OTHER [chinese]
What is Chinese? Is it any one single thing? Do you identify as Chinese? Then here is an opportunity to be onstage as part of Dunedin Arts Festival.
OTHER [chinese] is a ‘live documentary’. This means it's real people on stage, telling their own real-life stories (as opposed to actors learning a script). What's more, it’s for local people, exploring what it means to be Chinese in Otepoti Dunedin.
Alice Canton has created a community-based project that lets people speak for themselves and tell their own stories. “I have facilitated workshops all over New Zealand, and I’m always surprised at the range of stories and experiences that are discovered” she says. At the show, Canton is on stage acting as a facilitator for people to share their opinions, looking for commonalities and differences. Canton purposefully starts the questions off with some broad topics – “is Shortland Street the greatest tv show ever made?”, and then starts to narrow it down to “is NZ a safe country to bring up your children?” She’ll ask people to think about Dunedin’s history of its own Chinese community, and how these experiences have shifted over time.
“OTHER [Chinese] investigates “Chinese-ness’ and is an opportunity for both the audience and participants to be constantly discovering new things about themselves and others,” says Canton.
The project is looking for willing participants. There are options to join in a workshop, or to be interviewed, and then participate in both the Wanaka and Dunedin performances (three shows total). This is a volunteer opportunity, and open to anyone who identifies as Chinese (all nationalities welcome). No performance experience necessary!
It’s about belonging through shared experiences, through the joys of commonality (“my parents used to say that too!”) to the realisation that people’s experiences can be so different (between those who are fifth generation for example, and those who must struggle through visa applications).
When OTHER [chinese] has been presented in other cities, the people on stage and in the audience were surprised at its frankness and charm, and the realisation that being Chinese is no one singular thing.
OTHER [chinese] is still looking for participants. There’s more information and registration here
OTHER [chinese]
FOR PARTICIPANTS:
Workshop Period 3–12 April (evenings & weekends – full schedule TBC)
Travel Day Tues 13 April (day)
Performances in Wanaka on Tues 13 April (evening) and Dunedin on Thurs 15 & Fri 16 April (evenings)
FOR AUDIENCES:
OTHER [Chinese]: Dunedin Arts Festival, Glenroy Auditorium, April 15 & 16
Festival of Colour: Lake Wanaka Centre, Wanaka, April 13
