English Tsai

From Hypermarket to Melancholy: Suits, T-shirts, Beanbag Round
從大型超市到憂鬱：西裝、T恤與布袋彈（2016-）

In 2016, a Taiwanese newspaper ran a line that read: “President Tsai Ing-wen’s clothing has increasingly leaned toward loose-fitting shirts, fueling speculation about her sexuality as a middle-aged, single woman.”
This kind of reporting reflects how gossip, innuendo, and character smears have become an increasingly normalized—and entertaining—feature of political news coverage in Taiwan.
Since 2016, Wen Gum Gum has designed over 60 t-shirt graphics, some of which appear in Barbariam: Katalog von t-shirt (2022).

President & Commander-in-Chief of Taiwan T-Shirt Series: This project originated with her 2018 zine, Duckcrow Hypermarket, a satirical supermarket catalogue inspired by Taiwan's Sunflower Student Movement (2014) and presidential election. Playfully, she casts Taiwan's president, Tsai Ing-wen, as a t-shirt model, imbuing each design with poetic undertones. From this, she created the fictional persona "English Tsai," tweeting absurd yet poetic pronouncements. Wen Gum Gum also digitally superimposes her designs onto media images of President Tsai, documenting her political trajectory through a mass culture lens. The 2019 Hong Kong Anti-Extradition Law Amendment Bill Movement marked a turning point for Wen Gum Gum, revealing the limitations of playful imagery. Her work subsequently shifted towards monochrome painting and zines incorporating found objects, such as Depressed Cart (2022), responding to the absurdities of political narratives.

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「關於臺灣總統蔡英文近期的服裝，愈來愈趨向穿著寬擺剪裁的襯衫，讓中年而單身的蔡英文的同志假說不脛而走。」像這樣內容的句子，出現在2016年臺灣的新聞報紙中，對政治人物抹黑與謠言已經變成台灣新聞中的娛樂性主體。自2016年起，她設計了超過60款T恤圖案，部分收錄於《芭芭瑞恩：T恤目錄》(2022)。

臺灣總統暨三軍統帥（T恤系列）：這個計畫源於2018年出版的zine《金金大型超市》，這本zine戲仿超市型錄，靈感來自臺灣太陽花學運和總統大選。溫金金以戲謔手法將臺灣總統蔡英文化身為T恤代言人，並為每款設計注入詩意。她更以此為基礎，虛構出名為「英文菜」的角色，並在推特上發表看似荒謬卻極富詩意的推文。同時，她也將自製圖案合成到蔡英文的媒體照片中，以流行文化記錄其政治軌跡。2019年香港反送中運動讓她意識到戲謔影像的局限性。此後，她的創作轉向單色繪畫，以及融入現成物件的zine，例如《沮喪購物車》(2022)，以回應荒謬的政治敘事。

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WHY English Tsai? T-shirts “I Won’t Hurt You”(2016) feat. Ms.Tsai/English Tsai

T-shirts “Respawn”(2019) feat.Tsai Ing-wen/the President of Taiwan(2016-present)

“A man reborn as a girl meets a clone of himself from previous life, i cannoy recall my previous life…”
T-shirts “Too Hot” feat. Ms.Tsai/English Tsai

“Oh, and you know the thing about chaos?” feat. Ms.Tsai/English Tsai

“The universe has an interesting way of keeping us humble.”
T-shirts “I Won’t Hurt You”(2016) feat. Ms.Tsai/English Tsai

T-shirts “Gardening”(2018) feat. Ms.Tsai/English Tsai

T-shirts “Tulip”(2018) feat. Ms.Tsai/English Tsai

T-shirts “Nepenthes Love”(2018) feat. Ms.Tsai/English Tsai

T-shirts “I Won’t Hurt You”(2016) feat Ma99