Urban Legend, 2015 Artist in Residence Program

【Statement】

The content or material of urban legends points to the stories once happened or said to have happened, like an invisible force in our culture, life and society, somehow influencing and forming the habits and rituals of the modern world. According to the analyses, urban legends were constructed with three distinctive features: 1. passed down or spread around by oral narratives/word of mouth, which is true even in the modern world nowadays with all the technology and digital development we have; 2. constructed between fictional and non-fictional stories; 3. these legends have become a cultural symbol, some of them full of educational epigram messages, representing, forming the vision and value for the world that the people believe in.

The theme of 2015 Artist in Residence Program this year is “Urban Legend”, seven individual/ groups of artists were invited to explore and imagine those urban legends and stories which are passed down from mouth to mouth, with a common imagination in the memory of the urban residents, and one which flowed between the different spaces. The idea of “urban legend” was first discussed academically outside the area of folklore in The Vanishing Hitchhiker: American Urban Legends and Their Meanings (1981) by Jan Harold Brunvand, a British scholar. Two major concepts were proposed: firstly, that the legends, myths and folklores were not exclusively belonged to the so-called primitive or traditional society; and second, people may get a better understanding of modern city and society by studying these urban legends. He also commented that if a “legend” can be passed on for generations in a certain culture, it must possess three essential factors: basic, solid story structure; practical foundation of belief; and meaningful message or concept in the story. Urban legend is a subcategory of folk narrative; unlike fairytales that are completely fictional or myths that tell stories of gods or semi gods from ancient times, urban legends represent the history―or semi-history―of folklore. They based on more modern, recent ages that contain real people in real world. In these stories that passed down by word of mouth, some certain factors remained untouched while others vary with time. This process is sometimes known as “public reinvention”, where people in the folk society adding new materials to the traditional legends, continuing recreate and reinvent during the process of retelling the stories. Generally speaking, some of the narratives passed down by word of mouth were hence stereotyped or formalized, however the fine details within the stories never stopped changing with time.

Jan Harold Brunvand’s studies and publications in the 70s and 80s were conducted based on a large amount of urban legends in the US, analyzing and constructing the legend system in the western world. These beliefs and ideologies still managed to influence the forming of folktales, and also the angle and method that later generations interpret these stories. Being in the age and region that we are in today, especially for such a historical city as Tainan, multiple layers of various cultures and histories are stacked together; there are stories passed down by local Tainan residents for epigram purposes or served as a starting point for a journey seeking the culture and history of the past. There are also stories closely relating to our modern lives. For instance, the “Three Mysterious Cases of Taiwan― Lin Tou Sister, Chen Shouniang, and Burning joss paper in Lu-Zhu Temple” all happened in Tainan; also the suspense story and news of “Canal Mystery”, mysterious secret tunnel under the Fort Provintia, the legend of Tainan dragon vein of the city of Phoenix…all of which are famous legends passed down generations. And surely, there are more legends passing between citizens. Also, the recent urban legends such as China Town have a close link with urban development. Under careful exploration and analysis, it was found that these stories have an intricately important connection with the historical background setting, social structure and values.

