九份 Jioufen

This weekend I headed with some friends too Jioufen, I have been there before in November 2007 but that was before I was blogging. When I was there last it was blissfully cold then compared to the stifling heat we had today.

Jioufen is located just outside of Taipei it's about an hour and half drive from the city centre, depending on traffic. The are buses which you can take as well, and it's definitely worth a visit as you have amazing views overlooking Taipei city and you can try out all the different tea restaurants, so it's really worth to spend some time going around the town ship.
















Across the bay.

Jioufen is really busy on the weekend what ever the weather so it's worth to try and visit mid week if you can.

















Snowy.

I also found a museum which I missed on my first visit. The artist who ran the mini museum make sculptures in clay of faces he had seen in his dreams or at least that was his story. I thought his are work was slightly odd and not my cup of tea, but it was only 50NT and gave a few good laughs.






















Faces.





















Pulling faces.

It was a long Sunday because afterwards we then drove on too Gongliao I think. Where we went too have some absolutely delouses sea food. By the time I got home I was completely shattered.

Cool rock formation waterfall, which you can see as you're leaving Jioufen, it's not that well displayed in the photo from my mobile but it's is worth a visit.




















I must remember to take my digital camera with me on these outings.

Return to MOCA Taipei

I went back to MOCA this weekend as I met up with some friends who had come up from Kaohsiung and had been spending the weekend in Taipei.

I thought they would find the MOCA interesting because of that amazing installation on the top floor. I enjoyed visiting the exhibition just as much the second time especially for the Hanzi writing.

Pyramid.

Interestingly his Ivan's girl friend Nina told me the correct way of holding the ink brush, it's almost similar to how you hold chop sticks but you use the brush straight and not at an angel.





















Like a pro!

Ivan is also an Industrial Design in Kaohsiung and designs marine equipment for Horizon, which seems like a nice job to have if you liking sailing and living by the sea which I do.

X Beyond O - MOCA

Saturday was rather rainy and the weekend was spent at Georg's place with Ash and Jeroen watching The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, which is a great movie, men were men then.

Anyway the rays were out on Sunday, so I was really keen to get out of the apartment and do something, luckyily I checked out Jonny Blog which is my life line sometimes too not having a boring weekend. I have a small circle of friends and when they are booked up, you're kind of on you're own.












Not sure what it means, but the projection shows the stroke order to writing the Hanzi character.





















Trying out my ink brush Calligraphy skills, looks like those MTC lessons are starting to pay off!

The exhibition which I visited had the running theme was Calligraphy - Sign - Space. It was a bit dry to start with but ended amazingly, with a fantastic exhibition space up stairs and I thought the artist for me had really captivated in my eyes what I think the modern china style is.
















Awesome.

They had this vast room completely pitch black with a swimming pool the height of a table which was filled with to the rim with black ink. Running along the pool side was a scroll of white paper complete with brushes to practice you Hanzi calligraphy.
















The humming sound of air conditioners created a rather wonderful sound.

Ray Chen, amazing exhibition space, I have not been able to find much information about him, which is a shame, but I guess I have to keep searching.





















Ray Chen's exhibition in perspective.

Another equally interesting exhibition by Hsueh-Yi-Chien, which Incorporated a white room filled with fluoresce lights. The idea is that you take a Chinese fan and hold it next to the hole so you can see the hidden Hanzi images which are projected.
















Reminded me of the an integration room crossed between staring up at you're office lights the photo has come out quite dark but I think that because of the camera, it was amazingly bright and white!
















Mathias Woo and his interactive projected images.
















I also like the images project on to steel and wood surfaces.

I can also see a new investment been made in the near future to buy an SLR. I think, the Sony T2 is at the end of it's days and the photos just don't make the cut anymore. I have to say I am rather jealous of Jonny crystal clear photos.

Imperial Palace 故宮

This was a really nice way to spend a Sunday I went the Imperial Palace Museum with Rita. It was very nice and sunny not to hot and really relaxing just having a stroll around outside. We also went around the ceramic exhibition which I have seen I think about 3 times now maybe 4 but it's still interesting.

Hopefully this image above should enlarge if you click on it, but I have been having coding problems lately.

Me.

Rita been blinded by the sun.

The back of the pavilion.

Juming Museum 朱銘美術館

Over the weekend on our road trip we also went to visit the Juming Museum 朱銘美術館 which is set in a very beautiful location up in the hills the gallery site was about 25 acres so quite large for just the one artist Ju Ming who’s gallery it is.

Massive Bronzes sculpture.

The where only two to three pieces on show which I found interesting to look at among a lot of other stuff! I really like the parachute from these sculptures they looked very beautiful glittering in the sun light.

Very reflective, but not in these two photos.

I can only describe the art work as very Art Space if they went into mass production mode. I've added some photos below to give you an idea of the rest of the work on display.

With art work like this in the lobby entrance you know you’re in for a treat.

This was the artist Olympic collection, above.

There was quite a strong Military theme in his work, not really my thing, but quite popular with the Taiwanese fan base.

I think his Bronze sculptures sell for around 25-30K. Quite a lot, but if it’s your thing why not!

Salute.

The museum had also built a work shop for children to come on school trips and learn to paint and have fun which was a really nice idea. They also had a wall which you could paint on, slightly stuck for ideas I did a rather scary skill and cross bones.

Painitng away.

The team.

Chi.

The museum was definitely worth a visit as it’s in a very nice location up in the hills and you can get a lovely walk in with some great views of the surrounding valley too. But have lunch before you go as there is only one restaurant and it’s not very good.

National Museum of History Taipei 國立歷史博物館

Rita and me thought we would go and visit the Taipei History Museum to see the Millet, Masterpieces from the Musée d’Orsay, which were on display.

Landscape of the National Museum Park, if you click on the image you should get a larger view in a new window.

When we got there the was a line over 300 people queuing for tickets and it was about 4pm so we decided that a nice walk around the museums gardens would be a better use of time. Besides I can always see his work in Paris when I am next there.

Me.

Rita.

And finally this evening I've got around to painting the balcony five weeks after we moved in with help from the two other house mates.

Thinking about it now it was about time we got rid of the horrible gray concrete and is now a much nice summery light blue, when we get some greenery up there it should all come together.

The garden in perspective.

Martyr's Shrine 忠烈祠

While taking the bus to Nihau, which is one of the major business districts in Taipei city I went to visit the Martyr's Shrine 忠烈祠, or at least I think that was the name of this monument.

It wasn’t a planned visit but I happened to see this place though the bus window so on the way back from Nihau I thought I would drop by. I have posted some photograph, which I took below.

Front entrance.

1000 Paving stones.

Taiwan flags.

Sanctuary tower.

Lovely roofs.

The guards.

Garden walkway.

The inner gardens.

Jungle portal

Around the back.

Traditional window patterns.

Also completely randomly when I was sightseeing around Nihau I was on my way to a coffee shop and I could hear this person shouting out my name really loudly a couple of times, but when I turned around I couldn’t see anyone.

As I was walking away I thought I could hear someone shouting my name again, but I though nah I am in Taiwan 12,000 miles away from the UK it must be some crazy Taiwanese person! Low and behold who comes rushing in to the café to say hello Jonathan B.