“The Song of Time” marks Taiwanese contemporary classical realist painter Tzu-Chi Yeh’s first large-scale solo exhibition at a museum. Featuring 86 significant works spanning different creative periods, the exhibition also unveils three newly commissioned pieces, including the monumental Winter Solstice Sparkle, a seascape depicting the waves of Hualien. Born in Yuli, Hualien, in 1957, Yeh studied in New York and lived abroad for 19 years before returning to settle in Hualien. With refined Western classical realist techniques, he portrays nature, still life painting, and family, distilling time, memory, and emotion onto the canvas.

The title Song carries a dual meaning. On one level, it draws from biblical allusion, symbolizing the artist’s spiritual cultivation and sense of mission through migration and life’s challenges. On another, it echoes the idea of a “song of songs,” positioning Yeh’s works as lyrical meditations on family, daily life, nature, and existence, unfolding across six sections of the exhibition.

The exhibition follows a reverse-chronological narrative, arranged into six thematic zones:The Song of the Earth, The Song of Yesterday, Monologue and Dialogue, The Song of Youth, and The Song of Beginnings. From majestic landscapes to intimate still lifes and family portraits, the exhibition traces the artist’s self-exploration and reflections on life. His works serve not only as a diary of lived experience but also as vessels of collective memory and cultural resonance.

In dialogue with the museum’s ongoing program Collection in Dialogue, the exhibition situates Yeh’s works within the iconic architecture designed by Tadao Ando, setting them in conversation with masterpieces by Western sculptors such as Rodin, Degas, and Arman. Through this interplay of art and architecture, visitors encounter both the profound emotional depth in Yeh’s paintings and the unique resonance sparked between Eastern and Western art across time and space.
 

📽️Video：

The Song of Time-Exhibition Documentary (Short Edit)

The Song of Time-Exhibition Documentary (Full Edit)