ACuTe is a large-scale European innovation project funded by the European Union, designed to revolutionise the production and performance of theatre and the performing arts through emerging technology. The project brings together a network of 14 leading theatres, universities and creative arts organisations. Key members of ACuTe—Anders Hasmo, Dramaturge at Det Norske Teatret (Norway), Marcus Lobbes, Director of the Academy for Theatre and Digitality (Germany), together with Yan Pat To, Artistic Director of Reframe Theatre (Hong Kong)—will share their experiences navigating the intersection of performing arts and new technology in cultural testbeds.
Kingsley Ng
Media Artist and Associate Professor and Programme
Director of Bachelor of Arts and Science (Hons) in Arts and Technology, School of Creative Arts, Hong Kong Baptist University
Kingsley Ng
Kingsley Ng is a media artist often creating contemplative site-specific experiences through poetic and minimalist interventions that involve sound, light, image and kinetic installations. His past projects include Twenty-Five Minutes Older, a commission by Art Basel in 2017 which took the audience on a moving tram, and After the Deluge, presented in an underground stormwater tank the size of 40 Olympic-sized swimming pools in Hong Kong in 2018.
Ng received postgraduate training at Le Fresnoy – National Studio of Contemporary Arts in France, where he graduated with the highest honours. He then obtained an MSc in Advanced Sustainable Design from the University of Edinburgh and a BFA in New Media from the Toronto Metropolitan University. He is currently Associate Professor of the Academy of Visual Arts, School of Creative Arts at Hong Kong Baptist University, and the programme director of the BASc in Arts and Technology Programme.
His works have been featured in notable exhibitions and international venues such as the MACRO, Rome Italy; Contemporary Art Centre of South Australia, Adelaide Australia; Guangzhou Triennial, China; Land Art Mongolia Biennial, Mongolia; Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennale, Japan; IRCAM at Centre Pompidou, Paris, France; Pavilion Lille Europe, Shanghai Expo, China; InterAccess Electronic Media Arts Centre, Toronto, Canada; and the Hong Kong Museum of Art and Art Basel in Hong Kong.
Image courtesy of AAP
Anders Hasmo
Dramaturge, Det Norske Teatret
Anders Hasmo
Anders Hasmo is a dramaturg at the Det Norske Teatret (The Norwegian Theatre) in Oslo, Norway. He has contributed to more than 30 theatre productions, collaborating with renowned directors and playwrights across various genres and formats. His passion lies in exploring the synergies between performance and innovative technology. Notably, Anders participated in the European Theatre Convention’s project (in collaboration with the National Theatre in Zagreb) to develop sensor technology enabling actors to manipulate their own sound in real time. Currently, he is involved in a pioneering European large-scale project (ACUTE) focusing on the integration of AI in theatre. Anders holds a master's degree in dramaturgy from Aarhus University and has previously served as a dramaturg at the National Stage in Bergen. Beyond his theatrical work, he is a guest lecturer and chair of a national youth theatre project, with extensive experience in large-scale outdoor theatre productions.
Det Norske Teatret
Det Norske Teatret—The Norwegian Theatre—is the largest theatre in Norway, with a century-old tradition. Its repertoire varies from musicals to new interpretations of Norwegian and European classics as well as new Norwegian and international drama. Located in Oslo in a large, modern building with four stages, it also has a satellite stage in Rommen, in Oslo County. The theatre presents approximately 20 new productions each year, serving an audience of more than 260,000. It also houses a drama school with a multicultural student body. Over the years, the theatre has developed into a living house of culture, with poetry readings, concerts, art exhibitions, children’s activities, workshops and much more.
Marcus Lobbes
Director, Academy for Theatre and Digitality (Germany)
Marcus Lobbes
Marcus Lobbes has been the director of the Academy for Theatre and Digitality, the sixth department of the Theater Dortmund, since its founding in 2019.
As director of the Dortmund Academy, he is in demand locally, nationally and internationally in lecture and discourse formats; an important concern for him is the formation and promotion of various networks for the performing arts as well as the communication of artistic research in correspondence with the latest technologies to theatre and educational institutions, politics and the public.
He has been working as a director and set and costume designer as well as author in both drama and opera since 1995 and he has been regularly invited as a guest lecturer at various prestigious colleges and universities in Germany, Austria and Switzerland since 2014.
Picture ©️ Susanne Diesner
The Academy for Theatre and Digitality
The Academy for Theatre and Digitality was founded in 2019 as the sixth division of Theatre Dortmund. At the heart of its work is the employment of digital technologies in theatrical spaces, concentrating on four core areas: artistic research and development, professional training and further education, cultural policy advice, and national and international cooperation. Five years after its founding, the Academy for Theatre and Digitality is an established point of contact for cultural institutions, festivals and actors in the independent scene worldwide. An important hub for networking and ongoing development of digital transformation in culture, the Academy takes part in major European and international projects, including PlayOn!, ACuTe and EXCENTRIC. It offers various research labs, workshops, an audio/video studio and a green screen studio with a motion capturing system on an estimated 2000 m2. Here, theatre makers from all over the world find space to develop and test research projects with digital tools. Work created at the Academy can be seen on stages across the globe, setting new standards in digital performing arts.
Pat To Yan
Artistic Director, Reframe Theatre
Pat To Yan
Active in Hong Kong and German theatre, Pat To Yan is a playwright, director, educator, Acting Principal of HKICC Lee Shau Kee School of Creativity, Artistic Director of Reframe Theatre, House Author of Germany Nationaltheater Mannheim (2021‒2022) and former elected council member and chairman of the committee of Literary Art of the Hong Kong Arts Development Council (2019‒2022).
Yan holds degrees from the University of Hong Kong (BA, English Literature), the Chinese University of Hong Kong (MA, Sociology) and Royal Holloway College, University of London (MA, Playwriting).
His English-language play A Concise History of Future China was included among the five presentations at the Berliner Festspiele Theatertreffen Stückemarkt 2016, the first ethnic Chinese play ever selected. His Cantonese play White Blaze of the Morning was awarded Best Play at the 8th Hong Kong Theatre Libre. Seven of his plays have been translated and performed in German.
Suhrkamp Theater Verlag represents the copyright of some of his plays.
Official IG: @yanpatto
Photo Credit: Max Zerrahn
Reframe Theatre
Every creation of a theatre work is a new and unique experience. Every work therefore experiences a new process of reframing. Reframe Theatre—with the aims of exploring new writing, scenography, relationship between body and space—was established by Pat To Yan, a playwright, director and part-time university lecturer. The British renowned playwright and critic Dan Rebellato describes Pat To Yan as a “talented, engaged, enthusiastic, committed playwright whose work is extremely interesting, with power and effect”.
Reframe Theatre Official IG: reframetheatre
Schedule for Forum
16 Oct 2024 (Wed) | 17 Oct 2024 (Thu) | 18 Oct 2024 (Fri) |
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1530 – 1700
Cultural Infrastructures in Hong Kong & Mainland China
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1430 – 1600
Empowering Communities: Dance as arts, creativity and wellbeing
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1100 – 1230
Cultural Testbeds for Performing Arts and New Technology
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Remarks
- Simultaneous interpretation is available in English, Cantonese and Putonghua.
- Holders of the HKPAX Full Pass, Day Pass and Student Pass can access all sessions of Conversations. Spaces are available on a first-come, first-served basis. Online pre-registration is required.