With AI reaching unprecedented levels of intellectual capacities – would it be possible to design an android that represents the cultural identity of a country?
Post Theater and Po-Fu Wu have teamed up to invent the story of an android that represents the values of a liberal, progressive, free, open-minded place: Taiwan. In the course of a very physical, personal and intimate performance the audience understands more and more that they are witnessing the crisis of an artificial intelligence. The android on stage is able to perform his own inventor, as well as the actor he is modeled after – Po-Fu Wu. The performance plays with the ideas of the “original” and the “replicant” , and this juxtaposition is the core of the staging.
In NO MAN IS AN iSLAND Post Theater discusses these issues in a monologue with Po-Fu Wu who already worked in NONUMENTS with Post Theater (Hsinchu, 2019). The work is commissioned by the Monologfestival of TD Berlin.
Post Theater has a long professional relationship with Taiwan, with a residency at Taipei Artist Village at its beginning and several collaborations with local institutions since. NO MAN IS AN iSLAND is the first Post Theater production dealing with the current political situation of Taiwan, as well as the first performance with an AI as protagonist.
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer_DSC08693
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. DSC08719
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. DSC08723
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. DSC08723 DSC08743
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. DSC08755
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. DSC08758
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. DSC08764
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. DSC08772
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. DSC08775
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. DSC08780
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. DSC08781
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. DSC08804
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08812
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08818
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08820
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08837
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08843
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08849
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08868
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08870
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08881
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08887
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08900
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08924
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08946
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08977
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Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC08995
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC09045
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC09054
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC09058
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC09072
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC09097
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC09153
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC09158
Post Theater. "NO MAN IS AN iSLAND" with Po-Fu WU , TD Berlin, 2023/11 Photographer: Kimi Palmer. -DSC09099
The performance is in English, Chinese (Mandarin) and German with German and English subtitles.
Video Documentation
If you wish to see the full length documentation, please contact us at info@posttheater.com.
Credit
Artistic direction: Hiroko Tanahashi, Max Schumacher Live-Performance, voice-performance, co-dramaturgy, co-author, translation: Po-Fu WU Sound design, music: Sibin Vassilev Subtitle operator: Jingyun Li Commissioned and produced by TD Berlin Supported by the four-year festival funding of the Senate Department for Culture and Social Cohesion Berlin