Deng is an extraordinary Taiwanese embroidery artist (also known as a “fiber artist”) who combines oil-painting, embroidery, floral-based oil paintings, and soft sculptures.

She uses dyed embroidery and stitched soft sculpture to forge a language of cultural geography and history. Rooted in Taiwan’s cultural landscape and informed by field research and residencies across the world, her work draws on indigenous motifs, food culture, and deep historical truth to create textile narratives of place and belonging. Through hand-dyed fabrics and thread, Deng maps a visual world shaped by ecological observation and cultural circulation. Her “quiet feminism” emerges through material intimacy — reclaiming fiber art as a vital medium for self-expression and placing it firmly within the mainstream of contemporary art history.

Background and Identity to Her Art
Deng was born in Dongzhu, Hualian, in 1970 to an aboriginal mother and Taiwanese father. Her grandfather is Hakkanese. She loved graffiti since she was a child and began oil painiting at the age of 10. Her father did not openly support her artistic career at first, but has come around to silently supporting her. Deng thanked her father and sister for their sponsorship, her mother for her “spiritual protection from Heaven,” and the art partners she has worked with over the years.

She graduated in 1999 from the National School of Fine Arts (École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts) in Paris, France. Her early work featured oil paintings with mixed media, grounded in everyday life on traditional Taiwanese floral fabrics. 

Her recent works focus on Taiwan history, aboriginal culture, and ethnic integration. She has incorporated her love of the outdoors through mountain climbing and discovery, by blending these elements of life exploration into her tapestries and indigo dyeing map creations.

Although her most notable large scale works focused on field research and landscape-based mapping, such as Globalization at Table, Kuchapongone, and Cloud Leopard go Home, her soft sculpture series stitched representations center on food. With food soft sculptures, Deng approaches her art as a carrier of memory, emotion, and identity.

International Residencies
Since 2016, Deng has been an artist in residence in Pingtung (Taiwan), Pune (India), Los Angeles, and New York City. Currently, she is completing her residency in New York at Governors Island at House 17 with the Taiwanese American Arts Council under its founding Executive Director Luchia Meihua Lee.

The exhibition at Tenri Cultural Institute included a 30 minute documentary film showing Deng creating her work in each city between 2016 thru 2024, as well as traveling and adapting to life and new friendships within those cities during each residency.

Fiber Work on Governors Island: The Taiwan Map
Deng is currently composing and weaving her outdoor latest fiber art sculpture on Governors Island. She is making steady progress on her woven sculpture Taiwan Map, a large-scale fiber art piece that captures the cultural and geographical essence of Taiwan. Through intricate weaving and layered textures, Deng transforms traditional materials into a poetic cartography of memory, identity, and place. In June, the completed work was unveiled to the public on Governors Island as part of the ECO ART ON ISLAND program.

Final Thoughts on the Artist
I really admire Deng for both her incredible quality and prolific body of work she has been creating in the realm of the embedded stitch. It is highly labor intensive. Everything in her art is grown naturally. The dyes are made from all natural products grown in Taiwan. The fibers are whittled by hand from plant leaves which are gathered fresh from nature.

Watching her documentary film you will see how much work goes into the preparation of the raw materials even before the creation of the artwork begins. Deng does almost all of it herself, and it is both astounding and exhausting to watch.

Read this article on the Taiwanese great fiber artist Wen-Jen Deng where I originally wrote it in The Village View:

Wen-Jen Deng: Her Amazing Fiber Art Solo Exhibition at Tenri Culture Institute

Listen for our latest Talking Taiwan interview with amazing fiber artist Wen-Jen Deng. For more information:

tenri.org/gallery/index.shtml

taac-us.org talkingtaiwan.com

Kaju Roberto is an accomplished musician, singer/ songwriter, journalist, and an award-winning producer. He is the artist Rad Jet on Spotify.

The post Wen-Jen Deng: Her Amazing Fiber Art Solo Exhibition at Tenri Culture Institute appeared first on Rad Jet's Historic Jazz Walking Tours.

Through its evocative lens, the film chronicles and examines the presidency of Tsai Ing-wen, Taiwan’s first female president and events that happened during her tenure from 2016 – 2023.

