Janus Moments: Taiwan’s Democratic Awakening Through a Journalist’s Lens

The exhibition during the Global Month and at the Conference will showcase a curated selection of Huang Tzu-ming’s (HTM) photographs, both in black-and-white and colour, documenting key moments before and after the lifting of martial law. These include images of street protests, gatherings of marginalised communities, and scenes of state repression. Most prominent of these are the portraits of Taiwanese Comfort Women and the political tattoos of the Korean War Prisoners of War. Accompanying the photographs will be a short documentary video featuring interviews with key figures from the dangwai (黨外, 'outside the party') magazine circle (Huang, 2022). These individuals, once dissidents under the authoritarian regime, risked imprisonment because of their role in platemaking, printing, graphic design, transportation, sale. They also risked financial ruin to publish these critical commentaries. Some of them reached prominence as politicians or media commentators in the following decades. Their stories—such as writing by hand, evading censorship, and using hearses to smuggle publications—offer invaluable insights into the lived experience of resistance.