Program
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As part of the “Taiwan Moves” program series and in collaboration with Southern Jump Open Space, Taiwanese artists are visiting HELLERAU for a two-week residency. During a joint open studio, they will offer insights into their research.
Yi Yun Hsueh & Kai Wen Wu: Invisible Square
This choreographic research project explores how the body and consciousness change in the face of social and political uncertainty. Building on their previous work on the mind-body divide, urban existence and bodily memory, the artists are now broadening their focus to include a collective, societal perspective. The residency in Germany is intended to facilitate international exchange and the site-specific development of the material.
Chen Pin-Ni
Chen Pin-Ni explores boundaries and transitions within street dance culture – between dance styles, genders and places. In the southern Taiwanese scene, she frequently encounters the notion of ‘dance purity’, whilst experiencing her own hybrid body, whose movement language is perceived there as ‘European’. She is using her trip to Dresden to explore, through encounters with dancers from diverse backgrounds, how hybrid bodies are perceived and whether diversity in dance can be understood as a possibility rather than a deviation, beyond categorisation.
Please register in advance via: schallenberg@hellerau.org
Artists in residency
Chen Pin-Ni (born 1998, Chiayi, Taiwan) is a dancer and choreographer. She has been active in the street dance scene since 2015, influenced by hip-hop and locking as well as a strong focus on musical improvisation. Since 2020, she has been combining street dance with contemporary dance and working with various choreographers. In her choreographic practice, she explores the body from a female perspective and challenges notions of strength, gender and belonging. In doing so, she examines the concept of ‘soft strength’ and how bodies move, adapt and assert themselves within existing structures.
Yi Yun Hsueh began her artistic career in street dance culture and now moves between hip-hop communities and contemporary art. As a battle dancer and MC, she combines elements of popping with a precise, controlled movement language. Her work views the body as a vessel of consciousness and explores themes such as alienation, disembodiment and altered states of consciousness. Inspired by literature, film, music and Daoist rituals, she works across disciplines – from Butoh and site-specific performances to VR and motion capture.
As a dancer and performer, Kai Wen Wu’s artistic practice is deeply rooted in street dance culture. Drawing on many years of battle experience and a background in breaking and contemporary dance, he blends street culture with contemporary performance. His focus is on floorwork and improvisation. In doing so, he explores the relationships between the body, the city, psychological states and collective emotions. He examines how the body changes under pressure and in extreme conditions, and how individual and collective tensions are expressed physically.
About Southern Jump Open Space
Founded in 2025 by artist Chou Shu-Yi, Southern Jump Open Space is Taiwan’s first platform dedicated to the body and dance. Through program curation, performance presentations, artist invitations, and exchange initiatives, it fosters connections with diverse fields, including experimental music, environmental theatre, and visual media.
Its programs encompass performances, artistic dialogue, daily training, artist residencies, and public engagement, cultivating a forward-looking hub for artistic exchange and co-creation while supporting independent artists in their experimentation and creative practices.
Funding
“Taiwan Moves” is presented in collaboration with ESMC and with the kind support of the TSMC Education & Culture Foundation and the Ministry of Culture, Taiwan.
Funded by the Cultural Foundation of the Free State of Saxony. This initiative is co-financed by tax revenue in accordance with the budget approved by the Saxon State Parliament. With the kind support of ‘So geht sächsisch.’
Taiwan Moves
