APPEX 2000 Artists and Writers
Artists
Cambodia
Mao,
Tip Moni is a teacher and performer of Cambodian classical and traditional
dances. She is dedicated to reinvigorating these art forms, which are
almost lost to Cambodian culture. Since 1991, she has performed and taught
extensively at the Royal University of Fine Arts, Phnom Penh. She has
toured in China, Indonesia, France, Japan, Singapore and Thailand as a
member of the University's traditional and classical dance troupe. Recently,
she has conducted research as a member of Kain Dance Research and Cambodian
Dance Research in an effort to document, illustrate and describe various
Cambodian classical and traditional dances.
Soeur,
Sophea is a performer and teacher of Cambodian classical dance, specializing
in the character Hanuman. He is a teacher at the Royal University of Fine
Arts in Phnom Penh and has performed on tour in Japan, Singapore, Hong
Kong, Thailand and Laos. Committed to sustaining and strengthening the
arts of Cambodia, he is also an active researcher. His work has included
research and documentation of the Ken wind instrument and dance at the
University of Vientiane in Laos and, most recently, he has focused on
research and documentation of Cambodian classical dance with the Japan
Foundation and the Royal University of Fine Arts.
China
Peng,
Jingquan* began learning performing skills in 1970, under the strict
system of the old traditional Chinese theatres in his home county Huayuan,
China. There he managed with imitation (like most beginners in Chinese
traditional theatre) to acquire stage-acrobatic skills, conventional patterns
of body movements, and other techniques that an authentic and qualified
Chinese theatre actor must know. After ten years of apprenticeship, he
became a professional actor and is well known for his creation of theatrical
roles in different styles of Chinese traditional theatre. In 1980, he
arrived in Changsha and joined the Huagu Opera Troupe of the Hunan Province
as an actor and an emerging director. He is currently the artistic director
and playwright of the Huagu Opera Troupe and is in demand as a writer,
having written plays, scripts and articles for his own company as well
as for other theatre groups throughout China.
India
Ettumanoor
Parameswaran Kannan is a performer of traditional Kathakali from Kerala,
India. He began studying this remarkable theatre form in 1976 under the
late Kalanilayam Mohankumar. In 1989 he studied facial expression under
Padmasree Mani Madhavachakyar and continued into higher level training
in Kathakali under Kalamandam Vasu Pisharody from 1990 to 1993. He has
won numerous awards for his Kathakali performance and has performed in
the United States as well as many other areas both inside and outside
of Kerala. He has also been engaged in the development of new creative
works that incorporate Kathakali techniques and is currently a researcher
in the International Centre for Kerala Studies at the University of Kerala.
India/Tibet
Tashi Dhondup* was born and raised in India and began dancing at the
age of eight. At age 12, he became the youngest member of TIPA (Tibetan
Institute of Performing Arts) where he performed in operas and toured
Northern India for three months. His artistic achievements in Tibetan
performing dance, music and opera led to his being recognized as a "Junior
Artist" at TIPA in 1989. He has toured in Europe and the United States
and was featured in Martin Scorsese's film "Kundun." He is a
virtuoso performer of the six-stringed darnyn and is also developing his
skills as a playwright and filmmaker. He is a returning APPEX artist.
Tsering
Dorjee (Bawa) was born in Shimla, India, and is a distinguished Senior
Artist at TIPA (Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts). He has been active
as a performing artist, specializing in Tibetan Folk and Monastic dance.
Dedicated to the preservation of Tibetan arts in exile, he is also a research
scholar at TIPA. He has been on numerous cultural exchange programs, including
performances in the Netherlands and a World tour as a dancer and musician.
In addition, he has been featured in Eric Villi's film "Caravan"
as well as Martin Scorsese's "Kundun".
Indonesia
Ida Ayu Wimba Ruspawati was trained in the classical Balinese dance
repertoire. Since 1986, she has been a dancer, choreographer and dance
instructor at STSI, Denpasar (Sekolah Tinggi Seni Indonesia, the Bali
State College of Indonesian Arts at Denpasar). She has toured extensively
and performed with STSI in Japan, Canada, Germany and the United States.
She is interested in how Balinese and other Indonesian arts relate to
other world arts and is often involved in cross-cultural exchange and
creating new collaborative pieces.
