A woman in pink coveralls pushes a wheelbarrow in a vast sea of glistening white salt piles. Indigo-dyed fabrics flutter in the wind. And huge, round dishes of persimmons sit out under the sun.

Chia Hui Chien’s serene photograph series “The Gifts of the Sun” challenges any preconceptions you may have about Taiwan. Beyond the high-rises of the high-tech hub Taipei, rural people have been sun-drying food, fabrics, and incense for centuries. And even to the young Taiwanese artist known simply as CHiA, it was a revelation.

She spent six months travelling with her team to the outer regions of her home country to document the sun-drying process before it’s replaced by modern machines and technology.

“The main point of the trip was experiencing life outside the city,” the Taipei-based urbanite explains (through a translator) from Toronto, where her exhibit is being featured at TAIWANfest before it travels out to Vancouver for our own version of the event. “By seeing this rural life, I got to see how the food that I grew up eating was grown and prepared. And I realized that a lot of the foods I grew up with were made through sunshine.”

Soybeans, fish, and squid are some of the most popular items that are dried to add flavour punch to Taiwanese dishes. CHiA points out that often, the sun-drying process helps to preserve the food better than any modern, mechanized process. She not only captured images of the farmers who still practise the ancient techniques—some of whom appear in her photos using colourful, patterned umbrellas to shield themselves from the sun’s rays—but also got to do hands-on work helping them.

“Whenever I was interviewing farmers, they often asked us to help out on the land in what they do every day in their life,” she says. “We might spend up to half a day working on a farm.”

CHiA’s results are just a small part of the visual-arts and design program at this year’s TAIWANfest. Her exhibit joins others such as The Art of Seating, a show of coolly contemporary bamboo furniture that blends ancient craft with cutting-edge industrial design, and First Impressions, a display of sleek fashions emblazoned with geometric Taiwanese aboriginal designs by the artist known simply as Andre (both at Robson Square throughout the event).

For CHiA herself, it’s all part of showing the many colours of Taiwan—definitely one of the goals of her vivid travelling show.

“I feel like I have more of an understanding of Taiwan now, in general, and I would love to document more of these places outside of Taipei,” she says.

In a way, these are CHiA’s gifts to us from the sun-drenched lands of rural Taiwan. “I want to have foreigners see not only Taipei, but all the different cultures that Taiwan has. And I wish, through my display, to get other people excited about seeing these places as well—because they are so amazing!”

The Gifts of the Sun runs on the 400 block of Granville Street during TAIWANfest, Friday to Monday (September 4 to 7) from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.; CHiA speaks Monday at 4 p.m. on the 800 block, on the Formosa Chat stage.