How a new generation of Indigenous artists is redefining Taiwan’s contemporary art scene

After Indigenous artist Sakuliu Pavavaljung was stripped of Taiwan’s National Award for Arts following his sexual-assault conviction in April, curators and artists have pointed to a generational shift in Taiwan’s Indigenous contemporary art scene. Two prominent 2025 projects highlighted this change: the Taipei Performing Arts Center presented the Taiwan debut of Hagay Dreaming in May, a collaboration between Shu Lea Cheang and Truku artist Dondon Hounwn that premiered at Tate Modern in London in 2025, and Tai Body Theatre won the Taishin Arts Award grand prize in June as the first Indigenous collective to do so. Curator Wei-Lun Lu said artists emerging since the 2010s—often academy-trained—have increasingly used video and performance and engaged “white-cube” exhibition contexts, challenging paradigms set in the 1990s and 2000s. The article notes Indigenous peoples make up about 2.5% of Taiwan’s population across 17 officially recognized nations, and it highlights institutional developments such as the Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts’ contemporary Austronesian art program launched in 2005 and the Pulima Art Award established in 2012, which returns next year alongside the second Taiwan International Austronesian Art Triennial in Pingtung.

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