Nuryanto Susanto was born in Karanganyar, Indonesia, and is a choreographer,
dancer and faculty member at STSI, Surakarta. He has performed on tour
in the United Kingdom, Japan, Germany, and Korea. He began choreographing
in 1988, integrating Javanese and modern dance forms and expression. His
works have been performed in Bali, Surakarta, at Borobudur Temple in Central
Java, the Indonesian Dance Festival and also in the Philippine International
Theater Festival and Conference in Manila. In 1999, he participated as
a dancer in the work of Chinese choreographer Wen Hui in Dining with 1999,
a work performed at the Indonesian Dance Festival in Jakarta.
I
Nyoman Windha, from the village of Singapadu,
is one of Bali's most prominent composers and musicians. He is a faculty
member of STSI, Denpasar who has taught, composed and performed extensively
both within Indonesia and internationally. His list of works now exceeds
forty major compositions including a range of dance music, accompaniment
for the popular dance dramas, other theatrical forms and many kinds of
instrumental music. In addition to teaching and performing his own work,
he has worked in collaboration with artists and groups such as Evan Ziporyn,
Dieter Mack, Keith Terry and the San Francisco Bay Area's Gamelan Sekar
Jaya. Touring and teaching have taken him to Japan, Europe, Hong Kong,
Australia and the United States.
Japan
Norihiro Higa was born in Okinawa, Japan and is a noted dancer
of classical Okinawan dance. He is a 'designated perpetuator' (instructor/performer)
of the national treasure "Kumiudui" (classical dance-play) and
is well respected for his performance of both male and female roles in
Okinawan dance. He graduated from the University of Ryukyu in 1978 with
a degree in Physics and is recognized for his commitment to the preservation
of traditional Okinawan culture.
Kiyoyuki
Owan was born in Yomitan Village, Japan. He began studying with his
father Kiyonosuke Owan in the Nomura-ryu of Ryukyuan classical music.
He later continued his studies with Haruyuki Miyazato in the Afuso-ryu
of Ryukyuan classical music. He is well known for his striking style of
playing the Yokobue flute using circular breathing. Active as a performer
in Japan, he has also participated in the Fifth Asian Performing Arts
Festival sponsored by the government of Hong Kong. In 1974, he opened
the Ryukyuan Classical Music Afuso-ryu Studio and, in 1999, he was designated
as a Holder of Intangible Cultural Assets in the Afuso-ryu School of Traditional
Ryukyuan Music by Okinawa prefecture. He is a special lecturer at the
Okinawa Prefectural University of Arts.
Thailand
Pradit
Prasartthong (Tua) was trained in Thai classical dance, drama, singing
and body music in Thailand. His current area of emphasis is community
theatre. He is the director of The Grassroots Micromedia Project (MAKHAMPOM
Theatre Group) in productions that address the needs of community cultural
development, working with children and youth from the village or urban
poor. The group builds grassroots links with communities through theatre
workshop programs. The workshops are often complemented by theatre productions,
training and information activities and address issues such as democracy,
child prostitution, environmental preservation, AIDS and drug abuse. His
company has toured Thailand, England, Germany and Australia.
Vietnam
Nguyen
Thu Thuy* was born in central Vietnam to a humble family that loves
the arts. Since childhood, Thuy has had a close relationship to the arts,
especially music. At the age of eight, she began her formal studies after
being accepted at the Vietnam Music School. She was recognized as an exceptional
student and performed frequently as a soloist at numerous prestigious
engagements. In 1993 she was honored at the National Professional Competition
for Traditional Music. She began her studies in the Vocal Department and
holds her Bachelor's degree in Traditional Music and Voice. She is currently
on the faculty of the Hanoi National Conservatory of Music. She has appeared
as both a musician and vocalist in performances throughout Vietnam as
well as on tour to Thailand, Indonesia, Denmark, Korea, Singapore and
France. She is a returning artist from the 1997 APPEX program.
United States
Cristian
Amigo is a composer, producer, guitarist, and ethnomusicologist.
His areas of interest include music technologies (new media), world music,
and popular music (soul, electronics, abstract, and jazz). Cristian has
composed and produced music for film, theater, radio, and television.
His
music has been featured in films screened at both the 1997 Sundance Film
Festival and the 1998 Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film and Video Festival.
He
was a 1999 Film Composition Fellow at the Sundance Institute's Film
Composers Labs, and recently, he participated in the 2000 A.S.K. Theater
Projects/Nautilus Music Theater Playwright-Composer Studio where he composed
theatrical-musical works. He has studied Hindustani music with Harihar
Rao
and jazz with Kenny Burrell, and is currently studying composition with
Wadada Leo Smith. He performs and records in Los Angeles with David Ornette
Cherry's free jazz/funk/world music Impressions of Energy ensemble and
Guinean master guitarist Abdullai Diabete. He has worked as a session
guitarist with Cheick-Tidiane Seck, Hans Zimmer, Narada Michael Walden,
Mark
Mancina, Les Hooper and others.
