Technology
What is technology? How does Zuni reinvent tradition and theatre through technology? If we define technology as the application of new techniques to improve certain conditions or find a solution to certain problems, then Zuni’s reinvention of tradition through technology seeks new solutions for the development and sustainability of heritage performing arts in contemporary times, and new ways of connecting ancient traditions with the current cultural and social environment. The goal of reinventing tradition through technology is to improve the conditions of production and reception of traditional arts in the contemporary world, and to enhance their communicative potential and relevance to contemporary audiences.
Central to the project of “revitalizing tradition” is the advancement, or twenty-first century “updating and upgrading”, of indigenous theatres through interaction with new techniques and technologies. The pursuit of this kind of “Xiqu 2.0” (or “Chinese Opera 2.0”) plays a significant role in the process of “recreating theatre though media and technology” that Zuni has set as one of its main creative directions.
Experimental operatic pieces by Zuni co-artistic director Mathias Woo reconstruct traditional Chinese architecture through multimedia and mix the artistic inheritance of Kun Opera – the most ancient type of Chinese opera that is still practiced today – with contemporary music. One example is The Forbidden City, starring popular Hong Kong singer Anthony Wong Yiu-ming. Woo has connected Chinese history to the contemporary social and political experiences of China and Hong Kong in such works as One Hundred Years of Chinese Architecture and 1587: A Year of No Significance. As part of Zuni’s History Theatre series, this production emphasises the relevance of the past – hence, of tradition – for our times. It shows how some apparently insignificant events occurred in the year 1587, which historians of China wrote off an uneventful and rather irrelevant year, turned out to be of great importance for the future of the country to the extent that their repercussions are still felt to this day.
