《From the Surface Outward: The Visual Construction in Chen Tao-Ming’s Canvas Experiments, 2003–2017 》

Abstract

This paper examines the canvas-based works of Taiwanese artist Chen Tao-Ming between 2003 and 2017, focusing on how his late-period paintings reconstruct the conditions of seeing through the manipulation of time, gesture, and visual structure. In contrast to his earlier experiments on paper (1975–2003), which centered on perceptual training and subconscious operations, Chen’s later works on canvas form what may be called “architectures of perception”—spaces shaped by layered traces, deferred completion, and a resistance to visual legibility.

This study addresses three interrelated aspects: first, the temporally extended and tool-driven spatial logic behind his painterly process; second, the deliberate design of visual disruption and perceptual disorientation; and third, the challenges these works pose to curatorial systems and the politics of visibility in contemporary exhibition contexts.Ultimately, this paper argues that Chen’s canvas experiments are not merely an extension of abstract painting, but constitute a radical inquiry into the ethics of

viewing, the instability of perception, and the structural limits of art historical categorization.

How Vision Is Generated: Research Problem and Theoretical Framework

After nearly three decades of experimentation on paper, Chen Tao-Ming returned to canvas in 2003, initiating a late period in his artistic career that remains both highly distinctive and underexplored. This study focuses on this phase of canvas-based work (2003–2017), seeking to investigate how structures of vision and conditions of perception are generated within the works themselves.

Unlike his earlier paper-based phase (1975–2003), which emphasized the permeability and spontaneity of paper materials, Chen’s later canvas works engage more complex strategies of surface layering, optical illusion, and spatial construction. These paintings continue his philosophical inquiry into the nature of vision, yet they do so through materially distinct strategies—deploying form and gesture to create three-dimensional, architectural, and even installation-like perceptual experiences.

This paper examines the canvas period from three interrelated perspectives. First, it explores how Chen’s manipulation of tools and temporality constructs what may be called architectures of perception—visual

structures with spatial depth. Second, it analyzes the blurred boundaries between image and non-image in his works, which destabilize the act of seeing and render perception contingent and unresolved. Third, it interrogates how these untitled, unclassifiable, and non- stylized works confront the demands of the contemporary exhibition system and open space for a different mode of interpretation—one rooted in the invisibility and indeterminacy of art itself.

Architectures of Perception on Canvas: From Experiments with Tools to the Spatialization of Time

After returning to canvas in 2003, Chen Tao-Ming did not continue the material substitutions characteristic of his paper-based period. Instead, he redirected his focus to the transformation of the brush itself. He employed unconventional tools such as industrial wire brushes, dental grinders, floor polishers, and self-made bamboo pens—implements no longer intended for traditional writing or painting, but for generating unstable, heterogeneous, and asymmetric traces that disrupt habitual modes of seeing.

These gestures were not merely formal experiments; they constructed a spatial experience. Through these marks, Chen built visual scaffolding and fissures— compositions that resembled cross-sections of space, compelling viewers to navigate through dislocations and

perceptual shifts. His paintings no longer relied on identifiable images or recognizable styles, but rather induced a state of delay, fragmentation, and disorientation in the act of viewing.

In addition to tools, Chen treated time as a critical instrument in his practice. Canvases were often left untouched in his studio for weeks or even months, allowing pigments to transform and the surface structure to emerge autonomously. His goal was not the expression of emotion or inspiration, but a kind of fermentation—time was invited to seep into the visual formation, turning the genesis of the image into a slow and uncertain process.

He frequently paused mid-painting, leaving the work unfinished for extended periods, allowing materials to settle, crack, or shift naturally. These temporal traces, when interwoven with the mark-making process, became not just records of production but the very conditions for perceptual engagement. The work ceased to be a finished artifact and became an evolving site of perception.

His canvases never sought theatricality or legibility. Instead, they became records of process—holding within them residues of erasure, delay, and touch: smudges from fingertips, pooled water stains, errant scrapes from palette knives, folds and cracks. These marks were not mistakes but ethical provocations—questions directed at

the viewer’s expectations. By refusing to stylize, to title, or to stage his work, Chen enacted a deliberate resistance against recognizability: painting not for display, not for naming, not for the marketplace.

