The Orange Figures by Lien-Chun Yu – 2136期

BY 沈容安(Bernice Shen)

With the coming of Tomb Sweeping Day and Children’s day, the spring break is the most exciting holiday at the beginning of April. Instead of going outside hiking, cultural events like exhibition-viewing has become more and more popular for people to spend their holiday.

The “Orange Figures（顏形橘指）” is Lien-Chun Yu’s（余連春）personal sculpture exhibition which is held at Hua Shan1914 Creative Park（華山1914文創園區）. Yu creates the sculptures in his own unique way. And there are lots of different categories of his creations which includes stainless steel series, terracotta life series, iron-welding tenderness series and terracotta human form series.

The word “terracotta（土塑燒）” is borrowed from Italy which means the clay sculpture heated with fire and. Terracotta is the main material in Yu’s works. He’s an expert in turning rugged clays into soft female forms. The human figures he made are not only smooth but also strong, and wild but also graceful.

“I think the works made by Yu all carried insightful meanings,” said Richard Kiang（江欽聰）, “The sculptures express the vicissitudes of life and the feeling of the creating moments. And those who ever went through hard times can see the artistic conceptions of creator’s living experiences.”

Yu finished his study in Japan in 1994. When he went back to Taiwan, he found that terracotta was very rare here. So he committed himself to popularize this material and improved the skill of  this art. After overcoming the problem of the sculpture crumbling and other difficulties, he even established his own feature of terracotta. He not only devotes all of his time to this work but also opens a new vista of art in Taiwan.