Australia-Taiwan Digital Residency Exchange

Critical Path/HORSE/Barefeet Dance Theatre 2021

From October 2020 to October 2021, Critical Path is working with HORSE and Bare Feet Dance Theater (Mauvais Chausson) in Taiwan for an online residency exchange between Australian and Taiwanese artists.

The intention is to create the basis of bilingual materials exploring the artists’ practice for English and Chinese speaking audiences and face-to-face collaborations in the future.

Participating artists (Australia): Kristina Chan & Timothy Ohl , Stella Chen, WeiZen, and Strange Attractor (Adelina Larsson & Alison Plevey)

Participating artists (Taiwan): CHEN Wu-Kang (Artistic Director HORSE), SU Wei-Chia (Director HORSE), Yeh Ming-Hwa, Lin I-Chin (Artistic Director Bare Feet Dance Theatre)

Facilitated by Claire Hicks (Critical Path), Wen Huang (HORSE) and Chien Chingtzu (HORSE)

First Task: As a response to making a video to introduce ourselves, I wanted to use the process to understand my personal philosophy and questions that plagued me:

We then had our first group Zoom meeting where we were randomly allocated to break out rooms after a general chat.

Second Task: The second video we were asked to make was to finish sharing about ourselves after having watched each others’ videos; thereby assessing what was missing from our first sharing.

I shared aspects of my practice and the methodologies I am exploring in creating performance series Stories from the Body which began in 2014.

The next stage was sharing a meal over Zoom (what Claire terms as ‘slow-dating’), which I’ve tried doing for Paesach with another family before. The configuration I was partnered with Stella Chen, and I-Chin and Yang from Bare Feet Theatre. The other groupings were: Wu-Kang and Ming with Tim and Kristina; Wei Chia along with Wen with Adelina and Alison (Strange Attractor).

We met over a late lunch at the Sydney end and breakfast at Taiwan’s end. It was fortunate having Stella in our grouping as she did the main translation between I-Chin, Yang and myself. I believe it was a four-hour journey with I-Chin and Yang’s daughter and dog, my daughter Yaslene and Domino our tuxedo cat, and Stella’s plants in the background (sometimes the foreground).

We shared experiences of living/being invited into indigenous communities in Australia and Taiwan. I-Chin and Yang had just returned from a trip in one of Taiwan’s mountainous community…Stella shared her experience in Central Australia and working in Darwin and connecting her interest in bog and swamp environments. I talked about my introduction into Kununurra and the Kimberleys in the early nineties: I was given a skin name by a community in Police Hole whilst they were educating their children on country; I developed a fever, was chanted over, stuffed with medicinal leaves inside my swag while recovering; I made a decision that I would forever be wondering which world is more ‘real’.