These works are neither minimalist nor expressionist. Rather, they represent an architecture of perception jointly constructed by tool and time—unstable, de- imaged, yet rich with structure and rhythm. To view them is not to decode imagery but to experience how the image emerges, disappears, and reappears through time.

The most radical of these perceptual architectures can perhaps be seen in his late paintings designed for viewing through 3D glasses. This intervention was entirely analog in nature, relying solely on hand-painted color strategies without any mechanical or electronic manipulation. It was not a gesture toward technological spectacle, but a further materialization of the conditions of viewing. Without relying on digital or optical tricks, Chen used only brushwork and pigments—displaced warm and cool tones, carefully designed visual parallax

—to produce a spatial illusion that could only be

perceived through color-filtered lenses. Without the glasses, one sees only misalignment and interference.

This maneuver converted optical illusion into a structural condition of seeing, while also casting doubt on the “accuracy” of perception. The canvas was no longer a

transparent surface unfolding before the viewer but a layered structure full of thresholds—requiring viewers to become conscious of their own sensory position and cognitive habits. Precisely because these works withhold stable, singular access points, they more forcefully reveal seeing as a constructed process. The insertion of 3D glasses was not a spectacle of technology, but a provocation: a reorientation of viewing toward its own mechanisms and boundaries.

The Design of Visual Disruption: Interrupting Vision and Constructing Perceptual Devices

Since returning to canvas in 2003, Chen Tao-Ming’s paintings have ceased to function as carriers of stylistic identity or generators of imagery. Instead, they operate as machines that construct the very conditions of seeing. These paintings are not meant to show something; they are designed to alter how we see. They refuse identifiable subjects and recognizable forms, and instead actively set traps for vision—drawing viewers into a suspended state of “wanting to see but failing,” a realm of ambiguous perception in which things appear to emerge but never quite solidify.

This sense of visual disruption does not stem from compositional chaos or chromatic disorder. Rather, it arises from a carefully engineered interruption of vision.

Chen deliberately situates his images on the threshold between emergence and withdrawal, forcing the eye into a repetitive cycle of attempted recognition and inevitable failure. His paintings often contain ambiguous cues— traces resembling landscapes, shadows, figures, or symbols—yet they never resolve into clear, stable forms. These fleeting hints serve as catalysts for vision, momentarily sparking recognition only to dissolve into perceptual uncertainty.

Such treatment does not merely suspend the representational function of images; it fundamentally destabilizes the act of seeing. Traditional modes of viewing rely on the clarity of form and the legibility of narrative. In Chen’s works, however, the image is never meant to be “seen”; rather, it generates the conditions through which seeing itself is produced. What he orchestrates is not visual meaning, but the rhythm of vision; not representational content, but the bending and twisting of perceptual movement.

His surfaces are often composed of layered pigments and textures, evoking the feel of geological strata, weathered marks, or natural residue. Yet, upon prolonged viewing, one begins to detect intentional traces of intervention: a stroke carefully sanded down, an edge repeatedly reworked, a scratch that is abrupt yet surgically precise.

These are not random disruptions—they are calculated

disturbances, revealing the designed nature of visual

disorder. What seems like confusion is, in fact, a constructed perceptual device.

Rather than “painting images,” Chen operates on the threshold of perception itself. The image becomes a suspended process, not a finished product. Seeing becomes less a faculty of recognition and more an unstable state of experience. His canvases do not depict “present” images but function as threshold mechanisms

—spaces where emergence and failure intersect.

Crucially, this visual disruption does not rely on digital technologies or visual spectacle. It arises from a rethinking of the most basic elements of painting: canvas, pigment, tools, and time. These traditional materials are no longer subordinated to the task of image production, but are reconfigured as mechanisms that generate perceptual disorientation. The canvas becomes a site of experiment, where vision is no longer guaranteed, knowledge loses its footing, and perception is decentered.

