SHYU Ruey-Shiann is one of the pioneering artists in Taiwan’s contemporary kinetic art movement. In the first ten years of his art education, Shyu focused on academic western paintings and sculptures. In 1993, he began his studies at Aix-en-Provence Art College, in the south of France. His interest in man-made objects and mechanical movements in this period led the path to the exploration of non-traditional media and machine-oriented art. When he returned to Taiwan in 1997, endowed with hands-on knowledge of modern art and contemporary theory, kinetic art became the cornerstone of his creativity and the chosen language in expressing his visions on life, memory, and issues on social and political concerns. Shyu’s work has appeared in museums and galleries worldwide, including The National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, Taichung; Location One, New York; Stone Villa, Sydney; Kaohsiung Fine Arts Museum; Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei; Hong Kong Arts Center; Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts, Australia; Eslite Art Gallery, Taipei; Taipei Fine Arts Museum; Montbeliard, France; the Bronx Museum of the Arts; the ISE Foundation in New York. Currently, SHYU’s kinetic installation work Eight Drunken Immortals is exhibited at the White Rabbit Galley in Sydney and will travel to Long Beach Museum of Art in California. Shyu has received many awards such as the Taipei Award of Taipei Fine Arts Museum; the Creation Awards of Lee Chung Sheng Art Foundation; the Yageo Tech-Art Award of the Asian Cultural Council of New York.
