Global Support Center & GA 
Guest Lecture 

Lecture Title: 
In Search of Polyphonic Voices: Curation and Aesthetics of Proximity 

Lecturer: Alice, Nien-pu Ko (Curator)

As part of the “Liberal Arts Course for Global Artists,” the Global Support Center is pleased to announce a talk event with Taiwanese curator, Alice, Nien-Pu Ko.

Alice, Nien-Pu Ko is a curator and writer living between Taipei and New York. Since the 2010s, Ko has curated exhibitions focusing on issues of modern and contemporary history, nation-states, and colonialism in Asia. Her projects focused on how art creates a space of mediation re-evaluating different histories and contouring alternative genealogies and modes of perception through alternative aesthetic forms. At Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, she was the co-curator of the retrospectives Tony Oursler: Black Box (2021), and curator of Tomb of the Soul, Temple, Machine and the Self (2018) which was nominated for the Taishin Arts Award, Taiwan. Recently, she was a curator-in-residence at International Studio & Curatorial Program (ISCP) in New York in 2022. 

In this talk, she will discuss her curatorial practices that rethink the politics of art in East Asia in relation to the mechanisms of “exclusion and inclusion” of nations and modern history. Including her recent curatorial project collaborated with Taiwanese artist, Hong Kai Wang. “fuengu” (“mountain” in Indigenous Taiwanese Tsou language.) is a sound project and installation explores the musical legacy and life of Uong e Yatauyungana (1908-1954) who was a Tsou thinker, composer, and pioneer to develop indigenous autonomous movement from Japan’s colonial period to the early post-war year. 

By sharing her exhibitions, the talk will discuss the possibility of collectivity as a form of art and how it could provide a potential questioning power structure and generate the form of recognition, healing, and empowerment. 

This talk event is co-produced with the Graduate School of Global Arts (GA). 

Date: Friday, October 14, 16:20-17:50
Place: GA Lecture Room, 2F, University Hall, Ueno Campus  (Map 26 University Hall)
Guest: Ko Nen-Pu（Curator)
Moderator: Kenichiro Egami (Project Assistant Professor, Global Support Center)
Participation: face to face classes (up to 20 people accepted)
Resistration: https://forms.gle/inZqRCoL92eF1E6V9　(Google Form)
Language: English (no Japanese-English interpretation to be provided)
＊Please note that the lecture will be recorded for archival purposes. This archive may be open to the public.

Alice, Nien-Pu, Ko

Alice, Nien-Pu Ko has worked as a curator on contemporary art, film, video, sound, and interdisciplinary projects. At Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, where she has curated and co-curated local and international exhibitions including Pan Austro-Nesian Arts Festival (2021), Tony Oursler: Black Box (2021), Tomb of the Soul, Temple, Machine and Self (2018), and a wide range of public programs. She was also involved in the curatorial team of touring SUNSHOWER: Contemporary Art from Southeast Asia 1980s to Now, organized by Mori Museum in collaboration with Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts in 2019. 

Previously, she worked with art institutions and museums such as the Taiwan National Culture and Arts Foundation, Tokyo Wonder Site, Bengal Foundation, Hong Kong Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism\ Architecture, Hong Kong, and Hong- gah Museum, Taipei and among others. Selected exhibitions include Flags, Transnational – Migrants and Outlaw Territories (Tokyo, 2016), Beyond the Borderline – Exiles from the Native Land (2015), and Reverse Niche – Dialogue and Rebuilding at the City’s Edge (2013).

Her recent writing includes catalogs and reviews on Au Sow Yee, Chen Chieh-Jen, Dumb Type, Ho Tze Nyen, Hilma af Klint, Shigeko Kobuta, Jane Jin Kaisen, Lala Ruhk, Wang Hong Kai, Tony Oursler, Yin-Ju Chen, etc. She was the editor of the books – Tony Oursler: Black Box and Surviving on Time: Curatorial Report from Asia published by Taiwan National Culture and Arts Foundation. 

Website: https://www.alicenienpuko.com/

★ For inquiries regarding this project, please contact the Global Support Center 　　e-mail:  globalsupport@ml.geidai.ac.jp　（Kenichiro Egami）