Josefina
Baez (La Romana, Dominican Republic) performer, writer, educator.
She is the founder and director of Latinarte, an art troupe that promotes
the arts, artists, and culture, latina in general, Dominican in particular
(theatre, visual arts, literature, music and dance). Her work is highly
subjective, multidisciplinary in context and intercultural in scope. She
has participated in many theatre festivals and workshops in Europe, Latin
America and Asia. A prolific writer, her works have been published in
Forward Motion magazine, Brujula/Compass, Ventana Abierta, Tertuliando/Hanging
Out and include books such as In Dominicanish and Telele, telele, telele
among others. She is a staff member of CAL (Creative Arts Laboratory)
at Teachers College/Columbia University.
Daniel
Diaz (Oseiku) has been a professional musician for more than 30 years
and has performed and/or recorded with artists such as Harry Belafonte,
Dizzy Gillespie, Nona Hendryx, Carols Santana, Joe Cocker, Urban Bush
Women, Chuck Davis Dance Company, the Alvin Ailey School, Forces of Nature
and the International Afrikan-American Ballet among many others. In most
recent years, he has been involved in a number of projects that focused
on multi-cultural and multidisciplinary work. He has been active in a
video documentary "Conguero!" which documents the lives of these
talented musicians. In addition, he was the director of Miami X Change,
a project that brought together Haitian and African American artists with
students and community groups to use arts and culture as a means of promoting
understanding.
Miriam Gerberg is a composer, ethnomusicologist and performer. Her
work with world musics includes a specialty in Moroccan and Syrian Jewish
musics, in addition to classical Arabic music, Japanese koto and Javanese
gamelan. As a composer, she has been commissioned to write works for chamber
orchestra, improvisational ensembles, opera, music theater, chamber instrumental
& vocal, dance and video. Her compositions have been performed across
the U.S. and in Israel, the Netherlands, Australia, Japan and Sumatra,
and she has performed original collaborative music/dance works with choreographer
John Munger in the duo Footloose in Motley since 1992. In recognition
of her composing works, she has received numerous grants, fellowships
and awards, including Eli Wiesel Award for Jewish Culture and Arts (twice)
and Brooklyn Opera Theater's Chamber Opera Award among many others. She
has studied with many master artists as well as earned a composition degree
from Crane School of Music, and MA in Ethnomusicology from Wesleyan University
and trained as an American Sign Language Interpreter. Currently based
in Los Angeles, in addition to her compositional and performing work,
she is Director of Outreach for the Department of Ethnomusicology at UCLA.
Danongan
"Danny" Kalanduyan was the first Filipino to receive the
National Heritage Fellowship awarded by the National Endowment for the
Arts, in recognition of his devoted teaching and performing Magindanaon
kulintang in the United States for the past twenty-three years. He comes
from a musically inclined family in Cotabato, Island of Mindanao. He solidified
the kulintang aspect of the Mindanao State Dance Troupe in their tour
of Asia in 1971. After receiving his MFA in Ethnomusicology from the University
of Washington in 1984, he taught at the University for eight years and
then began to take music into the community, schools and universities
through twelve years of teaching and performing. He has received grants
from the John D. Rockefeller Foundation, National Endowment for Folk Arts,
California Arts Council, and Henry Luce Foundation. He currently resides
in the Northern California Bay Area.
Roko
Kawai is a dancer, choreographer and educator, born in Tokyo and now
living in Philadelphia. She studied traditional Japanese dance and Bharata
Natyam while majoring in painting at the Rhode Island School of Design.
She has collaborated extensively, including working with Helen Todd of
New Zealand, jazz masters Reggie Workman and Oliver Lake, stage designer
Hiroshi Iwasaki, musicians Toshi Makihara and David Forlano. One of her
most transforming collaborations has been with HipHop dancer/choreographer
Rennie Harris. Her current works explore abstract narratives about our
relationship to place, migration, rootedness and boundaries. She is interested
in tradition and innovation and the dialogue between the two. In January
2000, she returned to her study of traditional Japanese dance while continuing
her investigation of improvising and scoring.
Denise
Yuriko Uyehara is an interdisciplinary performance artist, writer
and playwright and has been a resident artist at the 18th Street Arts
Complex in Santa Monica. Since 1989, she has been in engaged in experimental
performance, working with various communities in Los Angeles. Much of
her work springs from autobiographical materials and oral histories of
individuals who have impacted her along the way. She teaches community-based
performance and writing workshops for various communities including Asian
women and men, senior citizens, queer populations and the general public.
