Looking Forward and Backward between the “Boundary Lines”
written by Etan Pavavalung, the co-curator of “Between Earth and Sky: Indigenous Contemporary Art from Taiwan”
One of the Taiwanese indigenous peoples, the Paiwanese, sees “language and myth” as the “boundary lines” of living space and time. When we talk about myths at night, we call them milimilingan (the ancient and eternal rhymes). When we talk about myths during the daytime, we can only refer to them as tjaucikel (reports, narratives) Language and myth are treated very differently, just like heaven and earth during the day and at night. The concept constantly floats between the abstract and the tangible, the conscious and the subconscious, and consequently, this constructs the indigenous people’s living philosophy of “nature” and “boundary lines”.
In the “Taiwanese Indigenous Contemporary Art Exhibition” at the 10th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art in 2021, the eight participating artists come from various generations and ethnic groups, and by using diverse materials and integrating their own languages and myths, they re-interpret their views on contemporary cosmology and ecology. The three female artists, Aluaiy Kaumakan, Yuma Taru, Ruby Swana, explore contemporary messages of their own land, culture, language, myth, and the origin of life by way of the textile weaving process of fiber art.
Young artists Dondon Hounwn and Fangas Nayaw use video art to document and criticize the scars caused by colonization and modernization, as well as to reflect and recall the ethnic traditions, Ceramic artist, Masisiwagger Zingrur, expresses the concept of the ancient Taiwanese indigenous totems being also one kind of linguistic interface, that is, through rituals, relationship connections and sacredness are created. Meanwhile, the artworks of the two graphic visual artists, Etan Pavavalung and Anli Genu, also illustrate contemporary issues in relation to ethnic life imprints, myths, and ecological reflections
Taiwan is the mother-island of Austronesian, Taiwanese indigenous artworks are embedded with distinctive elements of ancient myths. lands and environs, religious rituals, cultural symbols, and ethnic identification. Through this exhibition and subsequent interpretations, the artists express the contemporary time-and-space axis between individual people, as well as between humanity and nature. We are in urgent need of constructing a new relationship, both friendly and piously. On the boundary lines of language and myth, we need to learn the philosophy of both looking forward and backward, and in so doing, we will realize the divine enlightenment of the wind blowing between heaven and earth in a natural way.
About Etan Pavavalung
An artist, curator, and documentary director, he is also an adjunct Assistant Professor in the Department of Indigenous Art Industry at National Kaohsiung Normal University and a Ph.D. student in the Doctoral Program in Art Creation and Theory at the College of Visual Arts of Tainan National University of the Arts. He is Paiwanese and was born into the Tavadran tribe of Dashe village, Sandimen town in Pintung County. He has had exhibitions at the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, Taipei Fine Arts Museum, National Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall, and Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts. His artworks have also been displayed at various international art spaces in France, Hong Kong, Guam, Singapore, Norway, Australia, and America. Beside his own art creations, he also looks forward to the construction of an overall context of indigenous art history. He is thus committed to the promotion of the contemporary indigenous arts as well as the coordination and curatorial work of joint exhibitions.
As a curator, he has curated “Art Festival on the Slope: Joint Creative Exhibition” (Department of Indigenous People in Pintung. 2015), “Pakialalang Path of Decoration: Pavavalung Family Exhibition” (Taiwan Indigenous Peoples Cultural Park, 2017), “The Story on the Slope: Joint Exhibition of Greater Sandimen Artists” (Art Center at National Kaohsiung Normal University, 2018), “Native Enlightenment: Contemporary Art Exhibition of Indigenous Peoples” (Howard Salon in Taipei, 2018). “Humorous Train of Thought, The Story of Adan’s Sculpture Art” (Taiwan Indigenous Peoples Cultural Park, 2019), “When Slope Culture Meets a Vertic City: Contempora Art Exhibition from Greater Sandimen” (National Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall /Taiwan Indigenous Peoples Cultural Park, 2019, Co-curator), “dekap Imprint: Joint Exhibition of Resident Artists in Art Village on the Slope” (1in1 Creative Space, Pintung, 2019 “Futurist Wave: Contemporary Art from Greater Sandimen” (Pintung Art Museum, 2020, co-curator), “qadjai Connect Lines: Joint Exhibition of Art Village on the Slope and South-east Asian Female Artists” (1in1 Creative Space, Pintung, 2019), “Taiwanese Indigenous Contemporary Art Exhibition of the Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art” (Queensland Art Gallery, Australia, 2021), “Distances between Us and the Future: An Exhibition of Taiwanese indigenous Contemporary Art” (Taiwan Indigenous Peoples Cultural Park, 2021).
