2nd B·O·N·D International Virtual Performance Festival: Global Chinese Voices, in June 2021!

The inaugural B·O·N·D International Virtual Performance Festival in 2020 engaged over 250,000 audiences from across the world, with 25 selected performances carefully chosen and curated from a pool of global submissions. This year, CHUANG Stage is excited to be co-producing the 2nd B·O·N·D International Virtual Performance Festival: Global Chinese Voices, supporting a chosen cohort of Chinese descent theater-makers currently residing and working in New York, Toronto, Brussels, Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Beijing. The cohort is commissioned to each create a new, digital monodrama that collectively manifests the underrepresented voices and experience of the Chinese diaspora. 

Projected for global live-streamed premiere in June, the cohort of theater-makers are given multitudes of artistic support and freedom towards bold statements in unprecedented moments for artists of Asian descent around the world. 

Through bi-weekly meetings, workshops, curated artist conversations, and masterclasses, B·O·N·D rigorously supports this cohort with rehearsal spaces (in-person in Beijing), stipend, an administrative and marketing team, and a hybrid, open-to-all community engagement plan--alongside the curatorial process of new forms and new plays in the digital landscape, B·O·N·D Festival extends the online community into global cities with “B·O·N·D in Your City”. 

“B·O·N·D in Your City” is a series of artist-led, open-air play reading workshops that are free to the public in the geographic locations where the artists reside, inviting local residents to play with the methodologies and the text of the artists’ choice. Prioritizing safety, some episodes of this city-based “traveling” series also take place online depending on local health official guidelines allowance. 

The new B·O·N·D Festival: Global Chinese Voices in 2021 seeks to build communities upon solidarity, visibility, and continued imagination for new forms, mediums, and stories in the virtual performance world. Created and led by US-based Chinese women theater-makers, the festival is driven to uplift Asian and minority voices through curating and learning with our artists and audiences in the face of crises and the hopes for a brighter future.

经历了疫情洗礼的世界和你我，是更亲近，还是更加遥远？

2021年，疫情虽然有所好转，但世界各地人与人之间的隔离依然没有消除：全球剧场也依然处于停滞或缓慢恢复的状态，全球亚裔与其他种族之间的矛盾也在不断升级……我们正站在前路茫茫的转折时刻，许多声音和话语，在心中和笔端喷薄，诘问自我和世界：后疫情时代，人与人之间，究竟如何能听到对方，看到彼此？如何消除因误解与忽视带来的仇恨？

我们认为：戏剧，是答案。

2021年，第二届维·国际虚拟现场演出展将提前举行，以全新的专场形式、实体与虚拟结合的方式呈现给全球观众。上半年的第一专场，以“独白剧·自由的声音”为主题，特邀多位现居世界各地的中国导演和亚裔艺术家，以共同孵化和独立建组的形式，分别创作独白剧作品，于6月起开始进行全球限时演出及放映。

在去年创建全球艺术赛博平台的基础之上，我们希望B·O·N·D2021能生长出纤细却坚韧的藤蔓，从虚拟伸展向现实中的国家、城市和人群。用独白的方式，直射戏剧人独立的声音，对抗隔阂、敌意与虚无。为身处全球各地的华人和亚裔艺术家和戏剧人发声，用戏剧的方式让更多人看到我们的存在，听到我们曾经只能“独白”的心声。

带着全新面貌归来的第二届维·国际虚拟现场演出展也将与波士顿地区双语华裔戏剧公司CHUANG Stage携手联袂呈现；以波士顿及美国东海岸地区的戏剧资源为圆心，打造渗透业界、连接世界、跨越地域-文化-语言的线上艺术新可能，全力推动独白剧与华裔青年艺术家的独特影响力。从形式入手，发掘、孵化、传递“我们自己的声音”。

This program is supported in part by a grant from the Boston Cultural Council and administered by the Mayor’s Office of Arts and Culture.