The Ministry of Culture is responsible for overseeing and cultivating Taiwan’s cultural assets, community development, cultural facilities, performances, visual arts, creative industry, literature and publications. In addition, the Ministry of
image source： Ministry of Culture
Culture is in charge of the nation’s museums, including the National Museum of History, the National Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall, the National Museum of Prehistory, the National Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall, and the National Performing Arts Center.
The Ministry of Culture has 5 main administrative objectives:
- Reinvent cultural governance and construct a support system for artistic freedom
- Connect the current land and people with historical memories
- Deepen community development and promote local culture
- Using cultural connotations to elevate cultural economics
- Launch a new cultural chapter in the future: value youth creativity, strengthen digital innovation and create international connections
In order to preserve and promote cultural heritage such as traditional crafts, the Ministry of Culture plans to focus on heritage and talent training, work with different offices and academic institutions. While promoting cultural preservation, the department hopes to diversify private industry and social development. The Ministry of Culture is committed to prevent a disconnection of cultural assets and talents. Also, the department often organizes important traditional performing arts, conducts research and document crafts related records, and they even give out awards and formulates protection plans. The Ministry of Culture is committed to preventing the fault of cultural assets and talents. It often conducts research, registration, and even awards and maintenance programs.
“福滿人間 - 2020 Chinese New Year Special Exhibition” is an exhibition organized and promoted by the National Taiwan Craft Research And Development Institute alongside the Fo Guang Yuan Art Gallery. The theme of this special exhibition is heaven, earth, and people. The exhibition creates an energetic and hopeful atmosphere through the use of the book, “行道天下 福滿人間,” written by master Hsing Yun in 2020 as a blessing for the new year. With a total of 76 works displayed in the exhibition, one of the many artists that displayed his or her work is none other than our interviewee, master Chin-Yi Yen. The traditional craftsmen use clay, lacquer, bamboo, cane, and other supplies as inspiration to produce the skillful crafts. Those works use art to express the spirit of everything in the world, from heaven to earth, and illustrate the vastness of the inexhaustible things in the world. The earth breeds all the materials and things, from heaven to earth, that artists use in their works. For generations, artists have collected local materials, which not only reflects the beauty of the natural environment and humanities, but also the vivid rural style, presenting the beauty of heritage. In addition, this exhibition conveys that crafts are the crystals and wisdom of human life. The crafts’ beauty are not only found in the materials, but also the spiritual symbols of a different generation.
The National Center for Traditional Arts was established in January 2002 as an affiliated institution under the Ministry of Culture in Taiwan. The National Center for Traditional Arts is mainly charge of planning for the protection, investigation, preservation, and development related things of traditional art. In addition, the National Center for Traditional Arts also allows nongovernmental professionals to run a part of the facility. Yet, both governmental and nongovernmental institutions have the same goals: Explore and expand traditional art and culture. The National Center for Traditional Arts’s positioning or orientation are mainly governmental, while parts of the actual center and some promotion work are operated under nongovernmental institutions.
The reason for the establishment of the National Center for Traditional Arts is to inherit the country's important cultural and artistic assets, and to continue the country's art by promoting the research and development of traditional theater, music, and dance, performing exchanges, education and promotion, and talent cultivation. The National Center for Traditional Arts integrates the National Light Theatre Company, Taiwan Yu Opera Company, Taiwan National Orchestra, and Taiwan Music Hall. The goal is to make traditional opera and music a unique high-quality cultural indicator in Taiwan and even other countries around the world. In addition, the National Center for Traditional Arts has proposed the "Cross-Art Convergence, Tradition Attention-Public Construction Cross-domain Value-Added Development Plan", and connected the Taiwan Traditional Theatre Center, National Center for Traditional Arts in Yilan, and National Center for Traditional Arts in Kaohsiung with a "three-in-one, one divided by three" strategy. The plan has successfully demonstrated the cultural essence of Taiwan's traditional arts, created a place for the exchange of domestic and foreign talents and works of traditional arts, and further promoted Taiwan's traditional performing arts to the world.
image source： Klook
In 2008, the Ministry of Education (MOE) announced that it will cease managing performing arts groups. All performing arts groups except for the National Taiwan Symphony Opera and the National Symphony Opera will be managed by the Preparatory Office of the National Headquarters of Taiwan Traditional Arts (NHTTA). In 2012, the Council for Cultural Affairs became the Ministry of Culture (MOC), so NHTTA changed its name to the National Center for Traditional Arts (NCFTA). A third level organization of MOC, NCFTA has subordinate units under its authority, including GuoGuang Opera Company, Taiwan Bangzi Opera Company, National Chinese Orchestra and Taiwan Music Institute.
