Isaac Newton defined, “When one body exerts a force on a second body, the second body simultaneously exerts a force equal in magnitude and opposite in direction on the first body.” Can the 2 forces co-exist and form a new force which is more powerful and good? In life? In art? The Artistic Director of Hong Kong Dance Company Yang Yuntao said, “Yes.” He shared his own story to tell us between reality and ideal, we can open a third window and see a third vision. The result is a ‘3rd Dimension’.
Yang was born in the mountainous province Yunnan of China. He is a clansman of White Tribe, the ethnic and racial minorities who, though poor, enjoy singing and dancing. At the age of 11, Yang was chosen by the country’s national college of dance to be trained from childhood to adulthood to be a professional dancer in the capital of China, Beijing. Before the age of 27, he spent most of his life in Beijing and Guangzhou, the latter was a liberal and exuberant city very much different from the solemn capital.
Yang said, “I do not see reality as a destiny. Yes, it is a constraint but its severity will depend on whether you are able to cope with it; and turn it in your favour and create a new possibility. I know dance is my past, present and future. It is the reality, but out of it, I tried the classical and folk dances of the Chinese. I also learnt the contemporary dance of the Western world. Right now, I am experiencing a new form of dance―Hong Kong’s individual and distinctive style which is non-Chinese and non-Western.”
“In the year of 2001, I applied for and was given a post as a dancer by the Hong Kong Dance Company when I was 27 in 2002. I travelled from Beijing, said goodbye to my parents in Yunnan and settled down in Hong Kong. Except for a short period during which I took my learning further in USA, my life has been entirely devoted to Hong Kong since then. I worked, got married and had 2 kids in Hong Kong. My kids speak fluent ‘Hongkongese’ but I don’t. It is sometimes incredible to think of them as the descendants of the ethnic group which should live in the high mountain of Yunnan,” Yang smiled.
Yang reflected on his career, “Like reality, art is also another name for tolerance, understanding and compromise. We should submerge below the differences and merge each other’s inspirations. We re-make our angles and emotions in the new works of art which delight. In the art world, the feelings of smugness and appreciation are in constant conflict with one another. Acceptance of other’s views enables us to turn the right way out and the new way is a third dimension of greater vitality.”
“I love Hong Kong. It is a multi-ethnic, multi-background, multi-cultural, multi-ideological and multi-religious society. It is a reality that I am fond of. Yet, I want to contribute to Hong Kong by changing it artistically into a platform for crossovers of ideas and expressions. I have not made it. There are still things which are apart. I am working hard. It will work as long as all of us in Hong Kong believe it and are really into it. I wish one day someone would immediately shout ‘Oh! That’s Hong Kong’ when he watches a dance performance on stage. Hong Kong is a truly international city and I hope our artists can all rise above the narrow confines of our individual concerns and interests to the broader 3rd vision as well as dimension of creating fabulous art pieces and exporting them to the different parts of the world,” Yang concluded.
I am utterly in agreement with Yang Yuntao. A lot of different flowers make a bouquet. The most certain test by which we judge a world city like Hong Kong is really its artistic strength i.e. if it can accommodate the vast amount of different ideas and absorb the vast amount of different energies & transmute them into a brand of ‘Hong Kong Art’.
