MOCA Taipei | Museum of Contemporary Art Taipei Ticket Design

The Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei (MOCA Taipei) is the first museum in the Republic of China positioned to promote “contemporary art.” Located in Taipei City, Taiwan, the museum was established on May 26, 2001.

MOCA Taipei was formerly the “Jiancheng Ordinary Elementary School” during the Japanese colonial period. The school was founded in early March 1919 (Taisho 8) and in its early days was exclusively for Japanese students. It was not until 1945 (ROC year 34), after Japan was defeated and returned Taiwan’s territory, that it was converted by the Republic of China government for use as the office building of the newly established Taipei City Government, until the Taipei City Government moved into the new civic center in Xinyi District in ROC year 83, when the Taipei Fine Arts Museum was commissioned to plan a new museum.

In ROC year 89, the then Cultural Affairs Bureau director Lung Ying-tai officially renamed it “Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei.” Then on May 27, ROC year 90, the opening exhibition “Light and Heavy Shock,” curated by curator Lai Ying-ying, grandly opened as the museum’s inaugural exhibition.

The two photos below, showing the front and back of a ticket, are from a ticket I bought when attending the solo photography exhibition “S Wanderful | Making Pictures” by the famous American photographer Steve McCurry.

Figure 1, MOCA Taipei ticket front

Figure 2, MOCA Taipei ticket back

In Figure 1, the front of the ticket, you can see that besides the white background, the main color is an earth-gold (RGB code approximately #A57C53) and the secondary color is silver (RGB code approximately #86A1B5). From the design concept it is easy to see that it was made by flattening and simplifying the front exterior of the MOCA building, and placing the large “MOCA” letters in the large blank space.

For anti-counterfeiting, the museum also stamped part of the structure from the front, including the museum’s outer perimeter and the white interior parts, while the wall-like part at the bottom of the image has only four long silver stamps.

Figure 2 is the back of the ticket, printed in a single black color scheme. From the clarity of the reduced lattice-window pattern of the museum, you can see that the printing technique is quite delicate. In addition, the layout of the Chinese and English text on the back is well-arranged and staggered — a layout approach well worth learning from.

What is more interesting is that the website address in the back information still uses http, showing that this batch of tickets was printed in a large run quite some time ago.

MOCA Taipei Museum Information

• Opening hours: Tuesday to Sunday 10:00-18:00 (ticket sales stop at 17:30).
• Contact phone: +886-2-25523721
• Museum address: No.39, Chang-An West Road, Taipei, Taiwan 103 Republic of China.
• Official website: https://www.mocataipei.org.tw