Residency Ping Hsiang-Wang and Kang-Hua Chang

We are happy to host a residency of Ping-Hsiang Wang and Artistic Consultant Kang-Hua Chang in wpZimmer from 4 to 16 March. Through partner Tatwerk in Berlin, Ping showed a work in progress of his Retina Maneuver in KVS, Brussels in WIPCOOP 2023. This led to more collaboration. In these 2 weeks he will work with Kang on the further development of the piece and connect with other artists and organisations of MAP’s WIPCOOP network. At the same time he will perform the work in progress again in Mestizo Arts Platform’s takeover of Monty on 8/3.

Ping-Hsiang Wang is a theatre director from Taiwan. His work focuses on how human behaviour is being disciplined and modified through the evolution of materiality, the internet, systems, machinery, the environment, and commerce.

Wang’s signature aesthetic is honed on the transference of normal daily landscapes into fantastic digital realities. He views theatre as a perceptual vehicle for enabling new means of communication and combines multiple performative elements using text, spoken language, sound, movement, live-streaming video, objects, and scenography. His work posits narrative as a full sensory experience.

In recent years, he has worked with diverse international theatre companies, including Agrupación Señor Serrano, Rimini Protokoll, and cmd+c company. Many festivals throughout Europe and Asia have presented his works, such as Romaeuropa in Italy, Grec Festival de Barcelona and TNT Festival in Spain, Festival de la Cité in Switzerland, and ¡Viva! Spanish & Latin American Festival in the UK.

Kang-Hua Chang, a native of Indonesia who received his upbringing and education in Taiwan, stands as a co-founder of the multi-creator collective, Co-Coism, based in Taipei. Noteworthy among his accomplishments are the grants bestowed upon him by the National Culture and Arts Foundation, including those under the Young Star New Vision and Overseas Arts Travel project, as well as the Youth Gardener project from the Ministry of Culture in Taiwan. His creative pursuits orbit around the intricate interplay between audiences and performers, underscoring a commitment to broadening the landscape of the performing arts. Recent endeavors conspicuously prioritize forms of performance that transcend the confines of conventional theater spaces. Through a strategic transition in both performance methods and venues, Chang actively reevaluates the role of performing arts in the contemporary landscape, scrutinizing their multidimensional implications on society, audience dynamics, and relevant issues.

Retina Maneuver. After completing his military service ten years ago and being discharged from the military, Wang rarely contemplated his status as a reservist. However, when the Chinese Communist Party surrounded Taiwan with a frequency unprecedented in history and conducted military exercises on a large scale, the artist began to consider whether, in the near future, he would have to prepare to annihilate the advancing enemy as a soldier on the battlefield, rather than following his vocation as a theatre director.

More info about Ping and his work: HERE