The outbreak of COVID-19 has disrupted cultural life nationwide as health authorities advise against indoor gatherings of more than 100 people and urge social distancing.
Several performances have been canceled since March 19, including the Taiwan International Festival of Arts. The event, hosted by the National Performing Arts Center, has been an annual showcase for local and global artists for more than a decade.
To curb the spread of COVID-19, the Central Epidemic Command Center on March 25 announced an advisory against indoor gatherings of more than 100 people and outdoor events involving more than 500 attendees.
Photo courtesy of the Taipei Philharmonic Chorus
The advice led the Ministry of Culture to suspend events that were to be held at its venues or by affiliated groups, including the performing arts center.
The National Theater and Concert Hall in Taipei, the National Taichung Theater in central Taiwan and the National Kaohsiung Center of Arts (Weiwuying) have either canceled performances by foreign artists or postponed those by local performers.
The National Theater and Concert Hall said that a couple of privately organized performances are still scheduled to go ahead this month, but it has stopped offering guided tours.
Restaurants and shops at the venue late last month reduced service hours in response to the outbreak.
National Taichung Theater is keeping its public area open, but all performances scheduled for this month have been canceled or postponed.
The venue, a tourist hotspot designed by Japanese architect Toyo Ito, still provides guided tours, but to smaller groups.
Weiwuying has also canceled all indoor performances for this month. It continues to offer guided tours, but the number of people in tours has dropped, often to fewer than 10.
Weiwuying said it would continue to host a series of free monthly outdoor dance events.
However, a ballroom dance-themed program on Wednesday last week was changed to a single-person format to avoid physical contact between participants. The next event is scheduled for May 6.
Four Taiwanese groups selected to present their works at Scotland’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe this summer would instead participate in next year’s festival after event organizers on Wednesday last week canceled all events scheduled for August.
Japanese footwear brand Onitsuka Tiger today issued a public apology and said it has suspended an employee amid allegations that the staff member discriminated against a Vietnamese customer at its Taipei 101 store. Posting on the social media platform Threads yesterday, a user said that an employee at the store said that “those shoes are very expensive” when her friend, who is a migrant worker from Vietnam, asked for assistance. The employee then ignored her until she asked again, to which she replied: "We don't have a size 37." The post had amassed nearly 26,000 likes and 916 comments as of this
US President Donald Trump said "it’s up to" Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) what China does on Taiwan, but that he would be "very unhappy" with a change in the "status quo," the New York Times said in an interview published yesterday. Xi "considers it to be a part of China, and that’s up to him what he’s going to be doing," Trump told the newspaper on Wednesday. "But I’ve expressed to him that I would be very unhappy if he did that, and I don’t think he’ll do that," he added. "I hope he doesn’t do that." Trump made the comments in
Tourism in Kenting fell to a historic low for the second consecutive year last year, impacting hotels and other local businesses that rely on a steady stream of domestic tourists, the latest data showed. A total of 2.139 million tourists visited Kenting last year, down slightly from 2.14 million in 2024, the data showed. The number of tourists who visited the national park on the Hengchun Peninsula peaked in 2015 at 8.37 million people. That number has been below 2.2 million for two years, although there was a spike in October last year due to multiple long weekends. The occupancy rate for hotels
A cold surge advisory was today issued for 18 cities and counties across Taiwan, with temperatures of below 10°C forecast during the day and into tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. New Taipei City, Taipei, Taoyuan and Hsinchu, Miaoli and Yilan counties are expected to experience sustained temperatures of 10°C or lower, the CWA said. Temperatures are likely to temporarily drop below 10°C in most other areas, except Taitung, Pingtung, Penghu and Lienchiang (Matsu) counties, CWA data showed. The cold weather is being caused by a strong continental cold air mass, combined with radiative cooling, a process in which heat escapes from
RSS