ago and still regret it.