Taiwan Today

When looking back on his life, 74-year-old Lin Hsin-yueh (林惺嶽) has many stories to tell. His father, a sculptor, died before he was born and his mother passed away when he was 6 years old. Lin was first forced to live with relatives he describes as “uncaring” and then in an orphanage. Life was harsh, but the child found comfort in drawing.

“As a boy, I was determined to become an artist as I had a keen interest in painting and regarded it as a spiritual sanctuary,” Lin says. “I felt even more motivated to pursue the goal when I found out that my father was an artist, and wanted to continue the life that my father had missed out on.”

Lin gained admission to the Department of Fine Arts at National Taiwan Normal University (NTNU) in Taipei in 1961, where he received professional arts training. Besides developing his painting skills, Lin read extensively in history, philosophy, psychology and sociology, and was particularly fascinated with Sigmund Freud’s theory on dreams as representations of unconscious desires.

In 1975, the painter went to Spain for advanced studies in Western art and while there got to witness the country’s transition to democracy, in contrast to the situation in Taiwan, which was under martial law at the time. In 1978, he planned an art exhibition to showcase famous Spanish paintings in Taipei and made a trip back to Taiwan to begin arrangements for it.

It happened that the airplane Lin took strayed into the airspace of the former Soviet Union and was attacked by fighter jets from that country, but fortunately was able to make an emergency landing on a frozen lake. Being thankful to have survived the terrifying incident, he began to meditate on the unpredictability of life and social responsibility of an artist.

All the difficulties Lin has gone through beginning from a very young age, together with his exploration of a wide range of subjects in the humanities, have influenced his painting as well as his writings on Taiwanese art, culture and society. In the process, he has become one of the most authoritative and dynamic figures in the local art community over the years, not only as a painter and educator, but also as an art, social and cultural critic. In addition to artistic creations, Lin has published numerous articles, papers and books including The History of One Hundred Years of Chinese Oil Painting: The Great Epic of Art in the 20th Century, Art in Wars: Witnessing the History of Suffering and Portraits of Artists.

In recognition of Lin’s multiple achievements and influence on modern Taiwanese art, the Taipei Fine Arts Museum (TFAM) has organized a major solo retrospective exhibition titled Lin Hsin-yueh: Enchanting Taiwan. The event, which began in early February and runs until May 5 this year, displays 137 artworks and many published works written by Lin from the mid-1960s to 2012. Among them, four large-sized paintings—Jhuoshuei River (1992), Blessed Hualien (2010), Formosan Landlocked Salmon (2011) and Glory of the God Tree Forest (2012)—have been publicly unveiled for the first time.

Huang Hai-ming (黃海鳴), director of TFAM, says Lin’s artistic concepts, eloquence, enthusiasm and talent have enabled him to gain considerable attention and authority in Taiwan’s art circle. “Lin’s broad vision, confrontational realism and keen insights—both reflective and critical, and evidenced by his expressive paintings—have been constructed on the basis of historical awareness,” Huang says. “One could say his art and ideas are thoroughly imbued with the history of Taiwan.”

After graduating from NTNU in the mid-1960s, Lin created works filled with a sense of mystery and solitude in a surrealist style. By the 1980s, however, his paintings had become more realistic, with the subject matter focusing on local landscapes, Huang says.

These later works in particular convey Lin’s passion for his native land, the director says. Numerous works featuring the Zhuoshui River (also spelled “Jhuoshuei”), for example, reveal his nativism. The images of Taiwan’s longest river, which runs through the central part of the island along wide beds of rounded boulders, explore the inherent vitality of nature and deeper ideas about the spirit of the land.

Liu Yung-jen (劉永仁), the curator of the TFAM exhibition, says planning the event was quite a challenge given that as an active and senior artist, Lin has built up a copious collection of paintings and publications in his body of work over time. The curator’s task was to present a selection of Lin’s artistic and other works that was at once comprehensive and coherent.

Depth of Career

To do so, the show has been structured into three parts: artworks best representing Lin’s various phases (including watercolors from 1964 and oils from 1969); papers by or about the artist including a biographical timeline; and a documentary film on Lin, The Boundless River, produced by Taiwan Public Television Service in 2010. The presentation of many of Lin’s epic paintings along with his written works is intended to convey multiple dimensions of his artistic career.

“Artists in general are adept at creating visually expressive forms, but few like Lin have good writing skills as well. Moreover, with his assiduous efforts, he has been one of the most prolific painters and writers of all time,” Liu says. “It is hoped that the exhibition can help members of the public appreciate Lin’s superb artwork and inspire young artists.”

Tsai Chao-yi (蔡昭儀), a researcher at the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts in Taichung, central Taiwan, says that the 20th century was the most turbulent period in Taiwan’s history, as it included the change from Japanese colonial rule (1895–1945) to the Nationalist government in 1945, and subsequently the beginning of 38 years of martial law in 1949. Lin, who was born in 1939, experienced these historical transitions, with the changes shaping the unique qualities of his paintings.

One of Lin’s most important works of art, the 1998 creation Returning Home, for example, depicts a school of salmon swimming up the Adams River in Canada to spawn (where they will lay eggs and die). The artist, Tsai says, intends to make an analogy between the fish’s arduous journey from the sea and the return of Taiwanese dissidents from abroad after martial law ended in 1987, even though they still risked incarceration.

