Performing—Feeling, Auto-Transformation, and Expression: Tang Shu-wing and His Theatre Studio in Hong Kong

non peer-reviewed essay

Tang Shu-wing


Tang Shu-wing Theatre Studio (Hong Kong)

Marzenna Wiśniewska

marzennaanna@gmail.com
Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń (Poland)
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7126-2102

Abstract

This article presents the multifaceted persona of Tang Shu-wing, an acclaimed director, actor, and drama teacher, and examines his profound connections with the Polish theater tradition, particularly Jerzy Grotowski. The text also discusses Tang Shu-wing’s Shakespearean productions staged in Warsaw and Gdańsk. Marzenna Wiśniewska’s introduction contextualizes the appendix, which contains the edited transcript of a lecture delivered by Tang Shu-wing during the international online conference Contemporary Acting Techniques in Eurasian Theatre, Performance and Audiovisual Art: Intercultural and Intermedia Perspective (2021). In this lecture, the director characterizes the main ideas underlying his actor training and work on performances at the Tang Shu-wing Theatre Studio in Hong Kong. An essential part of the presentation is the characterization of Tang Shu-wing’s philosophy of art, including the four stages of an artist’s development and the methodology of authorial performance grounded in pre-verbal expression and body-based minimalist aesthetics.


Keywords:

Tang Shu-wing, Asian theater, physical theater, actor's training

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Published
2023-09-01

Cited by

Tang , S.- wing and Wiśniewska, M. (2023) “Performing—Feeling, Auto-Transformation, and Expression: Tang Shu-wing and His Theatre Studio in Hong Kong”, Pamiętnik Teatralny, 72(3), pp. 57–71. doi: 10.36744/pt.1493.

Authors

Tang Shu-wing 

Tang Shu-wing Theatre Studio Hong Kong

Tang Shu-wing - theater director and founder of the theater company No Man’s Land, established in Hong Kong in 1997 and renamed Tang Shu-wing Theatre Studio in 2011. From 2004 to 2011, he was Senior Lecturer, Head of Directing and Playwriting and Dean of the School of Drama at the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts. In 2014 he founded the Professional Physical Theatre Youth Training Programme, which has become a brand for the development of young performers. He received multiple awards for his work, including the Arts Achievement and Best Artist of the Year awards from the Hong Kong Arts Development Council (2008 and 2013) as well as the Award for Outstanding Contribution to the Arts from the Hong Kong Arts Development Council (2021).


Authors

Marzenna Wiśniewska 
marzennaanna@gmail.com
Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń Poland
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7126-2102

Marzenna Wiśniewska - PhD, Assistant Professor at the Institute of Culture Studies of the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń. Literary manager of the Baj Pomorski Theatre in Toruń in 2001–2011. Head of the research project “Dorman. Open Archive” at the Zbigniew Raszewski Theatre Institute in 2016–2019. Member of the expert committees for theater programs and theater festival juries. Member of the editorial board of the journal Teatr Lalek, published by the Polish Centre of UNIMA. Member of the Polish Association for Theatre Research. Her main academic interests include theater and cultural performances, history and theory of world puppet theater, media in theater, theater for children and youth, theater pedagogy, culture animation, and management. She recently published Archipelag indywidualności: Solowe teatry performerów współdziałających z materią (Toruń, 2022).



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