A touring exhibition of works of art by people who have been on death row began yesterday at the Bopiliao Historic Block in Taipei’s Wanhua District (萬華), with organizers inviting people to ponder inmates’ potential to change and alternatives to the death penalty.
The Not Who We Were exhibition displays more than 20 calligraphy works or paintings by 15 people, including Cheng Hsing-tse (鄭性澤), who spent 14 years behind bars until he was acquitted in 2017.
Not every prison offers art classes, but he had the opportunity to learn Chinese painting from 2014 at a prison in Taichung, Cheng told a news conference.
Photo: Sam Yeh / AFP
Some inmates sent their work to family members, but in that way, members of society would not see how they had changed, he said.
“The death penalty is not the only way to solve problems. I hope people can see the possibilities for inmates who are sentenced to death,” he said.
The exhibition features a simulated prison ward of 1.368 ping (4.5m2) with one toilet and two beds.
Some people say that inmates live a comfortable life, but the simulated cell shows that the walled space with only one window is very narrow, Taiwan Alliance to End the Death Penalty executive director Lin Hsin-yi (林欣怡) said.
Death row inmates are usually known for their worst acts, but few know how they can transform after being in prison, Lin said.
The exhibition aims to encourage people to see the possibility of change in inmates and how that might be prompted through social assistance, she said.
Trade Office of Swiss Industries deputy director Beatrice Latteier, who also attended the opening, said she is impressed by the artwork and wished she could read the calligraphic characters so she could understand the creators’ mindsets.
“For Switzerland, the promotion of human rights is an important concern and a foreign policy goal. The death penalty is against human rights and is neither a deterrent nor does it contribute to reconciliation,” Latteier said.
Hopefully, Taiwanese society would be open to discuss the abolition of capital punishment, with both sides willing to communicate, she said.
The exhibition in Taipei runs through July 26 and would travel to Miaoli County from Aug. 1 to 9 and to Tainan from Aug. 22 to Sept. 3.
An apartment building in New Taipei City’s Sanchong District (三重) collapsed last night after a nearby construction project earlier in the day allegedly caused it to tilt. Shortly after work began at 9am on an ongoing excavation of a construction site on Liuzhang Street (六張街), two neighboring apartment buildings tilted and cracked, leading to exterior tiles peeling off, city officials said. The fire department then dispatched personnel to help evacuate 22 residents from nine households. After the incident, the city government first filled the building at No. 190, which appeared to be more badly affected, with water to stabilize the
Taiwan plans to cull as many as 120,000 invasive green iguanas this year to curb the species’ impact on local farmers, the Ministry of Agriculture said. Chiu Kuo-hao (邱國皓), a section chief in the ministry’s Forestry and Nature Conservation Agency, on Sunday said that green iguanas have been recorded across southern Taiwan and as far north as Taichung. Although there is no reliable data on the species’ total population in the country, it has been estimated to be about 200,000, he said. Chiu said about 70,000 iguanas were culled last year, including about 45,000 in Pingtung County, 12,000 in Tainan, 9,900 in
DEEPER REVIEW: After receiving 19 hospital reports of suspected food poisoning, the Taipei Department of Health applied for an epidemiological investigation A buffet restaurant in Taipei’s Xinyi District (信義) is to be fined NT$3 million (US$91,233) after it remained opened despite an order to suspend operations following reports that 32 people had been treated for suspected food poisoning, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. The health department said it on Tuesday received reports from hospitals of people who had suspected food poisoning symptoms, including nausea, vomiting, stomach pain and diarrhea, after they ate at an INPARADISE (饗饗) branch in Breeze Xinyi on Sunday and Monday. As more than six people who ate at the restaurant sought medical treatment, the department ordered the
ALLEGED SABOTAGE: The damage inflicted by the vessel did not affect connection, as data were immediately rerouted to other cables, Chunghwa Telecom said Taiwan suspects that a Chinese-owned cargo vessel damaged an undersea cable near its northeastern coast on Friday, in an alleged act of sabotage that highlights the vulnerabilities of Taipei’s offshore communications infrastructure. The ship is owned by a Hong Kong-registered company whose director is Chinese, the Financial Times reported on Sunday. An unidentified Taiwanese official cited in the report described the case as sabotage. The incident followed another Chinese vessel’s suspected involvement in the breakages of data cables in the Baltic Sea in November last year. While fishing trawlers are known to sometimes damage such equipment, nation states have also
RSS