Invisible Nation is a deeply penetrating film that shines a light on the spirit and resilience of Taiwan’s democracy in the face of an escalating military threat from China. It portrays President Tsai Ing-wen as an exceptionally smart, wise and tough leader. Unfortunately, it also reinforces the dread many of us feel towards the future of Taiwan as an independent nation.

The film’s length is 85 minutes and there are interviews from key Taiwan political figures and advocates including President Tsai Ing-Wen, Chu Chen, Yu-jie Chen, Bi-Khim Hsiao (Taiwan’s current vice-president), Freddy Lim, Audrey Tang, and Michelle Kuo.

According to IMDB, Invisible Nation gets an 8.4/10 rating.

So far, the film has been nominated for nine film awards, twice winning the 2024 Sun Valley Film Festival Award for One in a Million documentary, and the 2023 Middleburg Film Festival Audience Award.

Attending the First Screening

As host and producer of the longest running Taiwan-related podcast, my partner Felicia Lin and I were invited to attend the debut film screening as part of a larger Taiwanese group at the Woodstock Film Festival. That was a day of 8.65” record-breaking torrential rains in Central Park. We all rode up together in a chartered bus during the morning hours. Conditions on the New York State Thruway were quite treacherous.

What Inspired the Director to Create this Film?

On opening day we met director Vanessa Hope whose life changed in 1996. Hope was living in Taiwan from 1995-1996 when she was a PhD student taking part in a study abroad program during the inauguration of Lee Teng-hui, Taiwan’s first directly elected president.

1996 was indeed a very scary time to be in Taiwan. Scorched by Taiwan’s first direct presidential election and fledgling democracy, China attempted to intimidate Taiwan by firing missiles into the Taiwan Strait. Almost 30 years later, not much has changed.

After talking to her journalist friends, Hope became deeply concerned and obsessively curious about the future fate of Taiwan. She borrowed a newly purchased camera from her Chinese language teacher. Over that weekend, she was determined to film President Lee Teng-hui’s historical inauguration. She succeeded and her first short film embarked her on a film career.

Fast forward to 2016, Hope traveled back to Taiwan with an international delegation to witness the election of Taiwan’s first female president, Tsai Ing-wen. That’s when she came up with the idea to create a full-length feature film about Tsai Ing-wen’s presidency.

If anything, today the threat of a China invasion on Taiwan looms even larger. China President Xi Jinping has stated, “Taiwan is China,” and that reunification is inevitable. He also does not rule out using force. Taiwan is now once again a hot and important topic in international news ever since Russia invaded Ukraine in early 2022—a move which has only served to embolden China.

Challenges Making Invisible Nation

During our conversations with the director, we also talked about the challenges in making Invisible Nation and her personal motivations for making the film. Invisible Nation was filmed over a seven year period from 2016 thru 2023. This required an ongoing and highly detailed coordinated effort with the President and a great resolve by Hope and her team. They were given unprecedented access to Taiwan’s sitting head of state, which allowed them to investigate the election and Tsai Ing-Wen’s tenure.

This was not Hope’s first full length feature. Her first, All Eyes And Ears, examined relations between the U.S. and China through the stories of U.S. Ambassador to China Jon Huntsman, his adopted Chinese daughter Gracie Mei, and blind legal advocate Chen Guangcheng.

Invisible Nation is currently playing in select theaters around the U.S.

For more information, go to: https://invisiblenation.net.

Read this article where I originally wrote it in The Village View:

Invisible Nation: A Film That Chronicles Taiwan’s First Female President, Runs for One Week at the Quad Cinema

________________________________________________________________________________

KAJU ROBERTO is an accomplished musician, singer/ songwriter, journalist, and an award-winning producer. He is the artist Rad Jet on Spotify.

The post Invisible Nation: A Film That Chronicles Taiwan’s First Female President, Runs for One Week at the Quad Cinema appeared first on Rad Jet's Historic Jazz Walking Tours.

This outdoor event which ran from 12 Noon to 5:00 pm celebrating the delicious food, vibrant spirit, and diverse music culture of Taiwan was a jubilant affair. It has been held annually in New York City near the end of May ever since 2002. This outdoor event which ran from 12 Noon to 5:00 pm celebrating the delicious food, vibrant spirit, and diverse music culture of Taiwan was a jubilant affair. It has been held annually in New York City near the end of May ever since 2002.

