Artists

Prof. Zhang is the current chairperson of the Dance Department, Dance School of TNUA. Born in Cambodia, Zhang started his dance career in Australia, where he has been the principal soloist of the Australian Dance Theatre (ADT) for five years. He was voted as the best male dancer(1990) and the best choreographer(1996) by The Advertiser of South Australia. In 1996, he moved to Taiwan and started his teaching in TNUA.

Born and raised in Taiwan, Wu-Kang Chen started dancing at the age of twelve and graduated from the Taiwan University of Arts. In 2001, he danced with Feld’s Ballet Tech and Peridance. Becoming the soloist and principal the next year he started his long-term collaboration with choreographer Eliot Feld. In 2004, he co-founded HORSE, the first all-male dance company in Taiwan. As the artistic director of HORSE, he produced significant works that toured in Asia, US and Europe. Since 2011 he has started collaborating with artists from different disciplines, including musician Shi-Yang Li, Thai dance artist Pichet Klunchun, and etc.

WangRuping / Taiwan / She / Her / Dancer / Teacher / Learner / Explorer / Daughter / Mother / Single / Cooking / Traveling / University Of Taipei / Taiwan Mandarin / 48
Received her MFA from the Dance School of Utah University, Ru-Ping Wang is currently teaching at University of Taipei as assistant professor of the dance department. She has a long history of dancing with different dance troupes in America and Taiwan, including the Limón Dance Company, Martha Graham Dance Company, Metropolitan Opera Ballet, Mary Anthony Dance Company, Kun-Yang Lin Dancers, Taipei Crossover Dance Company, Taipei Folk Dance Theatre, Chamber Ballet Taipei, and etc.

I-Ling Liu, a contemporary dance artist originally from Taiwan and received a BFA from Taipei National University of the Arts, was a former member of Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company for 11 years. I-Ling has been creating and displaying her works as well as collaborating with visual artists, photographers, composers, directors and actors in theater and film. In 2020 she participated in Taiwanese-American artist Ming-Wei Lee’s work “Our Labyrinth” and performed in the Metropolitan Museum. In 2019 she collaborated with Taiwanese filmmaker Su Hui-Yu and performed “The White Waters” at Performa 19 Biennial in New York City. In 2018 she joined Luca Veggetti’s work as a soloist and performed in Bologna, Italy. Her works focus on reminiscence, trauma, freedom of speech and definition of “technique”. In 2017 her solo work “GENG” was nominated for the Taishin Arts Award in Taiwan. She is one of the recipients of the Cloud Gate Art Makers Project in 2021 and currently working on an evening-length solo.

As an active choreographer and dancer, Ming-Shen Ku has settled her base in Taiwan since 1987. Ku's works are influenced by many Western and Eastern dance styles, a merging development from her diverse backgrounds. In 1991, Ku became deeply involved in Contact Improvisation and introduced it to Taiwan. She founded her dance company "Ku & Dancers" in 1993 to present new works and promote the art of improvisation. Ku & Dancers has set their foot print in New York, Australia, Paris, London, China, Korea, Malaysia and Indonesia. Ku has also been invited as a guest artist to perform and teach in many universities and dance companies around the world. She has received Wu San Lien Award, a lifetime achievement award, in 2009, and the 21st National Award for Arts in 2019.

Born in Hong Kong, Christopher Chu received his BS in Civil Engineering from the National Taiwan University where he started dancing and has never stopped since then. Chu is the founding member of Ku & Dancers, and also a member of the Performing Arts Alliance in Taiwan. He is now active as a freelance dancer, choreographer and dance teacher. In 2017, Chu received his MFA degree from Taipei National University of the Arts (TNUA) Dance School, of which he is a current PhD student.

Anli Su is currently Professor and Chair of the Dance Department of Chinese Culture University, Taiwan. She received her MFA degree in Dance from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She joined Ku & Dancers in 1993 and has been involved in the education and performance of improvisation.

Mei Li is the Director at “Mei-Kuang Li Creativity Psychology Workstation”. She worked with Kirstie Simson in the filming of ‘International Documentary of Dance Improvisation’ and has been invited to perform and teach improvisation in numerous festivals in Japan, Korea, Hong Kong and Madagascar. She is an active practitioner, a performer of improvisation, a member of Ku & Dancers. She currently teaches at Dance Forum Taipei Dance Company.

Ming-chu Yu, aka “Xiaochu”, is a dancer, performer, and improvisation teacher in Taiwan. Yu enjoys having a close relationship with dance and theatre. In 2001, she went to France, where she studied and worked with different choreographers including Yuko Kametami, Erinc Aslanboga, Simon Williams and Yukiko Murata. She received her MFA from Université Paris Saint-Denis in 2005. Yu returned to Taipei in 2008 and has since been involved in several interdisciplinary projects.

Born in 1979, Taipei, Taiwan, Sue-ching is currently an improvisation dancer of Ku & Dancers, and a dance teacher. She received her MFA in Dance Choreography from TNUA. Chang joined Ku & Dancers in 2008, performed in Memory Puzzles, Decode2010, Voltar, Moon Light, Wonderland in i-dance Taipei 2013, and other outdoor improvisation dance performances.

Chen-wie Hsu, founder of Hsu Chen Wei Dance Company is an independent artist from Kaoshung, Taiwan. Hsu is currently dancing with Ku and Dancers. He received his MFA degree in Dance Choreography from Taipei National University of the Arts. Many of his dance works have won the Taiwan National Creative Dance Award, and have toured in many countries including America, Canada, Australia, France, Malaysia, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, and Macao.

