Purposed in Function

The development of design in Taiwan over the past century traces its origins to the period of Japanese colonial rule, when the approach of "fine arts as the core, design as the application" — balancing form with function — was adopted in service of colonial administration: disseminating government directives, promoting industry, and developing tourism. Applied design first emerged to meet the practical needs of daily life, appearing commonly in posters, publications, leaflets, picture postcards, advertisements, and packaging. As artistic design came to permeate the everyday domains of food, clothing, shelter, transportation, education, and recreation, ordinary people gained access to aesthetic cultivation and cultural enrichment through the objects of their daily lives. In this sense, artistic design may be understood as a "museum of everyday aesthetics for the common people."

This unit takes as its starting point the picture postcards issued to commemorate successive anniversaries of Japanese rule in Taiwan. In 1905, Wada Sanzo produced six picture postcards for the tenth anniversary of colonial rule — the earliest known example of this form in Taiwan, and the work that initiated the involvement of prominent Japanese artists in Taiwanese applied design. Alongside poster designs created to promote tourism and the export of tea and sugar, a diverse range of stylistic approaches emerged, including Western oil painting, Japanese bijinga, and Shanghai yuefenpai aesthetics, all united by a goal-oriented design sensibility in keeping with the principle of "purposed in function." Also featured are Tsukamoto Koji's (1896–1965) poster for the Taiwan Exposition marking the fortieth anniversary of colonial administration, and Yen Shui-long's poster designed for Osaka's Smoca tooth powder — both now regarded as iconic images in the history of Taiwanese artistic design. The unit concludes with the establishment of the Graphic Design Association of the Republic of China in 1962, Taiwan's first professional design organization, and the corporate identity systems designed by Ochi Hiroshi (1908–1974) and Kuo Shu-hsiung (1934–), which together mark the opening movement of modern professional design in Taiwan.