Choreographer Fang Yun Lo and her colleagues – the Vietnamese choreographer Ngo Thanh Phuong and the Taiwanese set designer Cheng Ting Chen – interviewed over one hundred people with Vietnamese backgrounds in Germany and Taiwan as part of a two-year journalistic research project. In spontaneous encounters at work, in stores, and snack bars, they talked about their experiences as immigrants or as members of families caught between cultures.
Home Away From Home deliberately exposes its own fragility and incompleteness, indeed the painful impossibility of being at home. [...] It is an associative panorama about identity and how it is fluid and difficult to define.
Home Away From Home weaves dozens of memories together into a touching, polyphonic journey through the Vietnamese diasporic communities that are often invisible. Divided into small groups, the audience meets six performers at different stations throughout the theater who tell their own stories and those of their families – as artists, workers, YouTubers, and students. A complex mosaic of human relationships emerges from stories, pictures, films, and audio pieces.
Home Away From Home tells the story of the global dimensions of labor migration and intercultural reality, and reports on disruptions and structural violence, while simultaneously exploring the overarching human categories of home, identity, and happiness.
Team
Co-Creation
Performers
Direction
Fang Yun LoArtistic collaboration
Ngo Thanh PhuongStage design
Music, Sound design
Patrik ZossoDaniel Somaroo AcuñaVideo, Editing, Camera, Film direction
Lighting design, Technical lead
Max RuxProject assistance
Vũ Mạnh ĐứcVideo support
René Liebert (STUDIO6)Stage camera
Andrés AguiloProduction management
Finance management
Information
Production
Polymer DMTEssen, DECoproduced with
Cloud Gate TheaterNew Taipei City, TWHELLERAU European Centre for the ArtsDresden, DEPACT ZollvereinEssen, DEProject funding
Kulturstiftung des Freistaates Sachsen KdFSDresden, DENational Culture and Arts Foundation Taiwan Taipei, TWFonds Darstellende KünsteBerlin, DECultural Foundation NRWDüsseldorf, DEGoethe-Institut TaipehTaipei, TWCity of Essen (Office for Culture)Essen, DEResearch partner
Research funding
Languages
Vietnamese, Taiwanese Chinese, GermanAvailable subtitles
Vietnamese, Taiwanese Chinese, German, English; other languages on request.Duration
1h40Age recommendation
14+Accessibility
Translation into sign language, audio description and touch tour possible by arrangement, access for the walking-impaired possible depending on the theatre.Additionally available
photo exhibition, short movie (32min)
Performances
Oct 20 2023 - Oct 22 2023
Installation versionSPIELART TheaterfestivalMunich, DEAug 26 2023 - Aug 28 2023
Oct 14 2022 - Oct 15 2022
HELLERAU European Centre for the ArtsDresden, DENov 26 2021
May 8 2021 - May 9 2021
Cloud Gate TheaterNew Taipei City, TWMay 7 2021
PREMIERECloud Gate TheaterNew Taipei City, TWFeb 27 2021 - Mar 7 2021
ONLINE Film VersionPACT ZollvereinEssen, DEFeb 27 2021 - Mar 7 2021
ONLINE Film VersionHELLERAU European Centre for the ArtsDresden, DEFeb 26 2021
ONLINE PREMIERE Film VersionHELLERAU European Centre for the ArtsDresden, DEFeb 26 2021
ONLINE PREMIERE Film VersionPACT ZollvereinEssen, DESep 10 2020 - Sep 20 2020