Research Degree Title

Visual Representations of an Imagined Return from a Taiwanese Exile: an installation of photographic diptychs with artists’ books

Supervisors

Prof JM Woodham

Mr D Watkin (external supervisor)

Aims of Investigation

• The importance of autobiographic writing in understanding present and future work: This leads me to a greater understanding of myself and the reason for undertaking this research. I will keep writing in Chinese and edit in English for the future.

• The diptych form with self portrait: The diptych form in my research is a very important mode of presentation. Although some other photographers use self portraiture in various ways - the created narrative, the structure of layers etc. my own use in combination with the split screen/diptych format is innovative and promises to be a fruitful way of expressing the chosen theme. Each visual exercise is a balance between intention (see above) and discovery. I am still learning and discovering new implications in the compositional format.

• The role of the old building in enhancing and intensifying a sense of exile: Old buildings for me are so powerful as a link with the feeling of exile. I have explored this question both in my artwork and in my writing (autobiography and statement).

• The sense of exile to be derived from old family photographs: I only have three family photographs from my childhood. For me, these old family photographs are the strong elements to link with the sense of exile. I will explore more about the meaning of old family photographs, both of mine and others.

• The interaction between exile and memory: I realised my feelings of exile relate to certain characteristics of the act of recall - the more the memory is stretched the deeper the feeling of exile. There is a very strong link between them. I will explore it more in my autobiography.

• Melancholia: I intend to research more into the visual conventions of melancholia in conventional icons such as works by Goya, Picasso, Walker Evans and the films of Scorcese. Can Melancholia be an alternative to active forms of sadness and depression? Can melancholia be an acceptable vehicle for creative practice?

Abstract

This thesis constitutes five sets of photographic work of self-portraits in diptych form within an installation, with two artists’ books and a written component. It explores and visualises my particular condition as exiled artist (voluntary and enforced) from Taiwan, seeking the possibilities of return.

Firstly, it presents the sequences of the individual’s journey into exile, from the countryside to the urban, moving from the island of Taiwan to the United Kingdom, and Taiwanese culture’s sense of exile from the mainland. Particular emphasis is placed on experiences of Taiwanese exile in economic terms and on the veteran servicemen who left the mainland after 1948. Secondly, the thesis examines the impact of exile on the individual’s sense of homeland, of parents and childhood over the last sixteen years.

Central to the understanding of the work is the structure of family life, the role of the Father and the duties of the Eldest Son in Taiwanese culture. Thirdly, the thesis explores visually the quintessentially Chinese experience of exile in the creation of “Chinatown” and surrogate structures of hometown. Fourthly, the thesis presents visual strategies for the return of the exile, and scrutinises concepts of reality and artifice in re-creating the hometown for the act of return. In contemplating a return, the work presents the futility of nostalgia and creates other strategies of survival in emblems of reconciling the past.

The installation sets the photographic work within a context of a metaphorical journey, a trajectory from an empty room through space to a sequence of galleries presenting themes of anxiety and loss, within the context of the imagined return. The diptych form is used to provide opportunities of separation of location joined in the overlapping self-portraits, giving the possibility of a visual comparison between two confronting images.

The written component combines analytic texts, diagrams, and images to explain and explore the nature of exile. The first part is an account of two Taiwanese exiles’ particular experiences. The second part details my personal history of exile and expresses family relationships, homeland and childhood in the photographic work. The third part articulates the specific role that photography plays in representing such issues.

Research Questions

• How to represent my own experiences of Exile and its recreation through Memory in photographic form?

• How to research and realise my thoughts and experiences through the visual language of a diptych structures?
  

• How to understand the condition of exile and how it might be  described in terms of images and words?
  

• How to explore the application of the self portrait to context?