The concept of this "urban legend," is based on the exploration and reflection about these invisible cultural symbols and stories. The various disclosures, descriptions and interpretations about the legends in the city is dug up, with its main text done up by ways of reflecting on history, stories, settings, sounds, objects and modern life. The legend and imagination from the mass culture and modern life is reproduced or constructed, and responded to one’s own experiences. Among the seven participating artists, the work of Ho Ming-Kuei, “Manufacturer of monuments – an unknown history”, is presented through two inscriptions, both with a connotation of the Lord’s Prayer, displaying two different historical viewpoints about Taiwan’s real existence, an imagination of the formation of the legend. Chen Bo-Yi’s “The spoken out wall” collects the orally passed down storied of the residents, and used the sound and debris devices to construct an old wall which retells those old stories of Tainan. These two persons approached the existence of these real and fictional circulating legendary stories from different cultural and historical dimensions. The “{Site} call soul ritual” of the Post-Theatre used scavengers as its dramatic action where the discarded memories, forgotten stories, and unnoticed scenes are picked up once again. Those once-existing spirits are captured and summoned where the past legends are retransformed to generate a live dialogue with the audiences. Tseng Bo-Hao’s “Ghost Forum Project” rewrote the Tapani Incident and various Taiwan folktales into fifteen story scripts and they were performed in the style of Bianwen. Performers from various field backgrounds were invited to perform. Both two groups of performers deconstructed and constructed the original tales and performed using various theatrical and storytelling methods. The created documentation of the performance is exhibited on the performing site. Another performing group, The Little Piglet, performed the “Human Flesh Tainan Show” by ways of singing in an actual city scenery. Kaori Tazoe from Japan was reminded of an old Japanese movie when he was present at the Tainan streets which have many exposures to Japanese element. He produced the film “Autofocus” by linking up his experience of Tainan streets and temples with his early nostalgic thoughts and movie settings. He explored the construction of the “story / fiction” in his set up of the scene. Huang Yan-Ying cooperated with Chuan-Men Theatre to organize a “Chuan Men Art Exhibition” where the children’s drawings for the competition were collected and exhibited. Together he held a joint art exhibition with the film printmaker, Yan Zhen-Fa. The billboards of Chuan Men Theatre, under the children’s paintings of their interpretation and imagination about the movie and the mass media culture, became a new focal location which has a profound linkage between the local culture and the old theater.

Heritage Manufacture Club_ Unknown History

Ho Ming-Kuei

In the seventeenth century, before the boom of Han Chinese immigrants disembarked on the Island of Formosa, the original inhabitants distributed throughout the island all spoke different languages, with their communication still remained in the stage of primitive life slaying. Two years after the Dutch East India Company retreated to the Formosa Island, Christian missionaries set foot on the island to conduct missionary work. Ds. Robertus Junius, the second missionary to land in Taiwan made Chihkan as his base, and began his long 14 years of missionary work in Taiwan. He claimed to have baptized 5900 people, mostly of the Pingpu tribe aborigines who lived on the southwest coast. During this time, he taught them Pinyin for recording the Formosa language, and used the text, now known as the Sinckan Manuscripts, to propagate the Christianity doctrines. In the eighteenth century, a man called George Psalmanaazaar, who claimed to be a Formosan, published a book (An historical and geographical description of Formosa) on the history and geography of Formosa, and presented the Lord’s Prayer in pseudo-Formosa text. Although these two texts are present on the same piece of land, these two real existing texts about Taiwan became a kind of legendary imagination under different views of Chinese history.

Venue｜Absolute Space for the Arts

Stories tole by the Wall

Chen Po-I

The wall is for those wandering souls who lingered in this old ancient city, to express those unforgettable past and the hidden sacrifices which dominated Tainan. By ways of sounds and object devices, allowing the decadent walls to narrate the ancient helpless happenings both inside and outside the walls so that these complaining whispers, could traverse back and forth between the past and the present, shuttling within space and time.

This project is based on the map done by the Taiwan government in 1875. The remnants of these ancient walls and old houses were searched for among the alleys of today’s Tainan. The debris were collected and marked on the map. At the same time, orally passed down tales and sounds of the allusions talking among the residents in the alleys were collected, and the field study results recorded and marked on the file. Lastly, these sounds and debris were constructed into old walls to be exhibited and to retell the stories.

Venue｜Absolute Space for the Arts

{Site} call soul ritual

The Post-Theatre

We dream, the falseness and the truth are all the same me.

Splash (fall into the water), may no longer cry out

My soul fly farther away without direction helplessly alone

My soul fly farther away fate in this world destined to be

The wandering souls that lingered in Tainan. Passed down by word of mouth, those loves and those desires. The glistening and rippling rivers, some being treated like monsters, some died of unattained love, some once lived a glamorous life, some were taken out, and some were hidden away or are no longer being talked about. An ancient city, with so many ''used to be''. Will destruction bring new life?

Through the dramatic action of scavenging, those discarded unwanted memories, gradually forgotten stories, and the scene that are no longer being noticed, once again were upheld, captured and summoned those souls that used to be here. Through the performers’ live acts and audience’s participation in the show, co-created a shared experience. Rebuilt those legends of the past and reconverted that with the present into a live generated dialogue. Not a reproduction of the story, but a translation of the past performance of the old souls, creating a scene on the spot different from the general imagination, a heterogeneous live scene. Call out to the soul: about others and the local contemporary ritual.