These practices constitute a kind of philosophy of perception. Chen’s work resists naming, closure, and resolution. Instead, it opens up a space of doubt around the very act of seeing. Vision ceases to function as a transparent path to meaning, and instead becomes a suspended, interrupted, and reinitiated existential encounter.

Therefore, Chen’s canvas works are not merely abstract paintings or variations on visual language; they are deep critiques of contemporary visual regimes. He does not ask, “What is this painting?” but rather, “What kind of seeing is possible here—and how might we interrupt the assumptions and habits of looking?” By treating disorder as method and interruption as aim, his visual experiments transcend stylistic categorization and emerge as philosophical devices poised between being and perception.

Visibility and Its Boundaries: Exhibitional Conditions and Openings of Interpretation

Following his return to canvas in 2003, Chen Tao-Ming’s works gradually entered the visible field of contemporary art institutions. Represented by galleries, invited to participate in various commemorative and group exhibitions, and eventually collected by public art museums, his paintings—unlike those from his earlier paper-based period—now stood as tangible visual objects on the walls of galleries and museums, open to public view. Yet, when attempting to situate these works within art historical discourse or curatorial frameworks, one still encounters a persistent hesitation: What style do these paintings belong to? Within what context should they be placed?

This hesitation does not stem from their abstract nature. As the history of Abstract Expressionism has shown, non-narrative and non-denotative forms do not preclude mainstream recognition; on the contrary, they often constitute the very core of modernist visual language.

The issue here is not that Chen’s paintings are “difficult

to understand,” but rather that they deliberately resist offering clues to be understood. His works do not emphasize the stability of formal vocabulary, nor do they construct a coherent symbolic system or assert a personal style. They repeatedly delay the emergence and completion of imagery, refuse fixed naming, and resist any recognizable seriality.

In the context of contemporary exhibition practices, this approach is both liberating and problematic. Curatorial strategies often rely on “themes” or “styles” to organize visual experience and build narrative structures. Yet Chen Tao-Ming’s work fundamentally questions this organizational impulse. From the transformation of the brush to the choreography of time, his practice constructs an anti-theatrical mechanism of vision: images do not serve narration, compositions do not seek closure, and the act of seeing itself becomes the main protagonist.

As such, attempts to interpret his works using thematic, symbolic, or semantic curatorial languages risk over- interpretation or misdirection. What truly resonates with

the internal tension of these works is a curatorial language centered on “how vision is generated”—not the display of finished images, but a re-presentation of the perceptual conditions of delay, withdrawal, failure, and regeneration embedded in the act of painting.

Chen Tao-Ming’s canvas works therefore pose both a curatorial challenge and a deep proposition for contemporary visual discourse: in a culture oversaturated with images and burdened by semantic excess, he chooses to return vision to an unnamable origin. His canvas is not a medium for representation, but a site for the production of visual experience—not a space to depict something, but a field in which the viewer becomes aware of vision as an action and an ethical process of emergence.

Such practice opens a critical door for rethinking the basic assumptions of both art historical writing and curatorial interpretation. When an artist refuses self- naming, avoids stylistic consistency, rejects symbolic construction, and evades narrative organization, how do we engage with their work? Perhaps it is precisely in these uncategorizable and unnamed practices that we encounter a turning point in the conditions of contemporary vision—not to better understand an artist, but to relearn how to see.

《從平⾯出發：陳道明2003–2017年布上實驗的視覺建構》

摘要

本論⽂探討台灣藝術家陳道明於2003年⾄2017年間的布⾯創作，聚焦其如何在畫布上重構觀看條件、操作時間與筆的痕跡，並挑戰當代展演機制中的可

⾒性與詮釋邏輯。相較其1975–2003年紙上實驗階段

所展開的感知訓練與潛意識辯證，晚期布上作品呈現出⼀種由筆與時間共同構成的「知覺建築」，並透過錯視設計與感知裝置，引導觀看者進入⼀場持續延遲、未完成且去圖像化的觀看實驗。

