Like Water: Quiet and Flowing - Chien Yuan-chung (簡源忠) Multi-Media Mosaic Creation Exhibition

At the turning of the new year, the Taichung City Dadun Cultural Center (臺中市大墩文化中心) welcomes Professor Chien Yuan-chung's (簡源忠) mosaic art creation exhibition, bringing the most "heavyweight" flat creations of this year's exhibition period, a series of mixed media works centered on mosaic art. Seemingly rough gravel and fine bricks are delicately hammered, arranged, and constructed under sharp and precise knife techniques, generating flowing rhythms and layers of interlaced light and shadow in the picture, which are both stable and full of changes, making people unconsciously stop and stare.

Art is often a crystal that gradually forms in the tempering of time. It records not only the creator's life trajectory but also reflects the cultural textures and ways of viewing left by different eras. Professor Chien has been deeply involved in mosaic art for a long time, engaging in related research and creation since the 1970s, traveling to Europe to study classical mosaic techniques, and establishing a high sensitivity to materials, structure, and rhythm in rigorous and solid craft training. Such academic background allows him to continue developing a contemporary visual vocabulary on top of ancient skills, making mosaic art not just stay at the technical level but also become a way of thinking about time and the world.

"Like Water: Quiet and Flowing - Chien Yuan-chung (簡源忠) Mosaic Art Creation Exhibition" is a delicately laid out important exhibition between art, craft, and life aesthetics. The three series planned for this exhibition, "Loyal to the Original Heart," "Like Water: Quiet and Flowing," and "Fashion Composition," completely present the artist's creative trajectory starting from classical and gorgeous imagery and gradually moving towards natural imagery, life philosophy, and contemporary aesthetics. In the works, both the rhythmic movement and structural layers unique to mosaic art can be seen, and the continuous dialogue between the artist and life and time can also be felt, making this ancient skill still retain a rich and delicate vitality today.

Professor Chien specifically created a new giant mosaic art piece "Mother River—Mayuantou Creek" (〈母親之河—麻園頭溪〉) for this exhibition. The work takes the stream flowing through Taichung City (臺中市) as its theme, interlacing natural landscapes, historical memories, and humanistic life layer by layer. Through the 850-centimeter long mosaic picture, it slowly unfolds the story of the land and the flow of time, which is very meaningful. We sincerely invite citizens and friends to walk into the exhibition hall during the exhibition period to carefully observe how Professor Chien Yuan-chung (簡源忠) uses mosaic craftsmanship to let time flow in the picture and flash the light and shadow belonging to this city; we also look forward to viewers feeling the profound resonance brought by art among the layers of delicate stacking and starting their own viewing journey with the works.