Since hosting Lee Shi-Chi's first solo exhibition in 2002, Asia Art Center has maintained a close and enduring collaboration with the artist, including his participation in the 2016 and 2019 exhibitions on modern art in Taiwan. Within this generation of artists, Lee has always been regarded as a central and pioneering figure—a creator of remarkable breadth and imagination, and an active advocate for modern art across Asia. Since officially representing Lee Shi-Chi in 2024, the gallery has presented several of his iconic works at Art Basel in Hong Kong, garnering wide attention and acclaim. Traces of Lacquer marks the first solo exhibition following the representation agreement, spotlighting Lee's most celebrated and representative lacquer works, including iconic pieces from the Post-Orientation, Orientation, Rising Winds and Surging Water, and The Elegance of Han Dynesty · Orientation series. These works demonstrate the artist's distinctive visual language that transformed lacquer into a medium of abstraction and philosophical depth.
The exhibition also features two suites of prints from the Orientation Series, inspired by both the 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing and the historical fascination of Chinese literati with the moon. These prints retrace Lee's creative trajectory from his early experimental printmaking experiences to his later lacquer practice, revealing a lifelong commitment to bridging materials, mediums, and the interplay between Eastern philosophy and modern sensibility.
Following the Second World War, Taiwan became a strategic outpost at the frontline of the Cold War in East Asia—geopolitically critical yet culturally peripheral within the free world. In this context, art emerged as a vital means of defining cultural identity and local consciousness, shaping a modern art movement fraught with contradiction and reflection. As abstract art swept across the global art scene, artists throughout Asia responded through their own cultural lenses. In Taiwan, the Fifth Moon Group and the Ton-Fan Art Group, both founded in the late 1950s, embodied this dynamic energy. As a core member of the Ton-Fan Art Group, Lee Shi-Chi came to prominence in the post-war art world. He not only challenged conventional aesthetic frameworks but also sought to infuse avant-garde visual language with the essence of Eastern classical culture, forging a distinctly modern vocabulary of his own.
The Battle of Guningtou in 1949 cast a shadow of war over Lee Shi-Chi's childhood in his native Kinmen. His years of study unfolded amid the tension and artillery fire of the cross-strait confrontation. During this turbulent period, Lee's grandmother and elder sister were tragically shot and killed by a deserter, and his family home was destroyed in the conflict. When the 1958 Second Taiwan Strait Crisis once again plunged Kinmen into flames of war, Lee—having just graduated from Taipei Normal School’s Department of Art and remaining in Taiwan—was spared the violence. Yet the repeated devastation of his homeland left an indelible mark on his memory, a sorrow and tension that would often surface as underlying emotion and imagery throughout his art.
Lee's art bridges Eastern tradition and Western modernism, spanning multiple media—from printmaking and ink painting to abstract calligraphy, mixed media, and installation. His practice was shaped by two fundamental impulses: the latent influence of folk and traditional culture, and the visible allure of Western modern art. Rooted in his native Kinmen and intertwined with his understanding of China's historical and cultural legacy, Lee's creative foundation was both local and cosmopolitan. Growing within Taiwan's open and pluralistic artistic environment further provided him with the freedom to explore and embrace modern forms. Drawing from these experiences and humanistic resources, Lee developed a distinctive aesthetic perspective that set his work apart from mainstream artistic approaches in Taiwan.
The exhibition presents works ranging from early prints of the 1960s to mature pieces from the 2010s, tracing the artist's evolving experimentation and intellectual journey. Through his ongoing exploration of form and culture, Lee forged a path of coexistence between avant-garde innovation and classical tradition, laying the foundation for Taiwan's postwar modern art while deepening the resonance of Eastern spirituality within contemporary practice. Lacquer became the artist's primary medium in the early 1990s. Incorporating traditional cultural motifs such as plaques and door couplets, he developed compositions resembling tangram structures—displacing, reassembling, and recomposing abstract symbols to generate new layers of visual imagination. With its vibrant folkloric hues and dynamic contrasts, Lee's lacquer practice transformed familiar materials into personal artistic signatures. These works extend the spiritual energy and stylistic language of his calligraphic paintings from the 1970s, embodying the continuity of his creative innovation and vitality.
Lee Shi-Chi (1938–2019)
Born in 1938 in Beishan Village, Guningtou, Kinmen, Lee Shi-Chi's childhood was marked by the turmoil of war, largely due to the Battle of Guningtou of 1949. He was admitted to the Taipei Normal School's Department of Art from 1955, where he held his first solo exhibition in 1957, revealing his early artistic potential. In 1958, together with artists Yuyu Yang, Chen Ting-Shih, Qin Song, Jiang Han-Dong, and Shih Hua, he co-founded the Modern Printmakers Association, and later joined the Ton-Fan Art Group, becoming one of its key members. Throughout his career, Lee actively participated in Taiwan's modern art movement, producing prolifically and earning numerous awards.
In the mid-1960s, Lee co-organized the first and second Modern Art Festivals with poets and artist friends, inspiring a generation of young creatives and infusing Taiwan's art scene with new vitality—ushering in what is often called a golden age of Taiwanese culture. Between the late 1970s and 1980s, beyond his own artistic practice, he founded and directed several art galleries and curated influential exhibitions, some featuring international modern artists such as Hong Chao-Kuo, greatly advancing the development of modern art in Taiwan.
Deeply shaped by the sweeping tides of history, Lee's art was driven by his commitment to modernizing Taiwan's artistic landscape. His diverse practice reflects a profound inquiry into national identity and local culture, expressed through unbounded imagination and material experimentation. Lee Shi-Chi passed away in Taipei in 2019, leaving behind a transformative legacy that continues to shape the trajectory of Taiwanese modern and contemporary art.