本研究從三個⾯向切入：⼀、分析其非典型筆法與時間操作如何在畫布上建構出空間深度與觀看節 奏；⼆、探討其畫⾯中視覺錯亂的設計如何⽣成觀看中斷與感知的不穩定性；三、思考這類創作在當代展演語境中所⾯對的可⾒性邊界與策展詮釋挑戰。透過這些討論，本⽂主張：陳道明的布上作品不僅是抽象語⾔的延伸，更是對觀看⾏為、知覺裝置與展演倫理的深層反思與批判實踐。

⼀、觀看如何⽣成：問題意識與研究架構

在經歷近三⼗年的紙上實驗之後，陳道明於2003年重返布⾯，開啟他晚期藝術⽣涯中⼀段獨特⽽尚未被充分論述的創作時期。本研究聚焦於這段布上實驗（2003–2017）中所⽣成的觀看結構與感知條件，嘗試從作品本⾝出發，探究其視覺建構邏輯。

相較於1975–2003年的紙本階段，晚期布上作品不再強調紙材的滲透性與即興性，⽽轉向更複雜的肌理堆疊、錯視設計與空間建構。這些作品延續了他對

「觀看」本質的哲學思索，卻透過筆觸與時間的操

作、顏料層次的調度，將平⾯轉化為具感知阻⼒的視覺建築，甚⾄發展出近似裝置藝術的觀看裝置。

本論⽂將從三個核⼼⾯向切入分析：第⼀，筆與時間的操作如何在布⾯上⽣成⼀種具空間厚度的「知覺建築」；第⼆，圖像與非圖像之間的界線如何被模糊與滑動，使觀看經驗處於未完成與不穩定狀 態；第三，這類無標題、難歸類、非風格化的創作如何挑戰當代展演體系的分類邏輯與可視性規訓，並為「不可觀看的藝術」打開另⼀種詮釋開⼝。

⼆、布上的知覺建築：從筆的實驗到時間的空間化

2003年重返布⾯創作後，陳道明不再延續紙上階段的材料替換，⽽是將焦點轉向「筆」的轉換。他選

擇⼯業⽤鋼刷、醫⽤磨牙器、裝潢⽤打蠟機、⾃製

⽵籤筆等非典型⼯具作畫，這些筆不再是傳統書寫

⼯具，⽽是⽤以⽣成不穩定、不均質、不對稱的痕跡，挑戰觀看的慣性與認知。

這些操作不僅是形式實驗，更是⼀種空間感知的建構。他以筆的痕跡搭建出視覺的骨架與裂縫，使畫

⾯像是空間的剖⾯，讓觀者被迫在層層錯位與滑移中重構觀看的路徑。畫⾯不再依循圖像或風格的可識別性，⽽是讓觀看進入⼀種延遲、分層與迷路的狀態。

除了筆，他也將「時間」視為創作的關鍵⼯具。畫布常被他靜置於⼯作室中，有時歷時數週乃⾄數

⽉，等待顏料的變化與畫⾯結構的⾃我⽣成。他不是追求靈感或情緒表現，⽽是讓畫⾯「發酵」，讓時間滲入視覺構成，使圖像的發⽣成為⼀場緩慢且不確定的過程。

他經常畫到⼀半便停下，將畫作長時間擱置，讓顏料⾃然沉澱、乾裂或改變。這些時間所留下的痕 跡，與筆的操作交織成畫⾯的肌理構成——不再僅僅是創作的過程，⽽是觀看經驗的建構條件。

這些畫布從不追求表演性或可辨識性，⽽是成為創作過程的現場痕跡。他刻意保留那些非完成、被拭去、被等待的殘留痕跡——指腹輕抹、⽔痕堆積、刮⼑的錯動、皺摺與⿔裂——讓觀者感知到畫⾯不是「畫好」的，⽽是「正在」發⽣的。

這些痕跡並非錯誤，⽽是觀看倫理的提問。當他拒絕將畫⾯完成為風格語彙、拒絕為作品命名、甚⾄拒絕展演性（如系列化、可複製性），他所實踐的是⼀種「反可辨識性」的藝術態度——不為展⽰⽽畫、不為市場命名、不為機制表演。

