La Foret Urbaine - No.2

作品賞析

Artist Chi Pei-Chen loves photography, and her life in Europe made her deeply aware of the cultural differences between the East and the West. Therefore, she began to re-observe Taiwan and France from a different perspective, and developed a “city” combining Taiwanese elements with images of European cities in her “Forest” series. The scene presented in the work La Forêt Urbaine—No. 2 is a view from the top floor of a station in Lyon. Chi Pei-Chen painted Taiwanese advertising signs on the originally unadorned exterior walls of the buildings. The ads are for 18 Cu-Ease Chinese herbal medicine powder, the Kongba Kongkong Traditional Chinese Medicine Orthopedics Clinic, or feature characters like “the Little Sister, Chang Chun-ya” and “the Happy Grandma.” They were all popular advertisements in Taiwan in the 1990s. In addition, there are many local delicacies that overseas Taiwanese miss. Through her ingenious arrangement, these virtual signboards blend seamlessly into the European urban landscape in a way that cannot help but make people grin.