She has collaborated with several international artists and has conducted
public art investigations which encourage people to tell their stories.
She continues to work in collaboration with groups of people such as an
A.S.K. Theater Group fellow and with ten culturally diverse artists under
the direction of Robbie McCauley to create "The Other Weapon",
a multi-media presentation based on oral histories from Black Panthers
in LA.
Cheng-Chieh
Yu* received her M.F.A. in Dance from Tisch School of Arts, New York
University. Her choreography has been presented at New York City venues
such as Performance Space 122, LaMaMa Etc., Lincoln Center Out-Of-Doors,
Dance Theater Workshop, Taipei Theater, Danspace at St. Mark's Church,
and Movement Research at Judson Church. Her performance credits include
dancing for Cloud Gate Theater in Taiwan, The Jose Limon Dance Company
in New York City, and The Bebe Miller Dance Company and the Ralph Lemon
Dance Project Geography Part 2. Cheng-Chieh has been the recipient of
residencies, grants, and commissions from the Atlantic Center for the
Arts Residency at the Akiyoshidai Art Village (Japan), Bennington College
(Vermont), Movement Research (NYC), Chinese Information and Cultural Center
(NYC) and The Cultural Council of the Government of Taiwan. She has extensive
teaching credits internationally and in the United States, including the
Academy of Performing Arts (Taiwan), Beijing Dance Academy, and in NYC
at Movement Research, The Limon Institute, New York University and Dance
Space.
* returning APPEX artist
Writers
Pattara Danutra was born in Bangkok, Thailand. He is a drama lecturer at the Rajabhat Institute Suansunandha, a Bangkok Post culture writer, a Moradok Mai Theatre Group dramaturg and a researcher of the "Criticism as Intellectual Force in Thailand (Drama)" project. After finishing his B.A. in Dramatic Arts with highest honors from Chulalongkorn University in 1990, he was granted a fellowship by the Japanese Government to conduct research at the Department of Drama, Nihon University, from 1991 to 1993. Since 1993, he has covered many cultural events for "The Bangkok Post," including the New York-based Asia Society's "Traditional-Tension" exhibition and conference (1996), the Documenta X event in Basel, Germany (1997), and the London-based Arts&Education APEC conference (1998). He also wrote several critical articles in Thai, such as "Paradoxical Adoptions between Realism and Expressionism in Thailand" in "Moradok Mai Theatre Bulletin," and "Let's Study Thai Pop Culture" in Thammasat University's "Ratasartsarn Journal." In 1990, he served as a technician in the staging of "My Dearest Moon," Thailand's entry in the 2nd Asean Drama Festival in Singapore. Currently a Dramaturgy and Creative Drama lecturer, he collaborates with students on projects including 'sound theatre' for the blind and storytelling for the elderly.
Garrett Kam has been involved with Southeast Asian dance, music,
theatre, and art since the 1970s. He has a bachelor's degree in textiles,
and a master's degree in Southeast Asian history with a minor in Asian
theatre, all from the University of Hawai'i. He received a National Resources
Fellowship and an East-West Center grant to examine the role of drama
in Indonesian nationalism. Since 1975, he has specialized in Javanese
court dance, which he studied and performed with a semi-professional troupe
in Yogyakarta. He taught Javanese dance at the University of Michigan
at Ann Arbor, UCLA, University of Hawai'i, and presented lecture-demonstrations
and courses at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok and LaSalle-SIS College
of the Arts in Singapore. He studied ritual art on a Fulbright grant to
Bali, where he is a temple assistant, curator of the Neka Art Museum,
lectures to visiting groups, and assists the School for International
Training and Elderhostel programs. He has published extensively on Balinese
art, and also writes for the Singapore Arts Magazine. He has curated and
organized art exhibitions in Australia, Holland, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore,
and the USA. His latest publication, Ramayana in the Arts of Asia, focuses
on themes shared across cultures, which he sees as a way of increasing
artistic collaboration.
