Feb 11, 2025
SAN FRANCISCO, February 11, 2025—The Asian Art Museum presents the first North American solo exhibition of pioneering Taiwanese artist Yuan Goang-Ming, featuring work from his critically acclaimed presentation at the 60th Venice Biennale. Open April 3 through July 7, this large-scale exhibition in the Akiko Yamazaki and Jerry Yang Pavilion showcases Yuan’s masterful exploration of contemporary life through poetic video installations that bridge personal experience and universal themes.
Widely recognized as a pioneer in Taiwan’s new media art scene since the 1990s, Yuan creates immersive video and installation work that captures the tenor of globally turbulent times. His work often transforms intimate domestic spaces into powerful metaphors for widespread instability, from the haunting siren of Taiwan’s air raid drills to the violent disruption of safety in our own homes.
“At its core, this exhibition is about confronting the state of anxiety we all experience in today’s world,” says Rob Mintz, Chief Curatorial Director. “Uncertainty, fear, and chaos define the daily lives of so many in big and small ways, and Yuan Goang-Ming: Everyday War is one artist’s observation of this reality.”
“Yuan’s work speaks to the precise moment we’re living in,” says exhibition curator Abby Chen, head of contemporary art at the Asian Art Museum and curator of Yuan’s Venice Biennale presentation. “His depiction of personal spaces as sites of both comfort and conflict resonates with audiences worldwide, particularly as we navigate increasingly unsettled times. At the same time, this exhibition is deeply personal. It’s a manifestation of his experiences as a second-generation war refugee, and his reinterpretation of the legacy of trauma as both a son and a father.”
The exhibition brings work from Yuan’s celebrated Venice Biennale presentation to San Francisco, including the provocative 2024 video Everyday War, recording an actual explosion in the artist’s own bedroom — an evolution from Dwelling (2014), in which a similar scene takes place underwater. This progression reflects the artist’s observation that the gap between imagined and actual catastrophe has narrowed significantly for everyone in recent years.
The Asian Art Museum’s presentation builds on Everyday War‘s prior iteration in Venice with the inclusion of two additional works. Disappearing Landscape Passing II (2011) is autobiographical, looking at the ever-changing landscape of the artist’s home and neighborhood, emphasizing the ephemeral nature of place and memory. The second of two additional works can only be seen from outside of the museum. Indication (2014-2025), a video work in which the artist and his friends stand in a line, pointing fingers at the audience before suddenly collapsing, will be inaccessible from the main exhibition. Instead, the unsettling sequence — alluding to accusation, accountability, and the precarious role of bystanders in cycles of violence — will be visible from outside the building by passersby and museum guests along Hyde Street.
Everyday War’s immersive installation strategy creates a unique soundscape throughout the exhibition, merging and colliding audio from multiple works — including Prophecy (2014), a kinetic dinner table installation subjecting the center of home to the unpredictably intrusive nature of war — to generate an environment mirroring the layered complexity of contemporary life.
“This exhibition offers Bay Area audiences a rare opportunity to experience works that captivated the international art world at the Venice Biennale,” says Chen. “Yuan’s unflinching yet deeply poetic vision transforms personal spaces into universal narratives about hope, resilience, and the search for stability in an increasingly fragmented world.”
Yuan Goang-Ming: Everyday War is organized by the Asian Art Museum. The lead sponsor for the exhibition is the Fred Eychaner Charitable Fund.
Sustained support generously provided by the Akiko Yamazaki and Jerry Yang Endowment Fund for Exhibitions and the Kao/Williams Contemporary Art Exhibitions Fund.
About the Asian Art Museum
Located in the heart of San Francisco, the museum is home to one of the world’s finest collections of Asian and Asian American art, with more than 20,000 awe-inspiring works ranging from ancient jades and ceramics to contemporary video installations. Dynamic special exhibitions, cultural celebrations, and public programs for all ages provide rich art experiences that unlock the past and spark questions about the future.
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