Work Song 「工作之歌」

Lana Lopesi  拉娜·羅培茲

Treasure Hill, Upper Ray Gallery No.11 寶藏巖，上光巷11號展間

14.5.2016 – 12.6.2016

Work Song is a solo exhibition by Lana Lopesi of new work made in Taipei.

Through a western understanding of the world, Asia and the Pacific are often siphoned into two disparate groups. However contemporary Asia and Pacific cultures reveal significant similarities.

Historically, movement across the Pacific Ocean through Taiwan has been proven through shared DNA, but is also evident in tattooing practices and shared indigenous imagery. The most obvious evidence of a non-imperial Asia Pacific relationship is a shared staple diet including taro and coconut.

The dispersal of food groups not only happened during Austronesian settlement of the Pacific Islands but also later in the 19th Century through multiple movements of indentured labour. Chinese, Japanese and Indian communities were recruited to work in plantations such as sugar, copra, cacao, coconut, and taro in the countries of Samoa, Fiji and Hawaii. Long term settlement of these labour forces completely changed staple diets across the Pacific once again.

Through new work Lopesi is exploring how the plantation can be a canon of both indigenous knowledge and cultural influence. 

工作之歌」是拉娜·羅培茲的個展，將展出她於台北國際藝術村駐村期間的新作品。

在西方的世界觀中，亞洲和太平洋國家時常被視為兩個截然不同的群體，然而，現今的亞洲和太平洋國家文化顯示彼此有顯著的相似性。經由近似的生物DNA共同基因顯示，我們已經證實了歷史上，人們由台灣遷移至太平洋各處的足跡，不僅如此，從各地的刺青文化表現和相似的在地意象等等，都能夠找到彼此關聯的蛛絲馬跡。然而，最能夠說明非帝國殖民主義之亞太國家間的共通性，則是這些國家中共同的主要飲食，如芋頭和椰子。

相似食物群的散播，不僅發生在南島語系民族遷往太平洋群島定居的時期，也藉由其後19世紀時複雜多樣的勞工外移而散布開來。來自中國、日本、和印度的勞工群體，廣泛地在薩摩亞、斐濟和夏威夷等國的殖民地上，種植蔗糖、椰核、可可、椰子和芋頭等作物，這些勞工族群的長期定居，也再度造成橫跨整個太平洋國家的主要飲食徹底改變。

羅培茲將透過她的新作品，探討太平洋中的曾被殖民的國家，如何在其原始住民知識與後來殖民文化的交互影響下，形成現今的共通準則。