Chiu Wei-Hsiang 邱瑋祥 Taoyuan, b. 1997

Chiu Wei-Hsiang deliberately employs seemingly “naïve” and fragmented lines and compositions to summon the lingering shadows of past life experiences in the most direct and grounded manner. He consciously sheds the rigorous training of academic painting and calligraphy, opting instead for a “child-like” purity of vision to express the most sincere kau-pue (social bonding and hospitality) between people.

Born in Dayuan, Taoyuan, Chiu’s creative nourishment stems from the vibrant, salt-of-the-earth daily life of farming communities and a distinctly Taiwanese sensibility. In recent years, facing the expropriation and demolition of his home due to the Taoyuan Aerotropolis Project, he has turned to his brushes, transforming painting into a silent form of resistance. He emphasizes that his works are created "according to memory" rather than through the imitation of photographs. As home and kin disperse, the passage of time distorts memory, causing the contours of objects in his work to shift from concrete to blurred—a reflection of the psychological "phantom pain" that occurs when spaces vanish.

Chiu translates the “earthy” (t’u-wei) nourishment left by deceased relatives into a fast, raw, and emotionally charged visual language. He records the warm moments woven between people, objects, and spaces on canvas, attempting to preserve the spiritual legacy of his ancestors through painting, re-sculpting an emotional sanctuary upon the vanished coordinates of the land.

The demolition of Chiu Wei-Hsiang’s ancestral home and the passing of his grandfather fractured the extended family, leaving behind an absence that could not be easily repaired. In the aftermath, Chiu returned to his hometown to take on family responsibilities, navigating between the expectations of tradition and his own deferred choices. His daily rhythm was reshaped by obligation, and the weight of duty pressed heavily upon his personal freedom.

Within this constrained existence, he turned to painting at night as a ritual of release, transforming the exhaustion of labor into fragile yet potent images. Art became his diary and his outlet, a space where memory, grief, and longing could take form. Each brushstroke preserves a breath, a fragment of autonomy, and a place to dwell beyond suffocation. The works on view not only safeguard the fading warmth of kinship but also illuminate his ongoing journey through the night, where art sustains him and keeps him moving forward.