Tabakalera presents Walker, an exhibition made up of three audiovisual pieces conceived specifically for Tabakalera by the acclaimed Taiwanese filmmaker Tsai Ming-Liang (Sarawak, Malaysia, 1957), and co-produced with the San Sebastian Festival.
The project’s origins date back to 2011, when Tsai Ming-Liang collaborated with the actor Lee Kang-Sheng on the play Only You. Fascinated by a sequence in which the actor walked with extreme slowness, the director decided to transpose that bodily rhythm onto the screen, transforming the body into an observer that moves through different places around the world.
For Tsai Ming-Liang, this pursuit of slowness connects with the figure of the Chinese monk Xuanzang, who during the Tang dynasty (between the 7th and 10th centuries), a period regarded as the Golden Age of Chinese civilisation, travelled thousands of kilometres to India in search of Buddhist scriptures. Lee Kang-Sheng embodies a contemporary version of this monk: with a shaved head, bare feet, and a red robe, the character walks through the urban landscape in an exercise in radical introspection.
Since 2012, the Walker series has grown to comprise twelve films shot in ten cities, including Taipei, Hong Kong, Marseille, Tokyo, Paris, Washington DC, and San Sebastián. Dust, the latest film in the series, shot in San Sebastian during the summer of 2025, in collaboration with Tabakalera, is being presented in the Zabaltegi-Tabakalera section of the 2026 San Sebastian Festival following its première at the Venice International Film Festival.
Through the three works in this series selected for this exhibition —No Form (2012), Walker (2012), and Journey to the West (2014)— Tsai Ming-Liang invites us to walk the streets of Hong Kong, Taipei, and Marseille through a restrained perspective. By making slowness a virtue, the filmmaker reveals a different way of approaching life and observing the environment around us.
The exhibition, which will be open to the public from tomorrow, Friday, until 6 December, is part of Tabakalera’s exhibition programme dedicated to exploring the intersection between contemporary art and film.
Film series and complementary activities
As part of the programme of activities complementing the exhibition, Tabakalera has organised a film series that explores the Taiwanese filmmaker’s body of work. The first session, in which the film Vive l'amour (1994) will be screened, will take place on 3 October and will be presented by Javier H. Estrada, co-director of SEMINCI and curator of the series.
In addition, the programme of activities is complemented by dialogued visits on 24 September, 22 October, and 19 November, as well as an art workshop for families to be held on 24 October.
Tsai Ming-Liang
Born in Malaysia in 1957, Tsai Ming-Liang premièred his first film, Rebels of the Neon God, at the 1992 Berlinale. His second feature film, Vive l'amour (1994), won the Golden Lion at the Venice International Film Festival, while The River (1996) received the Jury Prize in Berlin, thus consolidating his position as one of the most outstanding directors of contemporary cinema.
In 2009, Face became the first film produced and included in the Louvre Museum’s collection as part of the Le Louvre s'offre aux cineastes programme. In 2023, Tsai Ming-Liang received the Pardo Alla Carriera (Honorary Leopard) award at the Locarno International Film Festival for his distinguished career in film.
Tsai Ming-Liang is one of the artists participating in the current 61st edition of the Venice Biennale.
Practical information
Walker:
From 18 September to 6 December 2026
Exhibition Hall 3, Tabakalera (1st floor)
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