Biographies
Dr. Margaret Chan - Moderator
Margaret Chan is currently working in Toronto's public arts sector promoting participation opportunities for the general public. Margaret's background spans the fields of ethnomusicology, education and geography. Her doctoral research focuses on the articulation of cultural identity through music expressed at Chinese festivals in Toronto. Her recent research interests are in applied ethnomusicology which explores the opportunities and challenges of boundary crossings between front line arts services and academic and theoretical interpretive paradigms.
Professor Dongshin Chang
Ph.D. New York University. Assistant Professor, School of English and Theatre Studies, University of Guelph. Chang teaches theatre/performance history, dramatic literature and theory and world theatre cultures from a global, comparative perspective. His research interests include race and performance, stage representation of the Other and intercultural performance. Chang studies and practices kunqu, a form of traditional Chinese theatre, and continues to learn and perform in the young male role type. He has organized and given lectures and demonstrations of kunqu for the general public, including a talk on kunqu invited by Little Pear Garden at Harbourfront Centre's 2008 World Routes Festival. Chang is also interested in exploring the potential and possibilities of utilizing and merging elements from different performing traditions as a creative approach. In 2006, Chang co-wrote and directed Confessions, an adaptation of the Greek Phaedra myth presented with Chinese theatre concepts and techniques, at the 2006 New York Fringe Festival.
Professor Shih-ming L. Chang
Shih-Ming Li Chang, Associate Professor of Theatre and Dance at Wittenberg University, is a performer, choreographer and mother of four loving children. At Wittenberg she teaches modern, jazz, ballet, tap, Chinese folk dancing, Tai Chi Quan and Sword Dance, as well as Dance Composition and Dance Ethnology, and has directed Wittenberg's Annual Dance Concert since 1986. Chang earned her B.A. degree in Dance at the University of Chinese Culture, Taipei, Taiwan and an M.F.A. in Dance at Smith College in Massachusetts. She has participated in numerous dance festivals, including Bates, White Mountain, Jacob's Pillow, eighteen gatherings of the American College Dance Festival Association, and the XI Annual International Contemporary Dance Conference and Performance Festival in Poland. Over the years Chang has given lectures and demonstrations on Chinese dance and culture in numerous universities, festivals, and conferences in Taiwan, Poland and the U.S.A. Chang served as vice president of Ohio Dance for six years, and also was executive director for Weaving Pine, a non-profit organization promoting Chinese Culture and performing arts in Ohio. She now serves on the National Board of Directors of ACDFA, representing the East-Central region since Oct. 2005.
Emily Cheung - Little Pear Garden Collective, Artistic Director
Emily Cheung is a professional Chinese dance artist specialized in both the Chinese classical and contemporary styles. She received her dance training in China, the United States, and Canada. With an active performing schedule, Emily has won many prestigious dance awards including three grand prizes from the North American Chinese Dance Competition for her excellent dance technique and interpretation. She is an educator, performer, and choreographer with a B.F.A. and B. Ed. and Master of Fine Arts in Dance from York University. In addition to her passion for Chinese dance, she also performs ballet, modern, Bharatanatyam, Latin and ballroom dances. Cheung is interested in preserving traditional Chinese dance, creating contemporary dance that honours the Chinese traditions, and collaborating with artists from other disciplines and ethnic backgrounds to create works with unique aesthetic sensibilities. Emily is an active member of PULSE dance conference, Cultural Pluralism in Performing Arts Movement, a member of SCDS and CODE. Over the years, she has been invited as guest lecturer and guest artists in both theatre and dance departments from York University, University of Toronto and Trent University. She has participated in numerous dance festivals including Sooryu Dance Festival, CanAsian, Nuit Blanche, Luminato, and Dusk Dance.
Professor Yin Mei Critchell
Yin Mei has established herself as a choreographer and performance/visual artist uniquely positioned to explore themes of artistic and spiritual significance arising at the intersection between Asian traditional performance and Western contemporary dance. She has collaborated with an astonishing array of artists, from well-known visual artists and composers, to Tibetan modern dancer Sang Jijia and traditional Balinese masked dancer I Nyoman Catra. Yin Mei received a Guggenheim Fellowship in Choreography in 2005 and was a Choreography Fellow of the New York Foundation for the Arts in 2004. Yin Mei's recent work includes Nomad: The River, a multi-media dance theater piece. She is also currently developing a mixed media installation/performance work entitled City of Paper. Yin Mei is a professor of dance and currently Director of the Dance Program at Queens College, New York City University. She teaches contemporary dance technique, choreography, improvisation/composition, Asian performing arts, yoga, qi gong and tai chi. She has four times received a Queens College Innovative Teaching Award for developing original course offerings, including (most recently) a course entitled “Light In Performance” in conjunction with a Queens College Physics professor. She received her B.A., M.F.A. and coursework toward a Ph.D. from New York University.
