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The Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts (KMFA) is located in the Neiweipi Cultural Park, the original area of the Neiweipi Wetland, at the northwestern corner of Kaohsiung city. Love River runs through this area with Guishan and Banpingshan in the north and Shoushan that runs north and south in the west ofthe area, forming a scenic landscape embraced by mountainsand rivers.

 

The Neiweipi Cultural Park is an area of 40 hectares demarcated by Meishu E. 2nd Rd., Meishuguan Rd., Makadao Rd., and Mingcheng 4th Rd. The Cultural Park is known for its integration of cultural landscape and natural ecology. In addition to the premises of the KMFA, it also includes the Children's Art Museum, the Sculpture Park, the Ecology Park, and the Austronesian Cultural Area, offering citizens a multi-functional living park with features of arts, culture, leisure, natural ecology, and
education.

 

Surrounding the perimeter of the KMFA, the alluring trail of Madagascar almonds is recognized as one of the most beautiful walking trail in the city. The park's mesmerizing lake embodies the original ecological system of the wetland. Through the diverse topography, ecological engineering, and separating leisure areas for crowd and habitats for wildlife, the ecological restoration in the park has been tremendously successful, attracting innumerous precious wildfowls that visit or settle
down here and forming a lively park of eco-diversity.

 

Moreover, 37 sculptures tranquilly stand amidst the natural environs of the park, revealing changing looks and features at various moments of the day. The distinctive Austronesian artworks and characteristic plants in the park form a cultural site, which originates from the Austronesian Contemporary Art Development Project hosted by the KMFA for many years and demonstrates the uniqueness of Taiwan as the origin of Austronesian
cultural lineage.

 

In the future, Kaohsiung City's overall urban planning will introduce major transportation improvements to the KMFA park, including the underground railway as well as the Museum station of the light rail transit system, bringing an expectable increase of tourists. Together with the expanding urban greenways and leisure facilities, the park shall become the most exuberant and lively "lungs of the city" in the urban area of northern Kaohsiung. The KMFA is expected to become a crucial interface that bridges and integrates the newly developed and historic neighborhoods, and revitalizes and increases the overall value of the area and its further development.


At this decisive moment of reformation, the KMFA team shall adopt diverse approaches of management to transform the entire park and museum into a site of new lifestyle that integrates arts, education, nature, and leisure life. We shall also incorporate more creative elements of contemporary art, architecture, design and community development to expand the public's horizon and introduce more opportunities for carrying out dialogues between Kaohsiung and the world.

Towards a New Museum

The Louvre's Abu Dhabi branch is expected to open in 2017, and has now entered the final count down. The Centre Georges-Pompidou has announced its plan to establish a Shanghai branch in China. Meanwhile, in Taiwan, the construction works of several museums are already in full swing. Taking a retrospective glance at the history of museum development over the past two centuries, each wave of new museums has been a response to the transitioning times and rapid socio-cultural changes. It was also an attempt to re-examine the interaction and relationship between museums and the public in order to find a more active and initiative position of museums in society. As the Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts (KMFA) faces the diverse modes of the contemporary life that emphasizes communication, learning, leisure, and entertainment, an important task for the museum at present is how to transform itself in order to match the public's expectation.

Creating an Artistic and Cultural Life Circle with Unique Space and Ambience

Nowadays, when people visit a museum, in addition to quietly viewing artworks and learning about art, more importantly, they are offered an opportunity for a spatial experience that is different from their everyday life. The KMFA is richly endowed with forty hectares of greenland with ecological diversity and has the only independent Children's Art Museum in Taiwan. While the Kaohsiung City is re-designing its overall cultural and leisure blueprint with major transportation construction, including the Taiwan Railway and Kaohsiung Rapid Transit underground projects and the newly added Museum Station of the Light Rail Transit, the KMFA is also striving to
transform into an ecological and artistic park with the museum as its core. Through diversified and characteristic guided tours as well as introducing participatory exhibitions and performances in the park, visitors are offered a life circle of arts and culture centering on communication, learning, leisure, and entertainment.

Forming an Exchange Platform That Generates Creative Ideas

Through offering a chance to encounter different things, the museum becomes a tangible as well asan intangible platform of exchange for the contemporary society. In the museum, visitors encounter artworks, artists, art events, and even the hidden self from some corner of their heart while viewing art. I expect that the KMFA can engage the audience in a more energetic and active way and further become the generator of urban creativity. You can look forward to the future when the KMFA becomes the
best destination filled with surprises and creativity in people's daily life after the museum is completely transformed with its organization reformed and the exhibition facilities and hardware upgraded. Situated at a crucial juncture of Kaohsiung's transportation network and as the core of the city's cultural tourism, we shall endeavor in making the KMFA an essential hub of arts and life, culture and tourism, and for the local residents and the world—the creatively charged cultural institution that our
Kaohsiung citizens are proud of.