Iyo shrinks his shoulder and lowers his head, seems quite cramped on driver’s seat. He is too big for this car. The body shape reminds me of the work at Hualien Cultural Park: The Internal Structure of Land. It is a giant which is composed with wood chips sitting on the concrete floor. It holds a red heart and the blood inside being non-stop transfused to branches, plants, pads and Taipei 101 on its head.
Before I have a chance to ask Iyo why he moves his studio Jinpu, our car stops at an ordinary townhouse. An electric saw shrills abruptly the air. The noise makes me wonder if I interrupt Iyo’s work. He assures me it is fine for the huge cylindrical wood piece standing here is almost finished. Like The Internal Structure, it is collaged with long and thin wood clips to circle the internal structure of steel. The top of tube is open and a water-tap is installed underneath.
Iyo calls this piece kahicera’an, means gathering here. In the old times, his peoples called the place where collects drift woods or fishes ‘kahicera’an’. Iyo sees Shitiping Scenic Recreation, the future home for this art piece, rain-collecting tube, and all kinds of the wood clips on it as camphorwood, cypress, beechwood, Formosan michelia, Chinese elm, and red cedar are all kahicera’an.
‘I will invite people to draw on wood clips, people from my village, children and friends, to draw their feelings towards land. I will collage these clips to my work afterwards. They will be like blessings.’ He gave me a piece of clip and asked:’ would you like to draw one?’ I declined and said I am bad at drawing. He replied with smile ‘That’s ok, me too.’ This is his first try to include his community people in his creation, another form of gathering to him.
Distance with the public is tricky as working in village. Iyo’s studio used to locate at Shitiping. Having a café opened the studio more to the public. ‘No matter how busy I was, there were tourists would just walk in and ask “what are you doing now?”’ People still do that now but it is much quieter after his studio relocating to Jinpu. Be that as it may, Iyo doesn’t really want to build an isolated space to work. He wants to intrigue the young’s curiosity as he was attracted to the displays of village artist’s studio when he was a teenager.