Join us for the opening lecture of the spring 2019 A+D Thursdays Lecture Series, which is shaped around three key words: Creativity, Migration and Transformation. Stan Lai, co-curator of the series, is one of the most acclaimed playwrights/directors in Asia, known not only for creating some of the most memorable works for the contemporary Chinese stage, but also for creating bold new genres and staging innovations. His theories on creativity, heretofore only published in Chinese, are considered groundbreaking in the field. He is artistic director of Performance Workshop in Taiwan and festival artistic director of China’s Wuzhen Theatre. Lai’s works, which include over 30 original plays, two feature films, and four operas, include his epic 2000 play A Dream Like a Dream and 1986’s Secret Love in Peach Blossom Land. Born in the U.S. and based in Taiwan, Lai received a doctorate degree in Dramatic Art from UC Berkeley. He was a professor and founding dean of the College of Theatre at Taipei National University of the Arts and has also been a visiting professor and artist-in-residence at both UC Berkeley and Stanford University.

Course Description: Co-taught by Peter Glazer and Stan Lai, this series will explore the specific and metaphoric connections amongst Creative action—adapting Stan Lai’s concepts and training—and the possibility of personal, cultural, and social transformation. How do we understand movement, migration, and change both metaphorically and literally? How do artists working in literature, visual art, film, performance, and design explore and enact transformation? Aside from featuring insight into the works and creative methods of Asia’s Stan Lai, the series will also delve into current trends in Latino-American/Latino arts, as well as European and African art and performance. Arts + Design Thursdays is made possible thanks to support from the Big Ideas Courses Program in the College of Letters & Science at UC Berkeley and from generous supporters of Berkeley Arts + Design. For more information, visit artsdesign.berkeley.edu/thursdays.