The Guoguang Opera Company originated from the 陸光, 海光, 大鵬, and 明駝 opera teams which performed in the ROC army, navy, air force, and combined service force respectively. However, the Ministry of National Defence (MND) announced that it will stop operating the performing arts teams, dismissing them immediately. MOE soon reorganized the performers from the dismissed teams to establish the National
image source： Bangzi Operea
GuoGuang Opera Company. The year after, the 飛馬 Bangzhi Opera Group, also dismissed by MND, was merged with the National GuoGuang Opera Company and renamed the National GuoGuang Bangzhi Opera Group. When the MOE announced that it will stop managing all performing arts teams in 2008, the National GuoGuang Bangzhi Opera Group announced its departure from the Guoguang Company to form the Taiwan Bangzi Opera Company, becoming subordinate units of the GuoGuang Opera Company, National Chinese Orchestra, established in 1984, and the GuoGuang Opera Company which focuses only on Peking opera performances.
image source： Guoguang operea
The Guoguang Opera Company, one of the two public Peking opera performing groups in Taiwan, has performed in multiple countries such as the US, UK, and Brazil across the globe, promoting Taiwan’s traditional drama. Lead by professor Ms. Yuhua Zhang, the Guoguang Opera Company performs annually to the public, in schools, in communities, and gives speeches to promote
traditional Opera in a lively yet elegant manner to audiences from different age groups, regions, and with different education backgrounds. The Taiwan Bangzi Opera Company, led by Mr Hongzhi Peng, is often invited to perform in foreign countries. Its iconic pieces “Empress Dowager Cixi and Princess Zhen” won the Golden Bell Awards Best Traditional Drama Award in 2008, while “The Sorceress Bride” won the 9th Annual Taishin Arts Award in 2011. Finally, Ms Lizhen Liu’s National Chinese Orchestra also laid a profound foundation for Taiwanese traditional music through their works, and elevated it through performances. The orchestra’s performance combines play, choreography, arts, poetry, and other forms of literature, innovating and experimenting with new ideas within the traditional medium. Its albums such as “臺灣四季,” “心花兒開滿年,” and “心動・聲動” are all critically acclaimed. Other than these performing groups, the Taiwan Music Institute also contributes to Taiwan’s traditional music. The institution not only holds annual exhibitions for traditional opera, plays, and other performances, but also has a variety of media for visitors to enjoy. For those interested in learning more about the beauty of traditional Taiwanese music, the Taiwan Music Institute is the best place to go to.
Established on November 6th, 1999, the Taipei City Department of Culture Affairs became the first nationwide organization that has the responsibility for local cultural and artistic development. The organization’s affiliated units include the Taipei City Museum of Art, Taipei City Art Promotion Office, Taipei Zhongshan Hall Management Institute, Taipei Municipal Archives, Taipei Municipal Symphony Orchestra, and Taipei National Orchestra. The Taipei City Department of Culture Affairs was established to promote and organize local culture-related establishments, to preserve cultural assets (i.e. traditional performing arts, traditional crafts, and folk culture), and arrange culture-related exchanges or promotion projects, and enforce culture-related laws.
