macule

The Hayward Gallery café undergoes a bright and bold refresh courtesy of new public art commission, macule (2023), by Taiwanese artist Michael Lin.

macule is a colourful wallpaper installation completely covering the walls of the Hayward Gallery café. The wallpaper features a repeated plum blossom motif that is used in traditional Taiwanese, Chinese and Japanese textile designs, layered in hues of pink, reds and yellows. By using this motif, Lin navigates various visual languages and traditions, presenting the intersection of cultural identities and encouraging visitors to engage in shared culture.

With the scale of pattern determined by the width of the wallpaper roll, Lin highlights the historical process of wallpaper fabrication. In 17th century England it became possible to produce wallpaper in rolls rather than sheets, allowing for larger patterns to be repeated. However, Lin’s playful and non-uniform layering of macule also evokes the more variable process of handprinting, with each wallpaper roll featuring a different number of layers and complexity. Lin’s marriage of the craft’s physical tradition with technological advances is underpinned by the artist’s interest in the idea of labour in the Digital Age.

Michael Lin is a visual artist living and working in Taipei and Brussels, internationally known for his large-scale installation work of floral murals on architectural surfaces. The artist says: "For this commission I was interested in making visible the printing process. By incorporating the discarded proofs of the printing process into the main motif, the work seeks to destabilise the cultural reference. Both visually and materially I see it as a temporal counterpoint to the concrete environment of the architectural envelope."

Curated by Anusha Mistry and Yung Ma