top of page

Dirk Tsai (b. 1994, Taipei) received his MA degree in Fine Art from Chelsea College of Arts, University of the Arts London. His practice spans painting, sculpture, and spatial installation, focusing on the formation and transformation of perception across the body, time, and environment, while exploring the expansion and reconfiguration of painterly language within three-dimensional space.

 

His work is grounded in a methodology he describes as “sculptural painting.” Through the use of non-rectangular canvases and spatial structures, he transforms painting from a flat surface into a field of viewing that unfolds through movement. By embedding fleeting perceptual changes within static material structures, his works remain in flux, continuously shifting in relation to space and the viewer’s position.

 

In 2022, he received the Chelsea Arts Club Trust Award for Materials and Research. In 2024, he was awarded the Emerging Artist Grant from the Ministry of Culture, Taiwan, and was shortlisted for the sculpture category of the Da Dun Fine Arts Exhibition. In 2025, he was invited as an artist-in-residence at LIAN Museum in Hangzhou, China, and held his first solo exhibition, “Whispering Hues”, “Unnamed Shapes” in Taiwan and China.

|STATEMENT|

“Viewing is continuously reconstituted through movement in space.”

 

My practice originates from an unstable state of perception, focusing on how the body moves, pauses, and orients itself through its interaction with the surrounding environment. Walking through the city, turns alter bodily rhythm; shifts in light reshape the act of seeing; and the movement of scenery subtly affects breath and sensation. I seek to capture these small yet continuous changes and translate them into the starting point of my work.

 

This body of work extends the concept of “orientation” as proposed in Queer Phenomenology, understanding it as the process through which the body is guided, displaced, and positioned within the world. As orientation shifts, perception transforms, influencing how we understand time, memory, and our position within space. In this condition, memory is no longer a stable representation but a continuously deforming and fluid structure; time is no longer linear, but unfolds through layering, extension, and reconfiguration. I conceive this process as a form of spatializing experience—where time and perception are no longer confined to a flat surface, but become structures that can be physically encountered.

 

Formally, I work with sculptural painting and non-rectangular canvases, blurring the boundary between painting and installation. The work no longer exists solely as an image to be viewed, but enters into space as a presence that can be approached, circled, and physically experienced. Through processes of assembling, misalignment, and extension, forms gradually emerge, destabilizing a fixed viewpoint and allowing perception to shift and reorganize through movement—much like the body continuously adjusting to its environment. These structures carry fragments of memory while remaining in a state of incompletion.

 

For me, painting is not a closed result but an ongoing process. The work does not document a fixed moment, but traces the shifting trajectory of perception across time and space. As viewers move through and engage with the work, they become part of this system, re-experiencing how orientation is formed and how meaning is constructed through difference.

​|EDUCATION|

2023 MA Fine Art, Chelsea College of Arts, University of the Arts London, London, UK

|EXPERIENCE|

AWARDS

2026

・Aesthetica Art Prize, Longlisted, York, UK

2024

・Art Taipei - New Artist Awardee, Taipei, TW

・The 29th DA DUN Fine Arts Exhibition of Taichung City, Sculpture Section, Selected, Taichung, TW

2022

・MA Materials and Research Award, Chelsea Arts Club Trust, London, UK

SOLO EXHIBITION

2025

・Unnamed Shapes, Lan Art Centre, Hangzhou, CN

・Whispering Hues, Vine Gallery, Hsinchu, TW

2024

・ART TAIPEI 2024, Taipei World Trade Centre Hall 1, Taipei, TW

GROUP EXHIBITION

2026

・TAI ART FESTIVAL IN ASIA NEW BAY AREA, Kaohsiung, TW

2025

・The Blooming Dartemoor, Lian Gallery, Hangzhou, CN

・Natural World, Chelsea Art Club, London, UK

・Art Future 2025, Grand Hyatt, Taipei, TW

2024

・29th DA DUN Fine Arts Exhibition, Dadun Culture Centre, Taichung, TW

・Table Fable, Salisbury House, London, UK

・Echoes of Entanglement, L’ART, London, UK

・A Conversation with Water, Hypha Studios Stratford, London, UK

2023

・Emerging Artist Exhibition, TEAM LEWIS Foundation, London, UK

・The Hidden Manifesto, Gallery 46, London, UK

・Drunk, The Grosvenor Pub, London, UK

・Whatcha Lookin Art?, Cookhouse, London, UK

・Little Show, Cookhouse, London, UK

​​

2022

・Who Are You - The Evolution of Identity in Britain, Triangle, London, UK

・XYZ, Cookhouse, London, UK

・Between Paper and a Place, Lungley Gallery, London, UK

・ As SLATE, Triangle, London, UK

・I’M IN IT, SafeHouse, London, UK

・Nexus, Triangle, London, UK

2021

・Solstice, Triangle, London, UK

PUBLICATION

2026

・Barbagelata Foundation - SKYLINE, Spain

RESIDENCY

2025

・LIAN Gallery, Hangzhou, CN

bottom of page