In 1945, Japan's surrender marked the formal end of World War II. In 1951, the United States occupied Japan, and the two countries signed the first U.S.-Japan Security Treaty. The post-war society was filled with a sense of despair and hope coexisting. The Beat Generation, originating in the United States in the 1950s, laid the foundation for the hippie movement of the 1960s, spanning different media such as art, music, and literature. Young people exchanged blood and bodily fluids, sharing a dream that would never come true. On the Far East side, young people in Japan were also infected with intense post-war melancholy and recklessness. They resisted everything, including politics, economics, and even the ideological environment of society.
"Cruel Story of Youth" is Nagisa Oshima's second feature film, set in the late 1960s, just before the signing of the second U.S.-Japan Security Treaty. The post-war literary and film trends in Japan were initially explosive, much like "Cruel Story of Youth," with young people immersing themselves in violence and danger, striving for yet unrealized ideals. In the 1980s, Japan's economic bubble reached its peak, and the society and economic environment became filled with intense apocalyptic sentiments. Young people, tired of feeling powerless about the future, became a large group of NEETs (Not in Education, Employment, or Training) who rejected education and employment. The development of literature and film also became colder and lonelier. The mainstream consciousness of this negative attitude prevailed among the non-mainstream, and they were no longer willing to make an effort to change anything, not even to dream.
In "Cruel Story of Youth," YIRI ARTS bring together seven artists who, like young people of all ages, have gone through those cruel years, leaving their marks, and moving forward towards the next generation of eternal youth.
Spanish artist Guim Tio, who likes to collect old things, found an 8mm film reel in a flea market. It recorded a 3-minute and 44-second black and white family video. Madrid rarely sees snow, but like every family, they always capture images of children playing in the snow on rare snowy days as a keepsake. Guim dismantled the 8mm film and spent two months scraping off the faces in each small frame using a scraper. When the recognizable facial features were removed, the pair of brothers in the picture became like you and me in a different space and time, teasing the viewer's memory.
In addition to being a "female" artist, Chiu Chun-Ting added the label of "wife" last year. Chun-Ting's works often revolve around the theme of the family. In her 2017 work, she used vast wilderness spaces as a worldview, with white wolves, birds, and deer showing hints of red in their bellies, embracing the next generation of life and continuing to move forward.
"Life Companionship" is one of the series of themes that artist Lin Yi-Pei extended from 2018. Lin Yi-pei's solo exhibition "The Last Page of Mad Brew" in 2017 focused on vanished emotions, using beetles as symbols of fear and stress. In the new series, Lin Yi-Pei presents her symbolic messages in a more subtle and surreal form in her artwork. For example, the distance relationship between two swans roaming in a lake appears distant and unfamiliar, but the flying ribbons are like a celebration, and the visual dissonance and contradictions in the picture are still the core theme she intends to present.
Lai Wei-Yu's painting world, like Fellini's Trojan horse with hidden dangers, presents a myriad of characters in our city, with fantastical and exaggerated scenes, brimming with the festive atmosphere of a carnival. From early realistic portraits to a creative path that gradually embraces fantasy, symbolism, and theatrical elements, Lai Wei-Yu approaches seemingly absurd events with a childlike spirit, painting the canvas like Fellini's colorful kaleidoscope. He invites viewers to join in the revelry and clamor, but in the corners untouched by sunlight, we also glimpse the helplessness and desolation of life.
Sculptor Chen Yu-Erh, during his time at the Taipei National University of the Arts, volunteered at the Taipei Zoo, where he was responsible for guiding and explaining exhibits while learning the techniques of specimen preparation. After completing his doctoral program at the Okinawa Prefectural University of Fine Arts, Chen Yu-Erh currently teaches there and continues his research on the development of modern zoos and human-animal relationships at the Okinawa Zoo. "If I woke up next to you" is a series of works that visually depict physical disabilities. When we encounter a person with a severed hand or a blind individual on the street, we tend to feel a considerable level of empathy. However, when we see a dog with a severed leg or a blind cat, our emotional response seems to fall short of human-level empathy and leans more towards a relatively detached sympathy. With a deep love for animals, Chen Yu-Erh combines realistic animal sculptures with human elements, aiming to awaken in viewers their innate instinct and love for creatures and nature.
"Family Album" is the theme of artist Yeh Chih-Hang's solo exhibition in 2017. He rephotographed and enlarged his childhood photo album, using realistic painting techniques to recreate the photos and adding his own memories and imagination of his childhood. Similar to how we would add hats, ties, or even make them emit energy waves in humorous images of characters from our elementary school textbooks, Yeh Chih-Hang fully reproduces these nostalgic photos and then scrapes off the paint with a palette knife, revealing the vibrant fluorescent colors underneath. He presents these old photos and memories in a playful and whimsical manner.
Artist Shih Yung-Chun, starting from his artwork series "Daily System" in 2009, began assembling alienated objects on canvas to create works with a dreamlike visual presentation. Although the images are a combination of surreal elements, the elements in the works are still based on real people, events, and objects. He extracts the narrative subject, simplifies and objectifies the symbols of the objects, and breaks down the relationship between subject and object, constructing a disordered, nonlinear spatiotemporal image. In this exhibition, Shih Yung-Chun presents his work "Demonstration of Life - Botany" from 2010, where we can see an intertwining of flowers, plants, and fruits on the desks and chairs, as if the lessons are busy, but the children in the classroom are absent-minded, yawning and closing letters, immersed in their own imaginative world. The papers on the bulletin board transform into paper doves in the children's fantasies, carrying their consciousness as they escape from the classroom. Following the trajectory of their flight, our gaze is guided to a lonely child sitting in front of the command post, a child who seems to be either trying to squeeze into a cardboard box or trapped inside one. At first glance, Shih Yung-Chun's works are always splendid and magnificent. These symbols, like colorful building blocks, take on independent forms. He carefully selects and stacks them, building a castle that every child would envy. However, on a psychological level, this castle may be a mirror. Through Shih Yung-Chun's works, viewers see their own memories.
In "Cruel Story of Youth," the female protagonist hitchhikes with strangers at night, and the delinquent male protagonist drives away a middle-aged man who intends to violate the female protagonist, leading to their acquaintance. They each sleep with affluent middle-aged men and women to obtain money and social resources, and then they talk about their own love. Of course, this is not the only option in society. The sister of the female protagonist and her ex-boyfriend face a cruel reality and exist for their livelihood. It was an era in which people resisted society through their bodies and consciousness. In "Cruel Story of Youth" , seven artists each draw from their own perspectives, exploring the illusions and realities, despair and hope present in this world.