Since its establishment, the Taipei City Department of Culture Affairs is actively involved in promoting and guiding all sorts of traditional crafts projects. Other than establishing institutions such as the National Taiwan Craft Research and Development Institute or the National Taiwan Traditional Performing Arts and Crafts Council, the Taipei City Department of Culture Affairs provides subsidies and assistance to private programs regarding the preservation, research,
image source：21st Taipei art festival
publishing, study, and promotion of traditional crafts. The Taipei City Department of Culture Affairs also cooperates with the Bureau of Cultural Heritage and provides information regarding the Bureau of Cultural Heritage’s traditional crafts courses on the Department of Culture Affairs website. Furthermore, the Taipei City Department of Culture Affairs often hosts exhibitions, performances, competitions and other activities that help promote traditional crafts culture.
Since the year 2010, the Taipei Arts Festival has been held throughout every August. The Taipei Arts Festival is well-known internationally, it is a festival that promotes artistic and creative thinking by displaying artworks of renowned artists from all over the world, and is an important platform for the art community of Taiwan and the rest of the world. Other than fostering the artistic qualities of people of Taiwan, providing a rich and diverse platform for artists, and raising the popularity of artists that participates, the Taipei Arts Festival is an important factor in facilitating the culture industries and local tourism.
The Taipei Cultural Assets Center not only has plans to preserve cultural assets with physical format such as monuments, historic buildings, settlements, archeological sites, historical sites, cultural landscapes to avoid the loss of culture, but it also maintains traditional values of culture that does not have formality through long-term documentation, surveys, and research. In addition, several cultural movements and public art
image source：Taipei Cultural Assests Center
performances enhanced the public’s knowledge and attitude towards the cultural assets in Taiwan. The play that shows the indigenous culture in Taiwan, for instance, promotes the public’s understanding of the several minority aboriginal tribes. Through this play, the Taipei City Cultural Bureau hopes people will respect indigenous culture and recognize the country and traditional tribes.
The Bureau of Cultural Affairs of Kaohsiung City Government was inaugurated on January 1st, 2003. On December 25th, 2010, after the Kaohsiung-City-County consolidation, the previous County Government Bureau merged with the City Government Bureau, establishing the current cultural affairs bureau. The department focuses on promoting the city’s artistic events, developing the entertainment industry, and implementing cultural policies. The department is also responsible for Kaohsiung City’s major festivals, such as Kaohsiung Spring Arts Festival, Kaohsiung Film Festival, Kaohsiung Design Festival, Kaohsiung International Container Arts Festival, and Kaohsiung International Steel and Iron Sculpture Festival.
image source：Kaohsiung spring festival
The vision of the Kaohsiung City Government Bureau of Cultural Affairs can be categorized into seven units. To enrich citizens’ social and cultural literacy, the first unit focuses on fostering a reading culture in Kaohsiung City, establishing a state-of-the-art learning environment while improving the quality and increasing the quantity of book publications.
Moreover, the department understands the importance of cultural inheritance and preservation, in which the government has always been developing projects and plans on marketing cultural heritage and boosting cultural tourism. In addition, the government also wishes to make Kaohsiung an artistic city. To reach this goal, the bureau of cultural affairs has organized art exhibitions, developed digital platforms for cultural heritage, and arranged cultural events. However, the bureau of cultural affairs not only promotes static arts, but also performing arts; they focus on cultivating artistic-talented youths and create platforms to allow citizens to watch their performances in a more convenient way. Those performances have been strongly supported and promoted to strengthen citizen’s thoughts on the importance of cultural preservation. Besides, the bureau of cultural affairs has also pushed Kaohsiung’s cultural traditions to the global stage by holding international showcases, creating cultural exchanging programs, and constructing internationally standardized stadiums and stages. Last but not least, the most important of the seven units is to transform Kaohsiung to a culturally-enriched city. The bureau of cultural affairs wishes the Kaohsiung citizens can all recognize their cultural traditions with the Kaohsiung Cultural Center, and use the center as a cultural gathering place to encourage citizens to preserve and inherit Kaohsiung City’s cultural values.
To promote traditional crafts, the Kaohsiung City Government Bureau of Cultural Affairs often updates news on its website for traditional paintings, wooden and god sculptures, and puppetry. The news are all written with in-depth research and interviews with the craft masters. Each of the crafts type is described in detail, for instance: the preserved area, the preserved person, and the product’s full name. Besides the online promotion, the bureau of
image source：Kaohsiung international festival
cultural affairs also published books for the crafts, and they provided a summary for each book on the website for citizens who are curious, free of charge.
