Yu-Hsuan (Abby) Chao

2022 Taiwan Ministry of Culture Fellow

Yu-Hsuan (Abby) Chao

Yu-Hsuan Chao (趙又萱, aka Abby) is a photographer and writer of prose essays and short fiction based in Taipei, Taiwan. She has worked for a number of renowned media outlets in Taiwan and Hong Kong, writing about topics ranging from literary critique to lifestyle to feminist discourse.

She studied Bachelor of Arts Literature at National Chaio-Tung University (國立交通大學) and Humanities at Nanyang Technological University (南洋理工大學), Singapore. Chao also spent one semester at Università di Pisa, Italy, studying Film Theory.

Her first book entitled “Loneliness is a Symptom of Chronic Desire”, a collection of personal essays and short fiction, was released in 2021 and is currently being sold internationally. Through this work, she explores issues of identity, feminism and the power dynamics of relationships in consumerist cultures.

Currently, Chao is working on a collection of photography and travel essays about the interconnectedness of the creative process and experiencing other cultures. She is also writing a collection of short stories, “Paper Cuts”, exploring themes of hidden trauma and the incongruity of memory.