To celebrate Taipei Tech’s 110th anniversary, Taipei Tech Library and the Department of Cultural Vocation Development curated the Ancient Yearbook Exhibition to display precious old yearbooks from the Industrial Institute period. The exhibition will be held until November 19th at the Taipei Tech Red House, hoping to engage the public and form a dialogue on local educational documentaries in Taiwan. 

Wu Yu-fan, professor of the Department of Cultural Vocation Development and the curator of the yearbook exhibition, indicated that Taipei Tech Library has a relatively complete collection of the historical yearbooks back in the Japanese colonial rule period, and the exhibition will focus on displaying the contents, structures and design of the old yearbooks. “The exhibition venue, the Red House, ingeniously echoes the theme of the exhibition as it is a historical building on campus that can be dated back to the Industrial Institute period” said Wu.  

Wu further explained that the yearbooks were manufactured for various reasons: “They were not only the records of campus life of the Industrial Institute, but also the propaganda tools used by the Japanese government. The contents and photos published in the yearbooks manifest a sense of collective identity and implicate the social power structure at the time, which makes them interesting and authentic raw materials for social studies”.

Zhu Fang-yi, a master student of the Cultural Vocation Development Department, noted that the exhibition also showcases the ancient technique of producing photographic papers out of albumen, and the typesetting and book designs were all very different from our modern yearbooks. “As an Industry Institute at the time, it is quite fascinating to see how the old photos of the yearbooks bring out a ‘boys’ school’ ambience” said Zhu.