“Lin’s portrayal of the salmon’s instinctive struggle against the currents suggests the tenacity of life and an unyielding spirit,” the researcher says. “It also implies people’s identification with the land, the tracing of history and an exploration of the cause and significance of returning to the motherland.”

Creating images to illustrate issues such as authority, nationalism, the search for identity and historical memory is a difficult task. Nevertheless, Lin’s varied life experiences and penetrating vision into the real nature of things have enabled him to excel at such thematic expressions, Tsai says.

In recent years, Lin has made a new attempt to use landscapes as a means of interpreting the spirit of Taiwan. “The uniqueness of Lin’s paintings lies in his dreamscapes that combine reality and imagination, promote spiritual belonging and present the beauty of nature,” Tsai says. “By painting landscapes in a representational style, Lin shows us his state of mind and perhaps unconsciously draws on his childhood memories of playing in nature.”

TFAM curator Liu says Lin’s art in the 1970s was characterized by its emotional atmosphere. The acerbic, bleak, dreamlike, mysterious and somber images of fish bones, ruins and withered trees along ocean shores, in forests or at abandoned sites that dominated Lin’s work at the time lend themselves to a surrealistic approach. The artist’s subject matter began to change in the 1980s, however, as brighter images that featured the natural environment started appearing on his canvases, Liu says. Since the mid-1980s, the painter has been especially enamored with Taiwan’s high mountains, green plains and streams.

Nature and Imagination

“Lin goes out to observe nature and returns to his studio to work on the composition based on the elements he has gathered [outside] together with his own comprehension and interpretation, rather than copying nature exactly and passively,” Liu says. “That’s why his landscape paintings, a synthesis of objective reality and subjective understanding, appear unique and innovative.”

In the meantime, it seems that Lin has become less critical, more modest and increasingly concerned about the land of his native country as he grows older, Liu says, adding that these changes have consequently affected his artistic style. “Lin has endeavored to use a visual language to express Taiwanese identity. His interpretations of Taiwan’s natural scenery as the vehicle of national consciousness are vivid,” Liu says. “Plus, his attempts to create larger works of art to demonstrate the magnificence of Taiwan’s landscapes are admirable as such undertakings call for exceptional technique, physical strength and a strong will.”

Lin’s paintings of forests, fruit and rivers are also images that the average person can relate to and enjoy. The expression of concrete subject matter, particularly that native to Taiwan, contributes to the popularity of his artwork, Liu says.

In examining his own art practice, Lin admits that his life experiences have had a substantial impact on his perspective on life and art. An impoverished background, a near-fatal aircraft incident and the depressed times when Taiwan was under martial law, followed by the island’s political and social transformations to democracy and openness since the late 1980s, each has left its mark. Yet painting has always allowed Lin an emotional release and the free rein of his imagination.

Local artists, Lin opines, need to think independently and create pieces based on their own observations, feelings and experiences, rather than through others’ eyes or by following foreign trends. In addition, artists should play a bigger role in constructively criticizing the ills of society, while highlighting its good points.

On his travels through several of Taiwan’s national parks, Lin says he has been touched by the majesty of lofty mountains and the serenity of secluded streams with an abundance of splendid fish. The dynamic force of nature instills in him a sense of reverence and inner peace, and serves as an important source of inspiration for his artistic creations.

Taiwan’s Beauty

Such scenes are illustrated in his works. These include images of rural Hualien in eastern Taiwan, the giant trees of Qilan Forest Recreation Area in Yilan, northeastern Taiwan, the Formosan landlocked salmon, an endangered species endemic to Taiwan, the Zhuoshui River and locally produced fruit including guavas and mangoes.

“Moving from surrealist introspection and meditation back to [a realistic] representation of nature liberates me from the distraction of art-related theories and allows me a free hand to express the wonder of the natural world,” Lin says. “Plus, by featuring local landscapes and specialties, we can establish distinct characteristics in our art. I believe that localization is one of the means for gaining international attention.”

In recent years, Lin says he has been drawn to capture images of Taiwan’s natural beauty and hopes his work can highlight the importance of environmental conservation. “At this age, the eye of my soul is open and I have better ideas and techniques for creating art,” he adds.

In 2008, however, life dealt the painter another hard blow. Lin was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, an incurable condition which causes tremors and unsteadiness. “I was extremely shocked and distressed upon hearing the diagnosis. I thought to myself that I had two choices—retirement or making a last-ditch effort to create larger-scaled artwork, using my will to fight against fate,” he says.

Lin has opted to continue his artistic creations, since then having completed several of the oversized paintings that appeared at the TFAM show. In 2011, for instance, he worked eight hours a day for about five months to complete Formosan Landlocked Salmon, a work that stands 1.6 meters high and measures more than 12 meters long. For Glory of the God Tree Forest, which is more than 3 meters high and 6 meters long, he painted from an elevated work platform.

The artist says he takes medication to control symptoms of the disease such as muscle weakness, but still sometimes needs to use his left hand to support his right hand in order to draw on a canvas. “It’s indeed a strenuous process, but I obtain immense gratification when I complete a large work of art. I feel grateful to be able to produce big paintings and hold a large-scale exhibition at my advanced age.”

“My declining health does not snuff out my ambition and enthusiasm. Though I don’t know how much longer I can work on art, I’ll keep at it until my last breath as there are still plenty of local landscapes that I would like to paint,” Lin says. “Working toward a goal, or an ideal gives one a sense of happiness. That’s also where the meaning of life lies.”

Write to Kelly Her at kher@mofa.gov.tw