/ Video Sandbox III-IV：The Eight Muscle Clans of Master ShaoMao

The Eight Muscle Clans of Master ShaoMao by Liao Yu Jing, the fourth artist of the third edition of the Video Sandbox program, is presented in the “Memory” gallery on the first floor of ALIEN Art Centre. The work reflects the experimental spirit of emerging Taiwanese moving-image artists, responding to historical narratives and image politics through embodied action. Since its establishment in 2023, the Video Sandbox program has sought to transform ALIEN Art Centre into a site for artistic creation and experimentation through curatorial support, open calls, and exhibition-based practice.

The 2025 edition, themed Retro Simulator, reflects on the dominance of technologically enhanced images and the pursuit of hyper-realism in contemporary visual culture. Within this curatorial framework, Liao Yu Jing draws on the historical figure Lin Shao-mao, an anti-Japanese resistance leader active in southern Taiwan during the early Japanese colonial period. Incorporating the aesthetics of early Taiwanese television variety shows, the work translates fitness movements into a visual language of bodily resilience and resistance, inviting viewers to reconsider how history, memory, and the body are mediated through images.


The Eight Muscle Clans of Master ShaoMao

This film takes inspiration from Lin Shao-Mao (林少貓), one of the “Three Great Anti-Japanese Heroes” (San Meng) from the early years of Japanese colonial rule. Drawing upon historical records to reconstruct Lin’s life events, routes, and personality, the work merges specialized physical movements with contemporary landscapes, reanimating a historical figure once obscured by dominant narratives.

The project investigates the armed anti-Japanese resistance active in southern Taiwan between 1895 and 1902, tracing Lin Shao-Mao’s path from Pingtung to Linyuan and Xiaogang in Kaohsiung. Following his likely movements, the artist arrived at Longpan Cave in Fengshan—believed to have housed Lin’s family—and engaged with several key sites: the Former Dinglinzibian Police Station, her grandmother’s rice fields in Linyuan, Longpan Cave, and the Formosan gum tree (Bischofia javanica), said to be the last plant Lin ever touched. These sites constitute the spatial framework through which memory, history, and body intertwine.

During Japan’s colonial period, photographs documenting the surrender of rebel leaders—including Lin Shao-Mao—served as disciplinary and politically charged images rather than simple memorial portraits. These “bandit portraits” were produced to visualize the colonial authorities’ success in suppressing resistance. In response, this work explores an alternative mode of visual storytelling: filming locations, handheld objects, and subtitled texts become interlinked references to Lin’s character and livelihood. Through symbolic fitness movements, the body becomes a signifier of resilience and defiance, rendered in a visual style reminiscent of vintage Taiwanese television effects. This localized visual language reanimates the legend of a southern Taiwanese folk hero, allowing his presence to resonate within contemporary space.