Keywords: Shinmachi, brothels, cigarette dish, Tainan China Town, Canal, injustice spirit, couple suicide pact ……

Venue｜Howl Space Performance Time and Venue｜

2015.08.01 20:00 Howl Space

2015.08.03 19:30 321 Arts Village

Autofocus

田添 かおりKaori Tazoe

What called to mind is a movie about ancient Japan. It was the film “When a Woman Ascends the Stairs” directed by the Mikio Naruse in 1960. It is a delicate film describing a woman who worked in a bar work, and of her love and life, and of her painful disputes and struggles. Why would I think of this movie? That is because walking along the Tainan streets where the remains of many Japanese elements can still be seen, which makes me go into a kind of nostalgia for the long ago home town. Another reason is because there are many temples in Tainan like the Tainan Grand Matsu Temple where they worship and manage men’s and women’s fate. Therefore it seemed particular suitable place to ponder about those topics that are of concern to women, such as “dream, work, love, marriage and life”. That is one of the reasons why I associated to the film. I want to try to put that particular experience into a movie production, to produce a story about a woman, and to think up and produce a film based on that nostalgic scene.

Venue｜Howl Space

$10 Theatre – Tainan Human Flesh Show

Sexy Little Young Pig：

憂鬱陳公子、呼麥鬼豪、賽鴿光光、誠實巨人、中華白海豬

Little piglet entered a dark period, passed the Madou Daitian Temple, awakened and reckon that it should become a social welfare organization, possessed the body of a 10 dollar rocking horse, and then sacrificed itself and became fresh meat, fatty meat, smoked meat, and hamburger patty all for the beautiful girl.

Performance Time & Place｜

2015.08.09 20:00 Chihkan Tower

Ghost Forum Project

Tseng Po-Hao

The project rewrote the Tapani Incident and various Taiwan folktales into fifteen story scripts. Each talk show will perform three scripts (not done in the time sequence of the overall story), and is expected to invite nine performers of various fields to perform. Bianwen (a popular narrative literature) – the body (performing artist) - the viewer, in this transfer process, the fable of reality will be pieced together at the ending.

Venue｜Howl Space

Performance Time & Space｜

2015.08.16 19:30 , 321 Arts Village.

Price NTD350

Chuan Men Art Exhibition

Huang Yen-Ying

Chuan Men Theater has a long-standing history in the development of the film culture, whether it be of the local films or of the Taiwan films, they all have their important value. This exhibition reflects on the ongoing drawing works produced by the film art master, Yan Zheng-Fa, over the years. This has become a unique cultural phenomenon. During the summer vacation, a children’s drawing contest is held and the works are collected and displayed, making the billboards of Chuan Men movie theater become more than just for advertising function. It has become an exhibition for the children to hold in conjunction with the drawing master, becoming a new location where a profound linkage between the local culture and the old theater is achieved, a place where the children can fantasize their imagination about the movie and the mass media culture.

Venue｜Chuan Men Theatre

Information of Exhibition Venues｜

Howl Space

Wed.-Sun. 13:00-18:00

No.163, Sec. 2, Yongfu Rd., West Central Dist., Tainan City 70048, Taiwan(R.O.C)

Absolute Space for the Arts

Wed.-Fri. 12:00-20:00

Sat.-Sun. 14:00-20:00

No.11,Ln. 205, Sec. 2, Minsheng Rd., West Central Dist., Tainan City 70048, Taiwan(R.O.C)

Chuan Men Theatre

the billboards Always open

No.187, Sec. 2, Yongfu Rd., West Central Dist., Tainan City 70048, Taiwan(R.O.C)

Art Square Taiwan 12.00-22.00/ No.142-1, Sec. 2 Yongfu Rd., Tainan City

Organiser｜

Art Square Taiwan

Co-organiser｜

Howl Space、Absolute Space for the Arts、Chuan Men Theatre、321 Art Village、My Beverage

Sponsors｜

National Cultural and Arts Foundation、Cultural Affairs Bureau, Tainan City Government