• 2023-03-08

On October 28, 2022, the National Central Library hosted the Donation Ceremony of Dr. Ching-jung Chen’s Oil Portraits of Robert Scholz and Yi-man Wu. Professor Chen donated his portrait of music educator Dr. Yi-man Wu (1931-2019) and 1994 sketches of the opera “Carmen” to the National Central Library. Many special guests were in attendance.

National Central Library Director-General Shu-hsien Tseng stated that the acquisition of manuscripts and paintings is an important responsibility at NCL. This selfless donation by Dr. Chen not only adds much to NCL’s collection of manuscripts and paintings but also allows the sincere love of these two musicians in his paintings to create a wonderful tale at NCL.

Dr. Chen is a world-renowned artist who excels at large-scale wall murals and large oil paintings. Still his works of art span all forms, including pastels, watercolors, marble mosaics, fresco, and paintings on porcelain. All of these are outstanding works in their own right. Dr. Chen has showcased his works in countless exhibitions around the world and has received national and international awards on many occasions. In 2003, he donated a mosaic tile work called “The Holy Family” to the Pope, for which he was granted an audience with Pope John Paul II and received his blessing. In the Taiwan art world, this is an honor seldom seen.

One of the persons portrayed in Dr. Chen’s donated portraits is Professor Yi-man Wu (1931-2019), who was a well-known music educator in Taiwan who trained countless of the rising generation. The other portrait is of her husband, Professor Robert Scholz (1902-1986), who was an expert interpreter of Mozart. His is known worldwide for his piano, conducting, and composing abilities. Prof. Scholz was invited to come to Taiwan in 1963 to work in music education. Later, in 1969 he married Prof. Wu and the two of them continued to grow in their music abilities, working hand in hand to promote piano education in Taiwan. And that is how is musical love story came about.

In 1987, Prof. Wu donated her husband’s much loved musical scores, books, and manuscripts all to the National Central Library. This was a great boon to music lovers. In 2012, Prof. Wu also donated the oil portrait of her husband painted by Dr. Chen to the National Central Library so that it could be stored in NCL along with his manuscripts. It also gave patrons who like Scholz to be able to gaze upon his portrait.

On October 28, at the donation ceremony Dr. Chen presented a portrait of Prof. Wu that was painted in 2019 after her passing. The two portraits—one of him conducting music and the other of her looking pensively up at the Heavens—show them facing each other, ingeniously revealing their love of each other. Before her passing, Prof. Wu once cited her husband’s piece “Here Is Where the Most of My Love Is” to describe their love for the land of Taiwan. Now, both of their portraits will be preserved alongside Scholz’s musical scores in the National Central Library. In life, marital harmony is one of the most sublime and eternal blisses, and now this instance of it is archived at NCL.