這些作品不是極簡，也非表現主義，⽽是⼀種由筆與時間共同建構的「知覺建築」：不穩定、去圖像化、卻充滿結構與節奏的空間場域。觀看不再是辨識圖像，⽽是經歷圖像如何在時間中發⽣、被掩 覆、再出現。

這些知覺建築的最極致實驗，或許可⾒於他晚期使

⽤「3D眼鏡」觀看的布⾯作品中。這並非單純引入科技裝置以求視覺奇觀，⽽是⼀種對「觀看條件」進⼀步的具體化操作。他並未以數位或光學⼿段製作立體圖像，⽽是以冷暖⾊調的錯位筆勢與視差安排，創造⼀種需透過濾⾊鏡片才得以感知的空間錯視。在不使⽤數位輔助的情況下，他僅憑畫筆與顏

料，使觀看⾏為本⾝變得「條件化」——觀者唯有透過特定介⾯（3D眼鏡）才能進入畫⾯所設計的視覺深度，否則只能看到錯位與⼲擾。

這種操作將視覺錯覺轉化為觀看的⽣成條件，也進

⼀步提出對感知「正確性」的懷疑。畫⾯不再是以觀看者為中⼼展開的透明空間，⽽是設下⼀道道感知的⾨檻，使觀看者意識到⾃⾝的感官位置與認知習慣。正因為這些作品拒絕提供⼀種單⼀⽽穩定的觀看途徑，它們反⽽更強烈地揭⽰了「觀看」作為

⼀種建構過程的本質。3D眼鏡的介入並非科技的炫技，⽽是⼀場觀看條件的顛覆與轉向：不再是觀看畫⾯，⽽是觀看觀看本⾝的⽣成與邊界。

三、視覺錯亂的設計：觀看中斷與感知裝置

陳道明於2003年重返布⾯創作後，他的畫⾯不再是風格的承載體，也不是形象的⽣成場，⽽是觀看條件的製造機。畫，不是為了看⾒什麼；畫，是為了改變我們如何看。這些作品不僅拒絕可辨識的主題與形式，還主動設下觀看的陷阱，使觀者進入⼀種

「欲看⽽不能」、「彷彿看⾒⼜無法確定」的懸置狀態。

這種「視覺錯亂」並非來⾃構圖的混亂或顏⾊的失序，⽽是⼀種精密安排的觀看中斷。他刻意讓圖像處於⼀種即將浮現⼜旋即撤退的邊界，讓眼睛在不斷試圖辨認與不斷失效之間擺盪。畫⾯中經常浮現類似地貌、殘影、⼈形或符號的曖昧線索，卻從不讓它們真正落實為具體形象。這些線索像是觀看的觸媒，⼀閃⽽過，留下⼀種「彷彿曾⾒」的感知錯覺。

這種處理不僅解除圖像的再現功能，更瓦解了觀看的穩定性。傳統觀看仰賴形象的明確性與敘事的可循性，但在陳道明的畫中，圖像的功能從來不是被看⾒，⽽是⽣成「觀看的⽣成」本⾝。他設計的是觀看的節奏，⽽非畫⾯的意義。他創造的是知覺運動的彎折，⽽非畫⾯內容的表達。

這樣的畫⾯常出現層層堆疊的顏料與肌理，猶如地層、痕跡、氣象殘留，似有⼀種⾃然演化的氣息；但觀看越久，越會察覺其中潛藏著明確的⼈⼯痕 跡：⼀段被打磨的筆勢、⼀個被反覆修飾的邊界、

⼀道突⺎卻精準的刮痕——這些恰恰揭露了錯亂的

「設計性」，指出這種觀看⼲擾並非偶然，⽽是經營出來的感知裝置。

與其說他在畫畫，不如說他在操作知覺的臨界條 件。圖像不再是⼀種結果，⽽是⼀個懸置的過程。觀看不再是⼀種辨識能⼒，⽽是⼀場無法歸類的經驗狀態。這些畫⾯不是「在場」的圖像，⽽是「⽣成」與「失效」交會的邊界裝置。

