計劃目標主旨暨策展訴求：

自從2001年開始，持續兩年一度舉辦的「國際貨櫃藝術節」已然成為高雄的城市文明特色。每一只貨櫃藝術作品，都見證了這近十年來船業運輸在高雄邁向文明前進時的勢力消長。藝術家們的妙手讓每一只空櫃無中生有，也將嚴重扭曲、鐵銹橫生的廢櫃整理、再利用，演繹出我們想像不到的精采創意。種種創意，都提點出我們以貨櫃為創作媒材，除了反映環保回收的實質利益外，還有更重要的意義：人們在現實生活中追求的精神層次。而這也是我們在這一屆的貨櫃創作主題，試圖讓每只貨櫃都能成為構築一個「理想城市」的雛型。

2009年貨櫃藝術以「邁向理想城市的N種想法」為創作主題，結合貨櫃表面塗裝或內部互動裝置等，匯集國內、外傑出的當代藝術家發揮創意，為民眾在櫃體內、外設計一個邁向理想的城市中，人們可以想像的生活藍圖。藝術家可運用貨櫃表面塗裝或櫃內裝置，營造一個微型的創意建築空間或是娛樂生活模式。

本展期望能讓觀眾透過貨櫃節既「神秘」又「開放」的特質，分享到藝術家精妙、幽默或別具深意的巧思，超越貨櫃冷硬、巨大的量體威脅，帶給大家對生活更多的想像空間。藉由貨櫃藝術節，期許高雄身為台灣這個島國的重要海港城市，能散發出無窮的海洋魅力。

參與展出的創作者們，透過櫃裡、櫃外的裝置或塗裝，營造一個微型的創意建築空間、心靈修行場域或是大眾最期待的娛樂生活模式等，讓每只貨櫃除卻承載意義之外，還成為我們微觀這個世界多元思考的展現；同時也期待透過國際徵件的交流觀摩，人們有更多機會思考「全球化」觀點與自身文化、生活間的衝擊。

Goals and Curatorial Vision

The International Container Arts Festival was first held in 2001, and has been held once every two years since that time. The container arts festival has now become a major cultural event in Kaohsiung City. Each work of container bears witness to the role of shipping in the advance of civilization in Kaohsiung over the most recent decade. Thanks to the artists' versatile talents, each empty container is transformed from nothing to something, and the rust-filled, warped waste containers are neatened up and reused as unimaginably creative art. Apart from promoting the real environmental benefit of recycling, the use of scrap cargo containers as an artistic medium also invokes an even more important idea: That people can pursue spiritual fulfillment even in real, everyday life. This is the theme of this year's container arts festival, and we encourage the artists to transform each container into the prototype of an "ideal city."

The theme of the 2009 Container Arts Festival is "Ideas for an Ideal City." Together with external surface finishes or internal interactive installations, containers can allow outstanding domestic and foreign contemporary artists to exercise their artistic talents, and give visitors an imaginable blueprint of the ideal city through the internal or external design of a container. The artists can paint their containers or install devices in order to create micro innovative architectural spaces or entertainment or living models.

Because containers are both mysterious and open, it is expected that this exhibition will enable visitors to appreciate the artists' subtlety, humor, and deeply meaningful ideas, and help them overcome their impressions of the containers' coldness and threatening bulk, giving them more room in which to exercise their imaginations. We also hope that the container arts festival will reveal the boundless maritime charm of Kaohsiung – this great port city of the island nation of Taiwan.

Artists who wish to participate in the container arts festival can employ internal installation or external painting to create micro-architectural spaces, places for the cultivation of the soul, or popular entertainment and living models. Each container conveys meaning, and can also serve as a micro-expression of far-ranging ideas about the world. We further look forward to the interchange and learning that will occur with the participation of foreign artists, and more opportunities for people to think about the impact of globalization on their culture and lives.