Yingmei and Her Friends in Chongqing c

Duration:

12.02.2019 — 19.05.2019 (Opening Performancedauer: 1,5 hours)
Dimensions Art Center(DAC), Chongqing, China

Photographer:

Juren Chen

Object Interactive Performance and Object & Video Interactive Performance

Yingmei and her collaborators:

Yingmei Duan and Blaise Schwartz, Sufang Chen, Xunan Chen, Chongqing Huiling Service Organisation for People with Intellectual Disabilities, Jing He, HouLiuMei Hot and Sour Noodle Restaurant, Jiayi Hu, Yanzi Hu, Mr. L, Li Yu Tea Shop, Liang QianHao Restaurant, Ying Liu, Hua Lu, Wenting Ma, Mai Yuandi Bun & Porridge Restaurant, Ni Er, Jiamin Ouyang, Seven Days Vegetation Dyeing Art Studio, Qian Ren, Lihua Shao, Changxue Tian, Shenggu Tun, Qiong Wang, Ying Wang, Youzhen Wang, Xiyu Leather Art Store, Zhe Yuan, Zhaoqing Zeng & Ya Wang, Jing Zhang, Luona Zhang & Ke Hu, Zhaoying Zhang and Xianfan Zhu

In 2019, as an artist in residence for 3 months at DAC in Chongqing, I developed 34 “Object Interactive Performance” and “Object & Video Interactive Performance” artworks with my collaborators, which were brought together in the exhibition “Yingmei and Her Friends in Chongqing”.

The people I collaborated with were of different ages and worked in different professions. I hoped to better understand old and new friends who live in Chongqing and to create memories between us.

For the opening exhibition performance I invited people who were not engaged with the art world professionally. I transformed their everyday work into performance art. For example, the cleaning lady swept the floor and the shoemaker made shoes.

Over the years I have collaborated many times, and each time I have a different experience. Collaborating with each person has touched me greatly and given me different feelings. Each person is like a thick book of which I only get to know a small section during the project.

Nelson Mapako

A versatile Playwright/ Director, Performance artist, Theatre Trainer and Arts Administrator who strives on exploring the limits of creativity, Nelson Mapako has been practicing professional theatre arts since 1992. He was born in Zimbabwe in 1972 where he kicked off his artistic career with Tikwele Drama Group in Hwange. Later on he formed Ezemvelo Creative Artists. He has also worked for the Zimbabwe Association of Community Theatre as a field officer for the Matabeleland region, Amazulu Arts Consultants as Programs Officer, Theatre and Development Initiative as Artistic Director and Intwasa Arts Festival koBulawayo as the inaugural Festival Administrator.

Mapako has also worked for 6 years in Swaziland (Seconded by the National Arts Council of Zimbabwe’s Bulawayo province.) where apart from being the Programs and Training consultant for Swaziland Theatre for Children and Young People he was running individual theatre projects. While in Swaziland he established the Iphi ‘Africa Project. Of late 2011/ 2012 he has conducted Acting workshops for Intwasa Arts Festival ko Bulawayo in Zimbabwe as well as ParticNelson Mapako is a prolific artist who received training in Community Theatre between 1994 and 1998 through the mentorship of the late international acclaimed artist Ngugi wa Mirri. He is a holder of a Training of Trainers Certificate in Community Theatre, A General Certificate in Intellectual property from WIPO, A Diploma in Program Management and Monitoring. He has written/directed several stage & television productions including Television puppetry productions in Swaziland (Mantentekazane Swazi Television) and Zimbabwe (Khuluza ZTV) and has also featured as an actor both on stage and television. He is a recipient of the Zimbabwe’s prestigious National Arts Merit Award (NAMA) for Outstanding Theatrical Production (OUTCAST) in 2004. He was also a nominee for the NAMA award in 2003 for his production (SIX ALL OUT) Mapako’s other works have been performed at international arts festivals such as HIFA (Social Hanger 2003) in Zimbabwe, Matiwane Manana Arts Festival in Swaziland and Out the Box in Cape Town, South Africa. Intwasa Arts Festival koBulawayo,Ibumba Arts Festival in Zimbabwe as well as the SASOL Schools Arts Festival (A project for Grahamstown Arts festival)in Witbank South Africa. ipatory Theatre Workshops for PLAN Zimbabwe/Intwasa Arts Festival.

His international collaborations include working with Yingmei Duan – a performance artist from Germany as well as Laway arts South Africa/Netherlands. Nelson’s works are pregnant with artistic, social, developmental and political issues that affect the existence of humanity. His latest work is “A drop in the Land” done in collaboration with Laway Arts South Africa/Netherlands.

Yingmei and Her Friends in Chongqing c

Object Interactive Performance and Object & Video Interactive Performance

Nikhil Chopra

Johannes Zits

David Hancock

Di Lu

Beijing East-Village

Márcio Carvalho

Nelson Mapako

Xiaohan Han