Inside the dimly lit Guangfu Auditorium at Taipei’s Zhongshan Hall, we observe shadowy figures taking part in an unusual kind of congress meeting. Led by the presiding officer, all the delegates raise their right hands and take this oath: “These are the rights of the Provisional Alliance congress. As a representative of Taiwan, China, Chinese Taipei, Tai-Peng-Kin-Ma, Free China, and the Republic of China on Taiwan, I lawfully exercise my powers in the Provisional Alliance congress.” The presiding officer then throws a huge pair of “moon blocks” (crescent-shaped wooden blocks used for divination) into the air. One block falls on its flat side, the other on its rounded side. This is an auspicious sign, and the meeting can now begin.

During the meeting, some people propose ideas and others interrogate them. If the congress’s delegates—the audience—like the proposals, they may vote for them; the voting tokens are votive lamps shaped like ice cubes. The person who garners the greatest number of lamps wins and is carried on a litter through the auditorium, with the attendees cheering on both sides. Thus ends the congress meeting.

photo by Lin Min-hsuan

Involving the audience

This was a performance mounted by Co-coism at the Taipei Arts Festival in 2018. Entitled Provisional Alliance, the production represented the decision-making process of a modern deliberative democracy. Everyone attending the performance was a “delegate.” Bills were freely introduced and advocated, encompassing quite a few highly controversial and polarizing topics, such as “Humani­tarian­ism and the Rights of People with HIV/AIDS,” “The ‘Hand Angels’ and the Sexual Autonomy of Disabled People,” and “Legalizing Nudity.”

What made this performance special was the audience’s involvement. Ticket holders found themselves temporarily taking over Taipei’s Zhongshan Hall and being invited to participate throughout the performance. In the auditorium, the mesmerizing lighting and the parody of folk rituals set the scene for this eccentric democratic congress. This half-playfully created meeting reminds us of the history of the hall itself, which was built in the Japanese colonial era and later housed the National Assembly of the Republic of China.

Co-coism has distinguished itself by breaking the “fourth wall,” allowing the audience to take part in perform­ances. In Provisional Alliance, for example, the audience was involved in presenting proposals, in setting the agenda, in deliberations and debates, and in voting. The issues introduced were real, and so were the discussions and polls. The spontaneous interactions between attendees were integral to the entire performance.

More precisely, in conventional theatrical performances the stage belongs to the actors, while the audience are merely receivers. The stage is definitively separated from the seating area, and the audience passively take in the performers’ actions. Breaking away from these conven­tions, Co-coism’s creations are characterized by an immersive, participatory, and responsive approach. Giving pride of place to the audience, Co-coism invites them to act in the performances they are watching. As a result, each performance is uniquely special.

In Provisional Alliance, Co-coism creates an eccentric kind of democratic congress in a playful, almost irreverent way.

Co-coism: Collective and cooperative

Founded in early 2016, Co-coism is the brainchild of three dir­ectors: Hung Chien Han, Chang Kang Hua, and Huang Ding Yun. They were fellow undergraduates in the Department of Theatre Arts at Taipei National University of the Arts, where they specialized in directing. They find an inexhaustible source of inspir­ation for their creative projects in daily life. “In the earliest days of Co-coism, we often drew material from our life experiences or from everyday phenom­ena and molded it into theatrical forms,” Hung explains. “Our undergraduate training focused more on Western classics, such as works by Shakespeare and Chekhov. Since graduating, we find ourselves more interested in the land where we actually live, or in the issues that surround us in daily life,” she continues. 

For example, Co-coism’s Walking to the Moon was performed near the Taipei Fine Arts Museum at a replica of the modernist architect Wang Da Hong’s house (originally located in a lane off Jianguo South Road in Taipei City). Attendees were invited into the new house, where they spent half an hour crossing the borders of time and space and exploring scenes shaped by both history and fiction.

Another of Co-coism’s productions, You Can Sleep Here / Reunion, probed the issue of destigmatizing homeless people. When armrests are added to public benches in order to discourage rough sleepers, these questions arise: “To whom does this space belong? Are we banned from sleeping outside on these streets?”

Although the issue explored was a serious one, the atmosphere was jolly, and the participants often burst into laughter. As Hung ­emphasizes, “The aim of our productions is not to educate our audience, but to use an artistic perspective to share issues we are curious about. So throughout the process we sometimes play with our themes in a very irreverent or humorous way.”

Tomorrow Inn considers the subtle connections between two individuals in modern life, interrogating the possibilities of encounters, exchanges, and mutual understanding between people. (art by Sun Pei Mao)

An unpindownable dialogue

Pursuing novel themes and employing special ­methods, Co-coism deals with a tremendous range of subjects. Consequently, it’s difficult to pinpoint the company’s creative style. Though many of its projects refer to local issues or even express opinions about them, Hung, Chang and Huang agree that they do not wish to be yoked to “Taiwanese interest” or “local genres.”

“I have never thought of us as very local. What we do is to find out the meanings and motives behind certain phenomena, forging a dialogue with a particular space,” says Chang, clarifying Co-coism’s creative agenda.

Huang offers a further explanation: even though they have received training in Western texts and genres, it is inevitable that they—as artists who are nourished by Taiwanese culture—will still interpret creative works through their local lens. “Somehow it seems inevitable that artists’ cultural roots should become the backbone of their creative activities,” Huang says.

Harmony in discord

In order to bring out high-quality productions, Co-­coism’s meetings usually last for six to eight hours each time. During these discussions, ideas sharpen into focus through constant revision and refinement, a serious process which is nevertheless often interlaced with food, drinks, cigarettes, and gossip. The three directors’ ideas become so intertwined in these brainstorming sessions that they themselves often find it difficult to recall who came up with which detail: ­every production of theirs originates in consensus.

This harmony of course coexists with occasional discord, but clashes of ideas actually serve to keep up the team’s vibrant energy. Chang acknowledges that Co-coism’s harmoni­ous teamwork consists in their ability to tolerate differences. “And those differences are precisely what we want.”

Co-coism embraces both the unpredictabilities of audience involvement and the directors’ own broad spectrum of ideas, allowing their works to take shape in spaces that cannot be entirely subjected to their control. It turns out that the second “co” in the company’s name gestures toward its mission of achieving concord amid discord and producing a dazzling variety of works which do not necessarily have to serve a unitary purpose.       

Waiting for Godot breaks the boundaries between stage and audience, breathing new life into scenes from Nobel laureate Samuel Beckett’s original play of that name.

Marathon meetings lasting six to eight hours are typical of the way Co-coism’s directors work. (photo by Lin Min-hsuan)

P.T.O. (Please Turn Over) shines a spotlight on Taiwan’s college entrance exams, challenging the concept that we have to confirm our identities by comparing ourselves with others. Reflecting on individual autonomy, the piece invites us to think about how to negotiate society’s crude and simplistic attempts to categorize its citizens.