Mr. William Lau
William Lau was born in Hong Kong and raised in Montreal. A graduate from York University's Master of Fine Arts program in dance in 1991, William specializes in the arts of Nan Dan (male playing female role in the Peking Opera). He had developed and promoted the richness of Chinese dance and opera to a wide range of audiences nationally in Canada and had performed internationally including United States of America, United Kingdom, China, Mexico, Hawaii, Puerto Rico and Indonesia. William had also bridged Chinese performing arts to the Canadian mainstream communities by conducting workshops and lectures at various educational and cultural institutions. He had also pushed the boundaries of traditional arts practices by collaborating with professional artists of different artistic disciplines and diverse cultural backgrounds. His professional experience includes artist, arts administration, producer, researcher, and arts advocate. William had served on many Boards and Committees including the Canadian Conference of the Arts, the Toronto Arts Council, Dance Ontario, the Laidlaw Foundation and the Cultural Human Resources Council. He has also worked at the Canadian Commission for UNESCO, Department of Canadian Heritage, and the Arts Council of Great Britain.
Professor Robert Reid
Professor Robert Reid teaches in the Theatre Department. He received his MFA (1995) from Université du Québec à Montréal and joined the Faculty of Fine Arts in 2004. His teaching focuses mainly on acting and directing, and on the translation of text analysis into dynamics on stage, strongly influenced in his approach by the study of Meyerhold's biomechanics with Gennadi Bogdanov and by studies on Chinese Opera.. His research focuses on contemporary dramatic forms, on the relationship between contemporary forms and tradition, on interdisciplinary practices and on "composition scénique". During the last ten years Professor Reid collaborated on many theatrical productions and taught at different institutions, including Université du Québec à Montréal and at the Collège Jean-de-Brébeuf where he supervised the theatre program from 2001 to 2004. As a theatre director his work focuses mainly on the exploration of contemporary dramatic forms. He collaborated to the creation of two theatre companies: Le Groupe de poésie moderne and L'Ange-Éléphant. The former has been recognized as a unique and unusual phenomenon in Quebec's theatre scene. The latter, L'Ange-Éléphant, is dedicated to the exploration of new dramaturgy, both Canadian and International. This Company's recent productions includes The War Plays by Edward Bond, Body and Soul by John Mighton and Yvonne, princesse de bourgogne by Witold Gombrowich. Though Professor Reid works predominantly in French, he participated in projects with The Centaur Theatre, Projet Porte-Parole, Infinitheatre and other English speaking companies in Canada. Over the last 10 years he published articles in different specialty magazines, translated plays and participated in many conferences.
Professor Su Ya
Professor Su Ya received her Doctorate degree in Fine Arts at the Beijing Dance Academy. Su Ya is the Associated Professor at the Beijing Dance Academy since 2000 and taught classes in Chinese traditional and folk dances. This includes basic Chinese classical technique, traditional body rhythm, appreciation in Chinese dance and Chinese classical dance research. She also teaches Chinese aesthetics in performing arts, Chinese dance criticism and the history and cultural influence in Chinese dance. She specializes in classical Chinese dance and teaches classes with the use of props, such as the long sleeve and sword dance. Dr. Su has also published articles and books including "Differences and Similarities in Japanese, Korean and Chinese dance", "Chinese Classical Dance in Body Rhythm", and "Traditional Chinese Dance Repertoire".
Mr. Jinsheng Zhao
Jinsheng is a PhD candidate in social anthropology at York University. He has broad interest in the anthropology of performance, nationalism, gender and sexuality. Having carried out his one year fieldwork research (01/08-01/09) in China, Jinsheng is currently working on his dissertation tentatively entitled: "This Is Art!" --Performing Gender, Nation and Modernity in Nandan Practice in Beijing Opera, 1937-present. (Nandan: male who plays female roles.) Born and brought up in Beijing, Jinsheng worked as a professional translator (Russian into Chinese) and a book editor before getting his M.A. (with honors) in social science from University of Amsterdam.
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