Islanders - 寶島慢播

“Islanders” is a dance, visual, and music performance based in Taiwanese culture
About this Event

Let the World See Taiwan

Experience Taiwan through audio-visual and physical performances of Taiwanese artists in New York

A Two-day only “Super-Tai” Summer Art Show

On June 17 and 18 only, a group of young Taiwanese artists will bring to New Yorkers the very first Taiwanese themed live art experience. “Islanders: Compound Playground” Live Art Show combines music, dance, interactive audio-visual experience, and Taiwanese food all in one place to bring the audience a festival of art and beauty of Taiwan.

“Islanders: Compound Playground” is a three-part live art experience, a sound installation “My Childhood Home”, a film screening “1991”, and a musical dance performance “Compound Playground”.

My Childhood Home

My Childhood Home is an audiovisual music & sound installation focusing on the experiences of PaprTape as a multinational. Having spent his elementary school years in Taipei, Taiwan, PaprTape recalls his childhood where many families were immigrating out of Taiwan for the idealistic western lifestyle. The traditional family gatherings were gradually fading away, and the transitioning into the twenty-first century were bounded by bittersweet memories.

In this music & sound installation, PaprTape uses analog synthesizers and sound recordings to compose and design audiovisual emotions that portray what some multinationals went through while living in different environments. The sound textures and non-confirmative musical phrasing expresses the confusion and self-identification from moving back and forth between two different worlds.

As PaprTape noted, "We often feel like we can live anywhere, but at the same time, we feel like we don't necessarily belong anywhere. There's always a feeling that a part of us is missing wherever we go."

1991

Grant Hao-Wei Lin is a multidisciplinary visual artist from Taiwan creating films and digital photographs inspired by personal history of being an immigrant queer Asian artist living in United States. For Culture Lab, Lin is presenting work involving the topic of homosexuality, religion, intimacy and institutionalized oppression inspired by his past experience with a cult group. Lin works with dancers, composers, and VR builders to create a multi-sensory body of work with goals to provoke conversation around religion, sexuality, oppression, inclusion, acceptance, and intimacy.

Compound Playground

The dance duo, Chieh Hsiung and Yu-Wei Hsiao, are Taiwanese performance artists in NYC. Hsiung and Hsiao create dialogue through dance movements and the violin.

Since popular music and dance dominate the market for a while, it is easy for performance artists forget about their roots. “Compound Playground” is a project focusing on merging old-school elements into modern cultures. Hsiung is not only going to introduce the Taiwanese/Chinese folk dances, but also using their elements to connect modern dance, contemporary dance, street dance, andballroom. In Hsiao’s musical arrangement, he will re-arrange Taiwanese folk songs to Classical, Jazz and neo-soul styles.

In addition to the three-part live art performance, Yumpling, a LIC local Taiwanese restaurant will be providing classic Taiwanese fairs such as the Taiwanese style popcorn chickens, Apple Sidra, etc. to complement the visual-audio festival with gourmet flavors and smells of Taiwan.

This project is made possible with funds from the Statewide Community Regrant program, a program of the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature and administered by Flushing Town Hall.