Centre A presents The Treasure Hill Tea + Photo Project/Phase Five/Oversight, the personal and collective works of Taiwanese artists Wei-Li Yeh and Yu-Hsin Wu, based on the community of Treasure Hill in Taipei, Taiwan. The exhibition continues until Aug. 31.

Spanning a period of more than four years, this body of work integrates photography, text and video in a site-specific installation for the Centre A, Vancouver International Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, Canada.

Situated on the outskirts of Taipei on a hillside by Keelung River, the neglected Treasure Hill area has largely been forgotten by the majority of Taipei residents. Once a military post, the hillside was illegally occupied by soldiers and their families who had lived there during the 1960s. The squatters built simple structures and houses, and were later joined by migrants from the countryside.

During the 1980s, as many as 200 households were there. Treasure Hill was slum-like, crowded and disorderly. When only a few dozen middle-lower class households remained, the neighbourhood was slated for demolition. But through concerted campaigning and the efforts of cultural and social activists, experts and scholars, the area was preserved.

In 2004, Wei-Li Yeh took up residence in Treasure Hill. Yeh and his collaborators carried out four phases of the on-site Treasure Hill Tea + Photo Project. By the end of 2006, this art centre grew to include a teahouse, a museum which housed years of collected objects from the neighbourhood, a darkroom and classroom, an exhibition space, a photo studio, and an outdoor garden and rooftop space for performance art.

Phase IV, "Oversight" emphasizes the parallels between Treasure Hill and Vancouver Downtown East Side, where Centre A is situated, in the context of urban renewal plans.