White Fungus
art magazine and project based in Taichung City, Taiwan
White Fungus is an arts magazine and project based in Taichung City, Taiwan. Founded by brothers Ron Hanson and Mark Hanson in Wellington, New Zealand in 2004, it began as an intended one-off, photocopied political zine. Over time, the publication evolved into a widely distributed print magazine with an international readership.
The name of the publication comes from a can of "white fungus" the Hansons discovered in their local Taiwan supermarket in 2003. Each cover of the magazine is derived from a scan of that can. In 2009, White Fungus relocated to Taichung City, where it has since been based.
History
The first issue of White Fungus was published in October 2004 as a protest against the building of an inner-city bypass in Wellington, New Zealand. The proposed road project threatened to demolish heritage buildings and displace artists from their studios. The project had been successfully opposed by Wellingtonians for more than 40 years but was now being vigorously pushed forward by Mayor Kerry Prendergast, who is married to one of the city's biggest property developers, Rex Nicholls.
White Fungus attacked Prendergast's leadership, listed her financial holdings, and explored the history of Wellington's Te Aro area which was at risk due to the proposed road.
“White Fungus” enters the record as art magazine and project based in Taichung City, Taiwan. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what White, Fungus and magazine can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“White Fungus” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, White, Fungus and magazine provides the most credible route into that argument.
The strongest evidence will usually combine a dated visual record with documents produced by the authority responsible for the place. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 17, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7994710. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2004, 2003 and 2009.
Architectural summaries often privilege surviving fabric and can understate demolished phases, contested use or displaced communities. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.
- Historic place names
- Jurisdictional context
- Routes into maps and plans
Contemporary maps, plans, listed-building records, estate papers and the responsible local or national archive.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “White Fungus”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow White Fungus primary sources, White Fungus archive and White research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “White Fungus”?
- Which authority defined the place, boundary or structure at the relevant date?
- Which earlier names or jurisdictions may reveal additional records?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “White Fungus” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.