Not only does the Bureau of Cultural Affairs, Kaohsiung City Government aim to further develop its culture heritage center in order to popularize Kaohsiung’s cultural traditions, the government hopes to attract tourists through sightseeing opportunities and guided tours and make them realize the value of cultural preservation. To attract tourists, the Bureau of Cultural Affairs website even consists of a photo gallery and displays detailed description on Kao hsiung’s cultural monuments, historical architectures, memorial
image source：folktales
buildings, cultural landscapes, antiquities, traditional performing arts, and even oral traditions and folktales. One of the most popular monuments is the Cihou Fort constructed by 唐定奎 and 王福祿, which stands as one of the first forts in Taiwan integrating both Chinese and Western technologies. Not only is the monument intricately designed, Cihou Fort, along with hundreds of other cultural monuments, has a cultural significance worth preserving.
- National Traditional Art Center-Origin. February 13, 2020, taken from https://web.archive.org/web/20151115050441/http://www.ncfta.gov.tw/ncfta_ce/c05/index.aspx
- National Traditional Art Center-Taiwan Music Hall. February 13, 2020, taken from https://www.ncfta.gov.tw/taiwanmusic_74.html
- National Center for Traditional Arts-Guoguang Theatre Company. February 13, 2020, taken from https://www.ncfta.gov.tw/guoguangopera_71.html
- National Traditional Arts Center-Taiwan Yu Opera Troupe. February 13, 2020, taken from https://www.ncfta.gov.tw/bangziopera_73.html
- National Traditional Art Center-Taiwan National Orchestra. February 13, 2020, taken from https://www.ncfta.gov.tw/ncO_72.html
- Cultural Affairs Bureau of Taipei City Government-Organization Introduction. February 29, 2020, taken from https://www.culture.gov.taipei/frontsite/cms/contentAction.do?method=viewContentList&subMenuId=101&siteId=MTAx
- The reason for the establishment of the county and city cultural bureau and the current situation are described. February 29, 2020, taken from http://nhuir.nhu.edu.tw/retrieve/27246/090NHU00673020-004.pdf
- Taipei Municipal Government Cultural Bureau-Performing Arts Group. February 29, 2020, taken from https://www.culture.gov.taipei/frontsite/artorganization/groupFrontListAction.do?method=doRead&iscancel=true&groupId=2914
- Taipei Municipal Government Cultural Bureau-Cultural assets. February 29, 2020, taken from https://www.culture.gov.taipei/frontsite/ch/newsAction.do?method=viewContentList&subMenuId=1030120&siteId=MTA1
- Cultural Assets Bureau of the Ministry of Culture-Organizational History. February 29, 2020, taken from https://www.boch.gov.tw/content_129.html
- Kaohsiung City Government Cultural Bureau-Development History. February 22, 2020, take khcc.gov.tw/rwd_home02.aspx?ID=$1101&IDK=2&DATA=249&EXEC=L
- Kaohsiung City Government Cultural Bureau-Organizational Vision. February 22, 2020, taken from khcc.gov.tw/rwd_home02.aspx?ID=$1101&IDK=2&EXEC=L&DATA=37328&AP=$1101_HISTORY-0
- Kaohsiung City Government Cultural Bureau-Traditional Crafts. February 22, 2020, from heritage.khcc.gov.tw/HeritageList.aspx?appname=TraditionalCraft&Type=TraditionalCraft
- Cultural Bureau of Kaohsiung City Government-Cultural Assets. March 1, 2020, taken from http://heritage.khcc.gov.tw/HeritageList.aspx?appname=heritage02&Type=HistoricalRelics
- Kaohsiung City Government Cultural Bureau-Qihou Yantai. March 1, 2020, taken fromhttp://heritage.khcc.gov.tw/Heritage.aspx?KeyID=0cf33b4c-91f4-47ca-af9c-547cd2bef4d1
- Ministry of Culture-Cultural News. March 1, 2020, taken fromhttps://www.moc.gov.tw/information_250_96999.html
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