Chien-chi Chang at Frieze New York Art Fair
By Billy Kung
At the recent Frieze New York Art Fair, Chi-Wen Gallery (Taipei) presented two black-and-white photo series by Austria-based Taiwanese photographer Chien-Chi Chang: “Escape from North Korea” (2007–11) and “China Town” (1992–2011).
Born in Taiwan in 1961, Chang studied at Soochow University, China, and at Indiana University, USA. He joined Magnum photographic cooperative in 1995 and became a full-time member in 2001. Perhaps best known for his early work “The Chain” (1993–99), a collection of full-body portraits of men and women chained together in pairs at a mental asylum in Taiwan, which explored concepts of those marginalized and dispossessed.
