▌About Paint House Studio
The "Paint House Studio" was founded in 2000 at No. 20, Lane 161, Section 2, Dongmen Road in Tainan, and ceased operations at the end of 2018.
On January 1, 2021, the art project Effects of Reconstruction: Paint House Ex-Situ Preservation began implementation in the rural countryside of Dainei District, Tainan. During this period, amid evolving pandemic conditions and changing climate patterns, we constructed a platform-oriented space in the increasingly wild forest.
In the summer of 2022, a complex system of both tangible and intangible elements continuing from Paint House Studio began to be preserved at the new location. Called PH2 (Paint House 2), this system is considered to be the next phase of Paint House Studio. It also heralded the launch of a new initiative: Jiaoli Lin (literally the "exchange force forest") Greenhouse Art Residency Project. This creative project emerged from ongoing dialogues between Lin Huang-Ti and a group of young and mid-career artists who have maintained geographical connections with Paint House over many years.
Jiaoli Lin is the local place name, coincidentally metaphorical of the exchange forces between artists who are creating in this forest. Greenhouse represents our consensus on actions in this agricultural zone—replacing forceful development with gentle artistic cultivation, allowing creative work in the forest to coexist with the natural environment.
The Archive, or Found Objects exhibition at C-LAB in March 2025 continues this creative context and responds to performance plans developed from the Paint House Studio Archive. Participating artists include Rui-Heng WANG, Xin-Cheng CHEN, Wan-Xi LIN, Min-Yi WANG, Si-Jie CHEN, Li-Ying KANG, Yi-Zhe CHEN, Jian-Zhi LIN, Cheng-Liang LI, Yao-Sheng LI, Hui-Yu CUI, Zi-Qi YE, Bonnie TCHIEN, Wei-Hao ZENG, Jun-Yu XU, Pin-Wei JUAN, Yu-Wen HUANG, Jia-Ying LI, Kai-Min DONG, Yi-Xian QIU, Jing-Xiang WANG, Ting-Wen YANG, You-Li LIN, Wan-Ting WANG, and Huang-Di LIN. These artists continue to develop various dialogical collective creations through long-term collaborative rapport, constantly cultivating their own subjectivity through various forms of exchange and interaction.
▌ Notes on the Exhibition: Archive, or Found Objects
If the discourse surrounding independent art spaces in Taiwan during the 1990s centred on what kind of art to exhibit, then the conceptual shift revealed through the nineteen-year operation of the Paint House Studio, beginning in 2000, pivoted towards a more fundamental inquiry: what spaces does art require—or perhaps more provocatively, how does space itself generate art? This essential question permeates the studio's physical structure, exhibited works, initiated projects of varying scales, and the creative practice of the studio's 'maestro' (if I may use this term)—artist Lin Huang-Ti himself. We witness objects that first materialise as an artist's creation, then transform into functional spatial elements, later become incorporated into Lin's artistic expressions, exhibit elsewhere, and eventually return to some corner of the studio. These transitions rarely follow a predictable sequence, and the shifting contexts and meanings construct an intricate art-non-art circuit within the Painthouse—elusive to define yet undeniable in presence.
Though intellectually fertile, this circuit poses profound challenges for archival practice. How might one document a perpetually evolving space? What methodology captures objects that fluidly traverse between utility and artistic expression? How can one articulate an artistic practice that deliberately resists chronological narrative? These questions transcend mere preservation of memory and history, challenging our fundamental understanding of art and the spaces it inhabits.
In the 'Paint House Ex-Situ Preservation Project' (PH2), Lin eschews comprehensive material preservation in favour of something more ephemeral—the spiritual terrain cultivated over nineteen years and the web of relationships that flourished within it. The operational logic that moves fluidly between art and non-art becomes a playful challenge to the very distinction between art archives and non-art archives. Despite its resemblance to cultural heritage preservation, we must recognise that this 'space' remains fundamentally a creative project with intentionally blurred boundaries: each object simultaneously serves as historical documentation of PH2 and found objects for artistic creation; while the artists involved both engage in constructive labour and manifest their artistic vision through this very labour. This fluid coexistence of multiple identities perhaps articulates contemporary art's essential character—that every established category inherently contains the seeds of its own dissolution.
Yet in my interpretation, Lin does not employ this ambiguity to shepherd us towards nihilism. Consistent with his view of art as the cultivation and selection of 'relationships', archives in his practice embody this same principle. Visitors can physically navigate the exhibition, selecting vantage points and perspectives, actively forging new connections with the space (C-LAB/PH2) itself. Among those whimsically named 'UFO' and 'alien cats', our acts of interpretation and identification become integral to the production of archival meaning. Ultimately, archives transcend their traditional role as passive witnesses to memory, becoming instead active choices of relationship—or perhaps, viewed through the lens of Lin Huang-Ti's spiritual framework, tangible expressions of free will.
—— Nicole Wang (Project Researcher, Asia Art Archive)
▌ Exhibition Details
Exhibition Period：29th March - 13th April, 2025
Opening Hours: Tuesday to Sunday, 12:00–19:00; closed on Mondays. (Special Opening Hours: April 11, 12:00–21:00; April 12–13, 9:30–19:00)
Exhibition Venue: Taiwan Contemporary Culture Lab (C-LAB), Art Space I
Participating Artists: (in alphabetical order) Bob Bo-Young LIN, Bonnie TCHIEN Hwen-Ying, CHEN Hsin-chen, CHEN Qiao-ni, Chen Si-jie, CHEN Yi-che, CIOU Yi-sian, DONG Kai-min, HSU Chun-yu, HUANG Lien-kai, HWANG Yu-wen, JUAN Pin-wei, KANG Lih-ying, Lee Jia-ying, LEE Yao-sheng, LI Cheng-liang, LIN Chien-chih, LIN Huang-ti, LIN Wan-chien, LIN Yu-li, TSENG Wei-hao, TSUI Hui-yu, WANG Ching-hsiang, WANG Min-yi, WANG Ruei-heng, WANG Wan-ting, YANG Ting-wen, YEH Tzu-chi, YEH Yu-Tang
▌Events
Opening Reception & Guided Tour: March 29, 2025 (Saturday), 14:30–16:00
"Capturing Shadows" Workshop: March 30, 2025 (Sunday), 14:00–15:30
Workshop Instructors: Lin Huangdi, Wang Wanting
Workshop Registration Link: Accupass
※ All exhibition-related activities will be conducted in Chinese.
Organizers: Ministry of Culture, Asia Art Archive, Taiwan Contemporary Culture Lab (C-LAB)