Goang-Ming Yuan specializes in combining new media and metaphoric manoeuvres to investigate human consciousness. ‘Floating’ takes the perspective of an observer adrift in a boat moving listlessly towards an empty horizon. Imposing expanses of water and sky offer nothing to hold onto, and the little wooden boat is perhaps even already derelict. The boat is a powerful symbol in Taiwan’s history of refugees and colonizers arriving in vessels of all kinds – a kind of journey echoed across the world today as people attempting to cross the global wealth divide resort to centuries-old means. The view shifts from the exposed above-water world to the submerged, and rights itself again, increasingly succumbing to the calm beneath the waves. And so it becomes clear that this is lonely journey is as much about the existential struggle to find meaning in life without being softly overwhelmed, as the international boundaries that divide those lost at sea from the welcoming shore.

Born in Taipei, Taiwan in 1965

Now lives and works in Taipei, Taiwan

A pioneer of video art in Taiwan, Yuan Goang-Ming has worked with video since 1984, and is now one of the foremost Taiwanese artists active in the international media art circle. He received a master’s degree in media art from the Academy of Design, Karlsruhe Germany (1997), and currently holds a post as professor of the new media art department of the Taipei National University of Arts.

Combining symbolic metaphors with technological media, his work expresses the state of contemporary existence, and explores the human mind and consciousness. He received the 13^th Hsiung-Shih Art Award for the Best New Artist for his video and sculptural work Out of Position (1987) while he was still in art school in 1988. In 1992, his work Fish on a Dish garnered great acclaim in the Taiwanese art circle, and received the First Prize of the Taipei County Arts Award, while The Reason for Insomnia (1998) received the Jury Prize of the 1^st Digital Art Festival. His “City Disqualified” series (2002) holds an important place in the history of Taiwanese contemporary media art. 

Disappearing Landscape (2007) opens with a new format of moving images, combining video art and cinema, displaying the fascinating, theatrical everyday in three-channel video installations. The 2011 exhibition Before Memory continues his exploration of the idea of “home” and expands such exploration into ruins and nature, in a diverse array of large-scale installations about time and memory, the body and perception. His 2014 solo exhibition An Uncanny Tomorrow questions the environment we inhabit in a globalized context, pondering the anxieties and apprehensions of modern people. This exhibition received the Exhibition of the Year of the 13^th Taishin Arts Award. The 2018 solo exhibition Tomorrowland pivots around the idea that home in the future is no longer solid. The works are centered on the normalization and everydayness of warfare, embodying modern-day existence and human despair. The exhibition was also invited to the Hayward Gallery in London in 2018.

Yuan has participated in various exhibitions across Asia, Europe, and America. Among these include: Aichi Triennale (2019); Beyond Bliss: Bangkok Art Biennale (2018); Biennale de Lyon: La Vie Moderne, France (2015); Fukuoka Asian Art Triennale, Japan (2014); the 7^th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art, Australia (2012); Singapore Biennale (2008); Liverpool Biennial, U.K. (2004); Auckland Triennial, New Zealand (2004); Taiwan Pavilion at the 50^th Venice Biennale, Italy (2003); the 2^nd Seoul International Media Art Biennale, Korea (2002); 010101: Art in Technological Times at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (2001); ICC Biennial, Japan (1997), and Taipei Biennial (2002,1998, 1996). 

His work is housed in public and private collections of art museums and institutions at home and abroad. He has also been on the Collections Committee of the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, and a juror of the Taipei Arts Award, Taipei County Arts Award, Public Art, Venice Biennale (Taiwan Pavilion), and Asia Society Arts Award in the United States.