The Passport to Taiwan Festival is not only about Taiwanese music and food culture. This year it provided even more interesting content. Talking Taiwan,the longest running Taiwan-related podcast and Golden Crane Award winner made its debut there. Felicia Lin, its award-winning podcast host broadcasted a fun and interactive Talking Taiwan Live Stream all day long, while interviewing five notable Taiwan guests, and impromptu Taiwan-related enthusiasts who stopped by wanting to share their interesting Taiwan stories.

I had a chance to interview Felicia and talk to her about the significance of the event and a bit of Taiwan’s history. In full disclosure, I am the Executive Producer of Talking Taiwan.K: Can you tell me about the history and significance of the Passport to Taiwan?

The idea for an outdoor festival celebrating Taiwan dates back to 1999 when the U.S. Congress designated the second week of May Taiwanese American Heritage Week. But it wasn’t until 2002 that the first Passport to Taiwan was held, so it has been around for nearly two decades if you don’t count the pandemic.

Events like this are important, not just as a celebration of our culture and roots, but in the case of Taiwan, it’s especially important for our community’s representation, due Taiwan’s international isolation.

K: Tell me more about that.

F: How is it that Taiwan, with its effective early containment of COVID-19 (that made it a haven for COVID-refugees) has been blocked from joining the World Health Organization? And why is it that Taiwanese athletes have to compete under the name “Chinese Taipei” at the Olympics? It’s the same reason that Taiwan does not have a seat in the United Nations. The People’s Republic of China refuses to recognize Taiwan since it lays claim to Taiwan despite never having ruled it, not for one day.

China also forces countries to choose between having diplomatic relations with Beijing or Taipei. This is what happened recently when Taiwan lost Honduras as a diplomatic ally to China, leaving Taiwan with only 13 diplomatic allies.

K: What is the situation between Taiwan and China?

F: China’s President Xi Jinping has repeatedly stated that China will not renounce the use of force in seeking to reunify Taiwan with China. This is nothing new. During Taiwan’s first direct presidential elections in 1996 China lobbed ballistic missiles across the Taiwan Strait and now nearly three decades later, China sends planes on a daily basis into Taiwan’s ADIZ (air defense identification zone). The record stands at over 90 aircraft in one day.

Taiwan is now the most democratic nation and the first to legalize same sex marriage in Asia. Its path from authoritarianism to democracy was hard won after enduring 38 years of martial law (the second longest period in world history).
Peacefully safeguarding Taiwan’s democracy and human rights is a very real concern as the world witnesses Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s President Xi Ji Ping publicly praising Russia’s President Vladimir Putin for his leadership.

K: What is the state of the U.S. Taiwan relations?

F: I’d say it’s very favorable. In August of 2022, then U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan and when Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen visited the U.S. earlier this year she met with U.S. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in April. According to 2022 data, the United States was Taiwan’s second-largest trading partner for goods, while Taiwan was the United States’ 10th-largest trading partner.

Taiwan most notably produces 90% of the world’s semiconductors which are used in most electronics, and TSMC, Taiwan’s largest producer of semiconductors, is building a plant in Arizona.

K: Is there anything else you’d like to add that we haven’t covered?

F: Aside from all of these geopolitical issues related to Taiwan, I do hope that people can get to know more about Taiwan through the vibrant stories and people connected to it, by listening to our podcast Talking Taiwan.Visit our website talkingtaiwan.com or you can find us on all the major podcasting platforms.

The Passport to Taiwan Festival in New York City’s Union Square is definitely a late Spring NYC Cultural Must-Experience Event!

To learn more, go to: https://p2tw.org/

Link to the Village View article: ​

Passport to Taiwan: More Than Just Food, Culture and Music

​​​Kaju Roberto is an accomplished musician, singer/ songwriter, journalist, and an award winning producer. He is the artist Rad Jet on Spotify. https://open.spotify.com/artist/32si7c4nk210HPuqbXvhJg

The post The Passport to Taiwan: More Than Just Food Culture and Music appeared first on Rad Jet's Historic Jazz Walking Tours.