更關鍵的是，這種視覺錯亂並不依靠任何科技⼿ 段，也無需數位擬真。它源⾃對最基本的繪畫元素的重新思考：畫布、顏料、⼯具與時間——這些傳統媒材，經過反轉與抵抗，不再服從於圖像⽣產的任務，⽽是被轉化為感知混亂的製造機制。畫⾯成為⼀個實驗場，在其中，觀看失去保障、知識失去依據、感知失去中⼼。

這些操作，正是⼀種知覺哲學的實踐。陳道明的畫作拒絕圖像的命名性與完成性，轉⽽建構⼀種對觀看⾏為本⾝的懷疑與鬆動。觀看不再是⼀種通往意義的通道，⽽是⼀場被延遲、被打斷、被重啟的存在經驗。

因此，這些布⾯作品不只是抽象畫，也不只是視覺語⾔的變奏，⽽是對當代觀看機制的深層批判。他不問「這幅畫是什麼」，⽽是問「什麼樣的觀看可以發⽣？⼜如何中斷觀看的預設與慣性？」這種以錯亂為⽅法、以觀看中斷為⽬的的視覺實驗，讓他

的創作超越形式的分類，成為⼀種存在與感知之間的哲學裝置。

四、可⾒性與其邊界：展演境遇與詮釋開⼝

陳道明於2003年重啟布上創作後，逐漸進入當代美術體制的可⾒範圍。他的作品由畫廊代理，並受邀參與多次畫會紀念展與聯展，甚⾄被美術館納入典藏。這些作品不再如紙上期般隱沒⽽是在畫廊與美術館的展牆上，成為⾯對公共觀看的圖像實體。然

⽽，當我們試圖將這些作品納入藝術史或展覽機制時，卻仍⾯對⼀種詮釋的遲疑：這些作品究竟屬於什麼風格？⼜應置於哪種脈絡？

這種遲疑並非來⾃作品本⾝的抽象性。誠如抽象表現主義的歷史告訴我們，非敘事性與非命名性並不妨礙藝術作品進入主流關注；相反，它們往往正是現代藝術核⼼形式語⾔的⼀部分。因此，問題不在於「看不懂」，⽽在於這些畫作無意提供「被理 解」的線索。陳道明的布上作品不強調形式語彙的穩定性，也不刻意建構符號系統或⾃我風格。他的畫作反覆延遲圖像的⽣成與完成，拒絕固定命名，也不追求系列化的可辨認性。

在當代展覽語境中，這種創作態度既是⼀種⾃由，也是⼀種困境。策展實踐往往需倚賴某種「主題」或「風格」來組織視覺經驗與敘事結構，然⽽陳道明的作品卻是針對這種組織性本⾝提出質疑。從筆的轉換到時間的設計，他所建構的是⼀種反展演的觀看機制：圖像不為敘述服務，構圖不指向完成，

⽽觀看本⾝成為唯⼀的主⾓。

這也意味著，對於他的布上創作，若以主題式、象徵式或語意導向的策展語⾔進⾏詮釋，往往會落入過度解讀或錯置焦點的風險。真正能呼應這些作品內在張⼒的，是⼀種「觀看如何⽣成」的展演語⾔

——不是呈現畫作的結果，⽽是再現創作過程中那些延遲、撤退、失效與再⽣的觀看條件。

因此，陳道明的布上作品提出了⼀種策展上的挑 戰，也是⼀種深刻的當代表述可能性：在充滿圖像過剩與語義擁擠的視覺⽂化中，他選擇讓觀看重新回到無法命名的起點。他的畫布不是載體，⽽是視覺經驗的⽣產場；不是表現某物，⽽是引導觀者意識到「觀看」作為⼀種⾏動與倫理的⽣成⽅式。

這樣的實踐，也為我們重新思考藝術史書寫與策展詮釋的基本假設開啟了⼀扇⾨：當⼀位藝術家既不

⾃我命名、也不固定風格，既拒絕符號建構、⼜迴

避敘事組織時，我們該如何與之相遇？或許，正是在這些無法歸類與命名的作品中，我們看⾒了當代觀看條件的⼀種轉機——不是為了認識⼀位藝術 家，⽽是為了重新學習如何觀看。