Lin received her MFA from Taipei National University of the Arts majoring in performance, and her BFA from Taipei City University Department of Dance. In 2016, she joined Ku & Dancers and debuted in SADHU. Line also worked with a number of choreographers touring to Russia, Edinburgh, Netherlands, Beijing and Hong Kong in various dance festivals. She also works as a freelance interdisciplinary collaboration choreographer and dance teacher. Her dance work Distance created for the Sun-Shier Dance Theatre Salon has won the S-An Cultural Foundation Arts Award in 2018.

After graduating from the Dance Department of Chinese Culture University, Chia-hsien Su joined Ku & Dancer in 2016. Su had danced with Sun-Shier Dance Theatre and Taipei Folk Dance Theatre. Recently, he has been commissioned to present dance work in Sun-shier Salon. Currently, he is an MFA student of the Dance Department, Chinese Culture University.

Alex Chen is from South Bend, Indiana, USA. He currently dances with Ku & Dancers and is active as a freelance dancer, choreographer and teacher. After graduating from the Dance department of National Taiwan Sports University, Chen has worked with various dance companies and independent artists; and has toured in cities including Sibu of Malaysia, Edinburgh, and Macao.

A current dance research doctoral student at Taipei National University of the Arts, Sean Chen received his MA from TNUA with the master thesis winning the Chin-Lin Award from the Dance Research Society, Taiwan. His research interests include the practice as research, the presence in dance performance and the somatic self-construction. In 2013, with grants from both the LMF Dance Foundation and the National Culture and Arts Foundation, Sean started his research in the ontology of somatic practice. Joined Ku & Dancers in 2016, he is also a Feldenkrais Awareness Through Movement teacher.

Tsai Kuan-Ling / Kuan / She / Her / Tainan / Performer / Choreography Accompany / Bewegung_mit_Kuan / Masseur / ArtModel / Daughter / FurnitureMaking / Hiking / Zürich,Switzerland / 39

Coordt Linke is an interdisciplinary musician and composer from Germany. He graduated from Robert Schumann Hochschule from Düsseldorf, Germany, trained in classical percussion. His creative works range across the boundary between the modern art field including dance, theatre, and new-media. He has collaborated with renowned choreographers in Europe such as Akram Khan Company in Zero Degrees, Third Catalogue, and Sacred Monsters, and with Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui in Tempus Fugit, and Sutra.

Arnaud Lechat is a French musician and composer living in Taiwan. He works for many pieces of modern dance, improvisation, circus, or poetry. Arnaud is the co-director of the documentary film "Doumadiao" on Taiwanese opera as well as the author of numerous documentaries for Radio Taiwan Internationale on the music of Taiwan in his program "Désorientales". He recently released three albums "Delivraence 9" , "Tanshuman / Subhuman" and “Sur les ailes de l’heure bleue”.

Classical and jazz bassist nourishing projects with various influences, Tang Ming leads his career mainly in Taiwan, Brazil and France. His work focuses on innovating in techniques and instrumental playing, transposing the stylistic richness of traditional instruments into jazz practice, and opening up new aesthetic fields from these different confrontations. Also a multi-instrumentalist, Tang Ming has designed a new type of wind instrument called keyless dedicated to cursive ornamentation, emphasizing singularities and microtonal inflections. Keyless allows to integrate the richness of language inherited from different traditions of the world within the framework of tonal music and supports the possibility of playing freely in all tonalities.

As a musician exploring the sound of the universe, ET Chen believes that music, as pulses and sound, is a phenomenal exhibition of the internal energy of life and heart, an embodiment of the material world. In his improvisation music, he focuses on the somatic interaction between the sound and energy flow. As if in a Sisyphean ritual, orders and structures come and go amid endless chaos. Born in Taipei, Taiwan, Chen is a music artist whose didgeridoo performance is akin to a native ritual. The invisible mandalas so created are endowed with the rich and abundant vibrations of Mother Earth, which will lead one through a profound journey of healing and spiritual transformation.

Born in Yilan, Taiwan, Jipo Yang started playing the sheng at the age of 10, nurtured in the professional arts education of Taiwan. Yang’s sheng performance not only highly emphasizes on the aroma controlling of traditional works but also contributes in expanding the diverse possibilities of the instrument. In 2014, Yang founded the art platform “A Root Yilan” based in his hometown, with the main goal of sharing a unique perspective of life through performing arts and connecting people.

Graduated from National Taiwan College of Performing Arts majoring in music accompaniment for Taiwanese Opera and the Traditional Chinese drums, Chen studied under and was well acknowledged by masters Da-peng Liu and Bu-chao Zhuang. He has been exploring world percussion instruments such as the traditional Chinese gong, the African drum, cajon, tank drum, and hand pan. He plays actively with various groups including the A ROOT, A MOVING SOUND and the Taiwan Bamboo Orchestra. He also owns a specialty coffee shop – Sing.Cafe.

Li graduated from Berklee College of Music majoring in film scoring. After graduation, she returned to Taiwan and started her career in film scoring. At the same time, she was involved in dance accompaniment and music pedagogy. She pursued this and received her MA degree from the Teachers College, Columbia University. Currently, she is an adjunct lecturer in major dance schools including Taipei National University of the Arts, National Taiwan University of Arts, National Taiwan College of Performing Arts, and etc. She is interested in finding sound in the environment. With various instruments, she experimentally works with improvisation dance and other disciplines.