Den-Huei Kao graduated from the Graduate Institute of Trans-disciplinary Arts at Taipei National University of the Arts and the Department of Fine Arts at National Taiwan University of Arts. His recent practice centers on labor and environmental issues. Through fieldwork and embodied actions, he explores the relationships between people, space, and the environment, while reflecting on exhibition mechanisms and questions of publicness. His practice encompasses video, large-scale installations, and interdisciplinary approaches. He has received recognition including the First Prize of the Taoyuan Creation Award and the Outstanding Art Prize, and was nominated for the Taishin Arts Award. He has also participated in artist residency programs in Taiwan and abroad.
Powerlessness (koo-put-tsiong) takes the Taiwanese expression “Koo-put-tsiong,” which conveys a sense of helplessness and having no choice, as its conceptual core. The phrase also serves as a metaphor for the emotional traces left behind through processes of migration, displacement, and emplacement within a place. The work reconsiders how people reshape their imagination of “dwelling” within an unfamiliar environment. Through the interplay of wooden structures, light, and text, the work transforms scent, lingering, and waiting into metaphors for homesickness. It portrays the longing and waiting of displaced people for a distant place, as well as the memories of life accumulated through living alongside the land.
Production Assistance｜Guang Ying LightBox Advertising
Photography｜Yue-Shiuan Tu
