Whether they make your heart beat faster or your head spin, Chinese characters are a powerful force to be reckoned with. Yet, as the world's most complicated writing system -- with its combination of pictograms, ideograms and phonetic signifiers -- Chinese script is under attack and has been for over a century.
The first-ever Taipei Chinese Character Festival is organized by Taipei city's Department of Cultural Affairs and examines the history and culture of as well as the present crises facing Chinese characters from academic, artistic and technological vantage points.
PHOTO: MEREDITH DODGE, TAIPEI TIMES
According to Liao Hsien-hao (
The month-long festival will kick off tomorrow night at
7:30pm with an outdoor multi-media concert in the plaza of the Ximending's Chungshan Auditorium. The concert will use a traditional Chinese orchestra for background music to which several master calligraphers will ink their different styles of characters on large sheets of paper.
The performance is designed to demonstrate how the act of writing a character can become like a dance in which each stroke has a different quality or emotion. However, unlike a dance, the performance produces a concrete work of art that allows viewers to reconstruct the calligrapher's movements as they examine each character. If this interactive performance can't show you how to appreciate the complex beauty of Chinese calligraphy, nothing can.
There will be plenty of opportunities for examining all kinds of Chinese characters at the festival's exhibition entitled Chinese Characters and Life. It will open on Dec. 31 at the National Museum of History. The exhibition will focus on four main topics.
One section will feature the five calligraphic scripts, each with its own historical and socio-cultural significance: the seal script (
Another section is devoted to the decorative function of characters, displaying a collection of everyday objects from tea utensils to weapons.
The calligraphic art section shows how the deceptively simple act of writing can become such a rich and highly developed art form, while the "Chinese character technology and modern art" section is sure to hold a few surprises. The exhibition will give visitors a chance to become acquainted with the historical and cultural aspects of something they see and use everyday. For example, did you know that there used to be a character set used only by women?
"Much of modern society considers Chinese characters to be a relic of the past," said Commissioner Liao at a press conference Tuesday. But the main point of the festival, he stressed, was not for Chinese culture to pat itself on the back for past glories.
The International Academic Conference on Chinese Characters and Globalization is planned for Jan. 28-30 at the National Library.
Liao said that the most important task for the conference was to identify and discuss the threats facing the Chinese writing system. Scholars and professionals from various fields will discuss the status of Chinese characters in the "Confucian sphere of influence," which extends throughout East and Southeast Asia. Although Japan is the only non-Chinese society that still uses Chinese characters in its writing system, both Korean and Vietnamese were written using Chinese (or Chinese-based) characters in the recent past.
What are the benefits or drawbacks of switching to Latin or phonetic scripts (as Korea and Vietnam) did or simplifying characters as China has? As the Chinese script that can be used to write very different languages, it has historically been a symbol of China's will to unite and rule "all under heaven." But in today's very different world, is the use of this ancient script still practical or meaningful?
Meanwhile, two competitions will give the public a chance to show off their love of Chinese characters, for better or worse.
The elementary school Chinese character competition will test youngsters' skill with idioms, variable pronunciations, etc. The first round will be held at various schools in Taipei on Dec. 29 and the final showdown will take place on Jan. 22 at Chungshan Auditorium. Call (02) 2371 0086 x 12 to sign up. The Chinese word-game software competition will award innovators with prizes of NT$100,000 for first place, NT$50,000 for second and NT$10,000 for third. Submissions are due Dec. 31 and prizes will be awarded on Jan. 22. Call (02) 2371 0086 x 9 to sign up or visit www.culture.gov.
Performance notes:
What: Taipei Chinese Character Festival Opening Concert: Flying Ink.
Where: Chungshan Auditorium Plaza, No 98 Yenping S Rd, Ximending MRT station exit 5
When: Tomorrow 7:30pm.
Details: Free admission. For more information on the festival, visit www.chinesecharacter.culture.gov.tw.
Paul Thomas Anderson’s “One Battle After Another” was crowned best picture at the 98th Academy Awards, handing Hollywood’s top honor to a comic, multi-generational American saga of political resistance. The ceremony Sunday, which also saw Michael B. Jordan win best actor and “Sinners” cinematographer Autumn Durald Arkapaw make Oscar history as the first female director of photography to win the award, was a long-in-coming coronation for Anderson, a San Fernando Valley native who made his first short at age 18 and has been one of America’s most lionized filmmakers for decades. Before Sunday, Anderson had never won an Oscar. But “One Battle
What was the population of Taiwan when the first Negritos arrived? In 500BC? The 1st century? The 18th? These questions are important, because they can contextualize the number of babies born last month, 6,523, to all the people on Taiwan, indigenous and colonial alike. That figure represents a year on year drop of 3,884 babies, prefiguring total births under 90,000 for the year. It also represents the 26th straight month of deaths exceeding births. Why isn’t this a bigger crisis? Because we don’t experience it. Instead, what we experience is a growing and more diverse population. POPULATION What is Taiwan’s actual population?
In Kaohsiung’s Indigenous People’s Park (原住民主題公園), the dance group Push Hands is training. All its members are from Taiwan’s indigenous community, but their vibe is closer to that of a modern, urban hip-hop posse. MIXING CULTURES “The name Push Hands comes from the idea of pushing away tradition to expand our culture,” says Ljakuon (洪濬嚴), the 44-year-old founder and main teacher of the dance group. This is what makes Push Hands unique: while retaining their Aboriginal roots, and even reconnecting with them, they are adamant about doing something modern. Ljakuon started the group 20 years ago, initially with the sole intention of doing hip-hop dancing.
You would never believe Yancheng District (鹽埕) used to be a salt field. Today, it is a bustling, artsy, Kowloon-ish “old town” of Kaohsiung — full of neon lights, small shops, scooters and street food. Two hundred years ago, before Japanese occupiers developed a shipping powerhouse around it, Yancheng was a flat triangle where seawater was captured and dried to collect salt. This is what local art galleries are revealing during the first edition of the Yancheng Arts Festival. Shen Yu-rung (沈裕融), the main curator, says: “We chose the connection with salt as a theme. The ocean is still very near, just a
RSS