In 1998, Lin & Keng Gallery reached an important turning point in its history with its relocation to a new space on Dunhua South Road, marking the beginning of a new stage in the gallery’s development.
Compared with its previous location within an office building, the new space offered a more open setting and enabled the gallery to establish a closer relationship with the city and a broader audience. Beyond serving as a professional space for artists, cultural practitioners, collectors, and art enthusiasts, the gallery sought to create more opportunities for the public to encounter art through exhibitions, publications, and related programs.
The new space officially opened on July 24, 1998, with a relocation opening exhibition presented in two series. Pioneer Chinese Artists featured works by Lin Fengmian, Guan Liang, Sanyu, Wu Dayu, Yun Gee, Yang Qiuren, Wu Guanzhong, and Zao Wou-Ki. The second series, Contemporary Artists, brought together Li-Lan, Wang Huaiqing, Huang Rongxi, Zheng Zaidong, Yang Maolin, Fan Chiang Ming Dao, Xu Jiang, Yu Peng, Huang Chin-Ho, Chen Guoqiang, Hsueh Pao-Hsia, and Lin Ju. The two series, presented alongside one another, articulated the artistic perspective that Lin & Keng Gallery had developed since its establishment: tracing the development of twentieth-century Chinese art while maintaining an ongoing engagement with contemporary artistic practices. The contemporary series is also documented in the artists’ exhibition records as Relocation Opening Exhibition II — Contemporary Artists.
Since its establishment in 1992, Lin & Keng Gallery had gradually developed several interconnected strands of practice. From its early focus on introducing Western modern art to Taiwan, the gallery went on to organize exhibitions devoted to artists including Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Georges Rouault, André Masson, Francis Bacon, and Wifredo Lam. It subsequently expanded its activities toward the research and presentation of early twentieth-century Chinese art, including exhibitions devoted to Wu Dayu and Guan Liang, as well as projects concerning the pioneers of Western art in the early Republican period and the teachers and students of the Hangzhou Academy of Art.
At the same time, the gallery continued to support research, exhibitions, and publications devoted to Chinese artists who had worked overseas, including Sanyu, Yun Gee, and Zao Wou-Ki. Through exhibition catalogues and related publications, it gradually built up an important body of documentation and research concerning these artists. Alongside this historical research, the gallery continued to engage with contemporary art and collaborate with artists from different generations. Exhibition-making, art-historical research, artist representation, and publishing thus became interconnected aspects of the gallery’s practice. The gallery’s current institutional history likewise describes its long-term commitment to promoting Chinese modern and contemporary art and to tracing the development of Chinese aesthetics across different generations.
The relocation in 1998 was therefore more than a change of physical address. Seven years after its establishment, it marked a moment in which Lin & Keng Gallery further articulated the direction of its practice. From early twentieth-century Chinese art and overseas Chinese artists to contemporary art, the gallery gradually developed its own historical and artistic framework through sustained work in exhibitions, research, and publishing.
The relocation also became an important point in the gallery’s subsequent history. The gallery continued to present exhibitions by artists across different generations and to develop its engagement with both modern and contemporary Chinese art. The 1998 opening exhibition is recorded in the gallery’s exhibition archive as one of the key exhibitions of that year.
