Written by Yi-Ping Wu. This article recounts Taiwan’s 2025 cultural budget cuts amid political turmoil yet highlights the resilience of Taiwan’s theatrical landscape through the Taipei Theatre Awards, the Off-Broadway debut of Don’t Cry, Dancing Girls, the 2025 Expo Osaka initiatives, and the Les Misérables tour in Taipei and Kaohsiung, revealing international ambition despite systemic discrimination against the arts.
Written by Choesang Scholer. Despite the pressures of external forces on Indigenous land and domain, Indigenous community members utilise art as a medium for political protest to amplify their concerns when their government fails to do so. This article explores the way in which identity-building expression appears through various forms of art.
Written by Chee-Hann Wu. 2023 was a fruitful year for Taiwan’s arts and cultural events. This article focuses on significant events in Taiwan’s arts and cultural industries in 2023, such as theatrical performances and exhibitions, alongside related changes to cultural policy and difficulties faced by the publishing industry.
Written by Yi-Cheng Sun; translated by Yi-Yu Lai. Tze-Ning Hong, an independent researcher, designer, and artist, has been immersed in an artistic environment since childhood and graduated from the Department of Fine Arts at National Taiwan Normal University. Her father, a calligraphy teacher in elementary school, provided her with a unique perspective as she navigated between her family and school life during her childhood. From this vantage point, Tze-Ning constantly observed the subtle transformations between “her father as a teacher” and “her father as a dad.” This experience gave her a more nuanced understanding of the teacher’s role than the average person. She has captured and preserved unnoticed and delicate memories regarding art education due to her special position.
Written by Yi-Cheng Sun; translated by Yi-Yu Lai. This interview attempts to explore the metaphors of “workshops as classrooms” and “art creation as a learning process” in response to my curiosity about the phenomenon of “workshops, each with its own expression,” especially because artist Pei-Ying Lin frequently employs workshops in her art creation.
Written by Yi-Cheng Sun; translated by Yi-Yu Lai. Before starting the interview, during lunch, Rei-Tzu, the production coordinator of Flying Birds Theatre Group, told us about the “earliest university.” In English, “University” is derived from the word “universe.” In Latin, “universus” is composed of “unus” (one) and “versus” (towards a particular direction), giving it the literal meaning of “towards a specific direction.” According to our limited knowledge of history, the University of Bologna, established by students in 1088 in Italy, is the first university in Europe, earning it the title “mother of universities.” The “earliest university” topic quickly sparked our discussion about knowledge and the essence of education, with art being the primary focus.
