Brian Po-lun Kao was born in Taipei, Taiwan, in 1992. He embarked on his artistic journey at Tunghai University in Taichung, where he earned both his B.A. and M.A. degrees. He is the author of Cracked Stories and currently resides in Tainan, working as both a writer and teacher.

Brian Po-lun Kao

Interviewees｜Judy Huang, Jenny Jou Ko, Michelle Ko, Kuo Mei-Shu, Lin A-You, Lady Tree, Wu Mali, Wang Xiu-Hui

Curator｜Miss Bench
Novelist｜Brian Po-lun Kao
Visual Design｜Jiang Shan
Editor｜Elsie Lam
Space Design｜Pino Zhang
Newspaper Archives Collect｜Chen Yi Che, William Lien
Video and Audio Archives Collect｜Ileana Tu
Installation Team｜Ileana Tu, Chen Yi Che, Joe Tu, Jason JS Lee
Translator｜Chat GPT-3.5，Brian Po-lun Kao

Exhibition Organizer｜Miss Bench, TheCube Project Space
Online Exhibition Collaboration｜ARTOGO
Sponsor｜BAOTAI DEVERLOPMENT
Furniture Sponsor｜Jui Hung Ni, Chen Yi Che, Chen Chang Yi, Pino Zhang, Michelle Ko, Chen Mei Yan, Wang Xiao Pin
Special Thanks｜Eric Ko, Howard Yang, Liu Hsing Yu, Chu Yen Chen, Lydia Li

Participants

On the end of the bench sits the duchess, with the homeless tramp at the other end, thereby a conversation is about to begin. This is the existence of the “Art Exhibition”, facing upwards to the millionaires who purchase art, and downwards to the general public who are interested in art. At this very moment, it transforms a linear two-dimensional relationship into a platform that exists in three-dimensional space. No matter who you are, welcome to the conversation. This may be the most peaceful way to shift the world.

Curated exhibitions include:
2018, Abnomal, Chelsea College of Arts, UAL, London
2018, //, Chelsea Space, London
2019, A Ceremonial Animal, Liu Museum, Taichung
2019, O//O, Liu Museum / YAO Space, Taichung
2021-2022, Home Land Is Land：Retrospective Tour of the Failure Artist, Various location of Taiwan

Miss Bench

TheCube Project Space is an independent art space devoted to the research, production and presentation of contemporary art. As a non-profit art organization, it aims to explore local culture in depth, connect people from diverse backgrounds, establish long-term relationships with artists and participants and promote cultural exchanges between Taiwan and the international community.

TheCube Project Space has two venues: TheCube Gongguan and TheCube7F. Both venues are located in the immediate vicinity of top universities, a district enjoying rich cultural resources and where talented minds converge. A variety of bookstores, bars, live houses, restaurants and cafés are scattered around the streets and alleys. Located in this area, TheCube Project Space continues to engage in contemporary artistic practices, introducing artists from home and abroad, expecting to enrich southern Taipei’s features and contents in terms of culture and art.

TheCube Project Space

Audio Guidance

Black Sparrow

The Master's Chair

The Dining Table

The Magazine Rack

The Television

The Radio

The Bookshelf

The Working Desk

The Single Bed

Introduction

Written by Curator, Miss Bench

“Michelle Chen” is a fictional character co-created by myself and the author Brian Po-lun Kao. Her name is picked from the rank of popular female names from the 1950s to 1960s on Wikipedia.

I met Brian Po-lun Kao (I fondly call him Brian) in the theater scenario in Taichung. Back then, I would often visit him with a bottle of wine and a cat in tow. Later, both of us moved away from Taichung around the same time, prompting a motorcycle farewell journey. During this journey, we delved into conversations about our mothers, carrying a foreshadowing of this collaboration.

We began searching for “Michelle Chen” in our ways: I interviewed eight women aged 60 to 70, all from varying family backgrounds, educational levels, and marital statuses. Using the technique of “montage”, I assembled their experiences into a seemingly singular life narrative. On the other hand, Brian utilized his imagination, penning the story of the prematurely departed “Michelle Chen”. The remarkable resonance between his fiction and the interview records turned this work into a semi-fictional novel. It's difficult to distinguish whether Michelle is the women sharing their story with me or the consciousness in Brian’s text. However, we're confident she exists within this exhibition.

If one sees the “exhibition” as a body, this document exhibition serves as the brain, displaying the curatorial research documents and re-contextualizing them in their original scene, with the form of an individual intimate room, showing the curatorial thinking. The novel of Michelle Chen will soon act as a curatorial statement, developing into a contemporary art exhibition.

As you step into Michelle Chen’s room, she is a young woman who has just graduated, has a stable job, and is not yet married. The TV airs her cherished cartoons, dramas, and news. The radio broadcasts her favorite programs and campus folk songs. Her bookshelf houses texts she has read. Which all forms her world. As part of the documentary exhibition, only the items mentioned during the interviews are included in this room. We found that most of the interviewed women never had a room of their own, making this room perhaps a semi-fictional space.

At the end of this book, you’ll encounter an unconventional “author chronicle”. It neither belongs to the author Brian nor the protagonist Michelle Chen, but is composed of societal news mentioned during the interviews, detailing major events in Taiwanese society that Michelle Chen lived through. History, an unseen hand, directs everything. We are forced to flow following the wave, making the choices without a choice.

Starting from “listening”, blending factual narratives with cross-generational imaginations, we hope to find a communicative language that bridges generational gaps.

Lastly, heartfelt gratitude goes to the following eight confident, generous, fearless, tough, and powerful women:
Judy Huang, Jenny Jou Ko, Michelle Ko, Kuo Mei-Shu, Lin A-You, Lady Tree,
Wu Mali, Wang Xiu-Hui

Written at TheCube
September 8th, 2023.


Exhibition Organizer｜Miss Bench, TheCube Project Space
Online Exhibition Collaboration｜ARTOGO
Sponsor｜BAOTAI DEVERLOPMENT

Exhibition Brochure - Traditional Chinese

Exhibition Brochure - English

A Room of Michelle Chen

On the bookshelf, you can find Michelle Chen 's childhood toys and children's books such as " Thorn Bird" (刺鳥), "Gone with the Wind" (飄), and novels by Qiong Yao. During her high school years, some of the Qiong Yao novels had already been adapted into movies. As she continued her education in college, Michelle delved into translated literature and philosophical theories.After entering the workforce, she started reading self-help and motivational literature, a genre that includes books by Liu Yong. Many women have memories of exploring their brothers' bookshelves during childhood, so there may also be kungfu and science fiction novels among the collection.

You can find the books at the top of the bookshelf in the "Attachment" section. This collection of documents is the only part of the exhibition that not belongs to Michelle Chen. It comes from Miss Bench and Brian Po-lun Kao's booklist, and the "tags" provide clues that will show the audience the reference materials that influenced our thinking throughout this exhibition, revealing the curatorial thought process.