Mario Ontiveros is a doctoral candidate in Art History at the University
of California, Los Angeles. His dissertation, "Retheorizing Activism:
The Aesthetics of Social Responsibility in the work of Asco, Group Material,
Gran Fury, and Félix González-Torres," addresses the
ethical implications of public art practices engaged in sociopolitical
debates during the 1970s and 1990s. He has written art reviews for Zing
Magazine and co-edited two issues of the journal FRAMEWORK (Spring 1997,
Fall 1998) on the themes of labor, social organizing, and the notion of
the "in-between." His essay, "Under Construction: Conditions,
Propositions and Operations from a Generation of 'Emerging' Artists and
Arts Administrators," was recently published in the National Association
of Artists' Organizations' (NAAO) Field Guide Report (Winter 2000). An
essay analyzing the work of performance artist James Luna will be published
in the University of Rochester's on-line journal, [IN]VISIBLE CULTURE
(Spring 2000). Mario has worked professionally with various art institutions
in California, including the Getty Research Institute and the Social and
Public Art Resource Center (SPARC). For the Getty Research Institute,
he has worked on numerous projects that examine methods of civic engagement
through performance art, public art, and community-based art practices.
In recognition of his commitment to non-profit organizations, he has recently
been elected to serve on the NAAO board.
Marina Roseman has studied the performing arts as both scholar
and performer. She is intrigued by the particularities of the arts across
culture and history and their consistent power to affect lives individual
and social. Anthropologist, ethnomusicologist, musician, and dancer, she
has worked predominantly in Southeast Asia and the Caribbean, and has
studied with the Temiar forest peoples of peninsular Malaysia over a twenty-year
period. Her book, "Healing Sounds from the Malaysian Rainforest:
Temiar Music and Medicine," now being translated into Japanese, explores
the vibrant relationship between Temiars and their natural environment.
Dream songs Temiars receive from the animated spirits of the landscape,
forest sounds, and healing ceremonies are recorded on the compact disc
she compiled and produced for Smithsonian Folkways Recordings, "Dream
Songs and Healing Sounds: In the Rainforests of Malaysia." A co-edited
volume with Carol Laderman, "The Performance of Healing," investigates
the dramatic texture of healing ceremonies and medical procedures in a
number of societies. Marina is currently working on a book and associated
video documentary called "Engaging the Spirits of Modernity."
She has taught in Departments of Music and Anthropology at University
of Pennsylvania, Notre Dame University, and University of Maryland, and
is Research Associate on the faculty in the Department of Anthropology
at Indiana University. Recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim, National
Endowment of the Humanities, Asian Cultural Council, Social Science Research
Council, Wenner-Gren, and National Science Foundation, her work crosses
disciplines and audiences to celebrate the depth and significance of the
arts in people's lives.
Kazuko Yamazaki is currently Visiting Lecturer of Sociocultural Anthropology at Indiana University, Bloomington, where she is also completing her Ph.D. in anthropology under the direction of Anya Peterson Royce. She specializes in the anthropology of dance, performance studies, expressive culture, and folklore. Her research interests include the body, embodiment and learning, tradition and modernity, media and representation, agency and structure, and identity formation. Her dissertation titled "Other Modernities: The Making of Bodies and Movement in Japanese Performing Arts" discusses the modernization of the Japanese body through the ethnographic exploration of contemporary classical Japanese dancers and the historical examination of the state-initiated engineering of the body through physical education. As a "native" ethnographer, she has done extensive fieldwork in Tokyo, Japan, among contemporary Nihon Buyo (classical Japanese dance) dancers and choreographers. She is a certified performer and teacher of Hanayagi school of Nihon Buyo. She gives lecture-demonstrations and workshops of Nihon Buyo to college and community groups in the United States.
Ricardo D. Trimillos, Facilitator of the APPEX Writers Residency,
is Professor of Ethnomusicology and Chair of Asian Studies at the University
of Hawai'i (Honolulu). He publishes on Hawaiian performance, the musics
of East and Southeast Asia, and Western and Asian musical theatres. His
present project examines national, ethnic, and gender identity; culture
ad public policy; and issues of cultural representation and entitlement.
He is committed to making research widely accessible through film - "Kumu
Hula" and "Jewels of the Islands: Filipino Music" - and
recorded anthologies "Musics of Hawai'i". He has written for
the Smithsonian Institution and Brooklyn's 651 An Arts Center. He lectures
about Asian and Hawaiian culture for community groups in the U.S., the
Philippines, and German-speaking Europe. Trained as a concert pianist,
he currently performs the Japanese koto and musics of the Philippines.
He is music director for University productions of Japanese kabuki, including
"Natsu Matsuri" in the year 2000 and Philippine sarsuwela (operetta)
- "Pilipinas circa 1907". His Ph.D. in Music was completed at
UCLA, writing on the Muslim Tausug of the southern Philippines. He was
keynote speaker for the 1997 Inroads/Asia Conference at UCLA. His great
moment in 1999 was having Kenny Endo (APPEX 1997 and 1999 fellow) complete
his M.A. thesis and graduate this May.