On the interface between design and theater

Originally I was with HKAPA's Theatre Design Department. We changed the name to School of Theatre and Entertainment Arts from Technical Arts some years ago as we thought it was very important that people understand what the foundation of the training here was which was theater. We train students to work in theater, but the training creates a very strong foundation in everything they might do afterward. Our graduates work in theater, film, entertainment and also in commercial sectors. We make sure we give our students skills that are transferable.

On teaching theater in technology-driven times

What we teach our students is that they are able to transfer the skills they have learnt here. We may not be able to keep up with technology at all times as it advances extremely fast these days, but when our students go for industry experience they are exposed to new technologies. Like recently, they interned with Zuni Icosahedron and West Kowloon Cultural District for the Freespace Tech Lab Project. That experience opened their eyes to what new technologies can achieve.

On making tradition and innovation coexist

As a school, we are constantly looking at what might be useful for our future students. We are part of a revolution on a daily basis. This is a need and we are pushing ourselves a little bit more toward digital media. We are trying to create a department that continues with the traditions of performance art, but also looks forward toward digital technologies and their use and developments in performance

On using breakthrough technology in future HKAPA projects

We will launch an augmented reality and community project in collaboration with Osage Gallery and City University of Hong Kong. It is an app-based audio-visual experience which entails exploring the streets of Hong Kong in the early to mid-20th century. In a way, it is a guided tour. You will get to experience past decades through walking around. You could be standing on Star Street and say, oh, so this used to be a park with people engaging in activities in 1955, and so on.

It is opening up a different kind of experience for our students for the first time. It takes them slightly away from theatre. They get to know about the possibilities of AR and will probably apply what they have learnt to theater, maybe create interactive theater, where, for instance, the audiences may be asked to bring along their iPads, so that they are already participating even before they step into the auditorium.

On the future of interactive and immersive performance projects in Hong Kong

The appetite is growing, absolutely. And there is actually a lot of experimental work happening in Hong Kong on a small scale, such as in the Cattle Depot artists' studio. These small companies or groups do not have the money to mount promotional campaigns, but interested people already know about them.

However, we would like to see these small-scale groups, who often come together to do a show, receiving more funding. They cannot afford to hire top-end skilled professionals to help them develop ideas to sustain their creative growth. It would be good if there was a simpler funding mechanism from the government for the small-scale performance groups. Sometimes, an application for funding takes many months to process because of the sheer volume of these submitted. It is difficult for small-scale performance art groups with innovative ideas to grow under these circumstances. We need them to come up with new ideas, and new ways of work. They are the future of creative work coming out of Hong Kong.

On the place of Hong Kong on the world map of experimental theater

We are not behind. Given the size of the city, its creative output is phenomenal. For example, the groups who perform in the Edinburgh Festival come from the United Kingdom, Europe and other parts of the world. In tiny Hong Kong, we have over 400 drama productions alone annually. There is an amazing range of work. Our graduates have been doing noteworthy projects and are shaping and contributing enormously to the cultural map of Hong Kong, I just hope people take note of it.

Interviewed by Chitralekha Basu

(HK Edition 03/02/2018 page10)