Taipei Artist Village Residency 2013
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This project began as a response to my first visit to Taiwan in August 2011 for the SayTaiwan program as part of the Republic of China Centenary celebrations.
During the stay I met Pol White, a retired teacher and legal advocate who provided me with much of the information I wanted to know about Taiwan's colonial history. The City of Perth Taipei Artist Village Residency has enabled me to return to Taiwan to work with Pol. |
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Description
This new work is in progress. I initially wanted to develop a project with a small group of collaborating artists/performers and non-artists initially drawn from the people I met in Taiwan in 2011 but also including people I might meet as the project progressed. The idea was to work with the material of 'memory' which meant recording the thoughts and recollections of the collaborators directly relating to the history of Taiwan as well as using other historic recordings we may be able to source. These would then be used as material that is responded to – through both improvised and structured performance – in order for the collected memories to relate to each other in different ways and allow processes of response, association and reflection to occur. The work has now become more focussed on the aftermath of the Morak Typhoon (2009) in and around the Namaxia region in Kaohsiung County (in southern Taiwan). So far our research suggests that the destruction was worse due to long-term changes in land-use which relate to the changes in Taiwan's colonial status. Stage 1 - Initial Research Trip When I suggested to Pol we might collaborate, he asked for some information about the proposed project. His response was that he thought we should explore the idea of Taiwan's history and colonial past, not through approaching these questions directly, but through the frame of the Morak Typhoon - a subject people affected would respond to more directly. I agreed that this would be a good idea so Pol and his wife Jenny organised a trip to villages along and around the Namaxia region to interview older people and those who might know the history and changes to the people and land. This region of Taiwan is particularly interesting as several different indigenous tribes along with Hakka, Han and other ethnic groups originating in China as well people who have some European missionary ancestry live together there. A day-by-day description of the trip is coming soon. Stage 2 - Digestion and Further Research Now that Pol (with Robert and Jenny) and I have completed our trip, we will spend some time assessing the material we have collected. There are a number of threads of interest that run through the stories we have collected and as the material opens itself to us, we realise how much more we would like to do. Stage 3 - Performance Project Pol and I will be working on a performance project to be shown in September/October in Taiwan and in November in Perth, Western Australia. At this point we imagine the work will take the form of a performance lecture and workshop. Additional Information & Selected Works Where Art and History Collide: About These Works The PNG Work NFSA Fellowship Not the Sound Bite! |
