Chapter 1

"Bloody Memories" stems from sensitivity and reflection on collective traumatic memories. It does not refer to a specific historical disaster, but rather represents a contemporary, Asian, personal, and vague memory resonance. The work consists of videos and images. The video serves as the introduction for the entire project. I aim to achieve a similar effect to the intro in an album, serving as an extension and explanation of the main content.

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On an artificial rock formation in the park, I placed a vintage cassette player, playing Teresa Teng’s “Longing for the Spring Breeze” (Chinese: 望春風 Bāng Chhun-hong, in Minnan/Hokkien). Near the end of the film, the player is knocked down by a stone wrapped in a paper ball (a letter), but the music continues to play.

A Brief Overview of the White Terror Period in Taiwan (1949–1987) The “White Terror” describes the period from 1949 to 1987 in Taiwan when the island was under martial law and experienced nearly forty years of political repression led by the Kuomintang (KMT) government. During this time, under slogans such as “eliminating communist spies” and “retaking the mainland,” the government carried out widespread political surveillance, ideological control, arrests, imprisonment, and even executions across the island.

Tens of thousands of civilians, intellectuals, students, writers, and Taiwanese civil servants were accused of “radical thinking” or “collaborating with the enemy.” Many innocent individuals were detained for extended periods or executed without fair trials. These cases were often handled by secret courts, and families were left unaware of the whereabouts of their loved ones. The entire society was gripped by fear and silence. How Memory Survives... Like many traumatic histories, the memory of the White Terror could not be openly expressed for a long time, nor was it easily absorbed into the "official national narrative." As a result, it was passed down more through private channels: oral accounts within families, taboo conversations, music and poetry, metaphorical imagery, and so on. Music such as Longing for the Spring Breeze and traditional Minnan folk songs became “substitute vessels of memory” for a history that could not be directly spoken—when language was suppressed, melody became a hidden medium for carrying emotion, grief, and identity.

The White Terror was not a singular event, but rather a prolonged emotional condition within society: suspicion, silence, self-censorship, and emotional repression. This condition continued to linger in the deep psychological structure of Taiwanese society even after martial law was lifted, and it has inspired numerous literary, theatrical, and cinematic works that explore the “unfinished memory” of that era.

"Longing for the Spring Breeze"

The background music used in this work, Longing for the Spring Breeze, was originally composed in 1933 and is one of the most iconic Minnan-language popular songs in Taiwan’s local music history. Since the postwar period, it has been widely covered by numerous well-known singers due to its graceful melody, restrained emotion, and familiar language. Among these, Teresa Teng’s rendition has had the most profound impact and remains the most widely circulated version of the song across East Asia. In Taiwan, Longing for the Spring Breeze has transcended the category of a mere song to become a symbol of collective memory and emotional belonging. Especially during historical periods marked by social repression and blurred identity, such widely beloved melodies often served as carriers of intergenerational memory and cultural identity.

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