Cloud Gate Dance Theatre's 'Spring Riot 2026' Opens June 6, Featuring a Dialogue of Three Body Languages

(Central News Agency, reporter Chiu Tsu-yin, Taipei, June 5) Cloud Gate Dance Theatre's 'Spring Riot 2026' will debut tomorrow. Three creators with distinct styles will jointly explore the multiple possibilities the body can carry, engaging in a dialogue between culture, fatigue, and gravity.

A rehearsal press conference was held today at the Cloud Gate Theater in Tamsui District, New Taipei City. Paiwan tribe choreographer Baru Madiljin collaborated with Cloud Gate dancers to create 'She, Adorned with the Body,' exploring tribal memory and female bodily experience. Hungarian choreographer Viktor Szeri presents 'FATIGUE,' a work that won the Rudolf Lábán Prize, Hungary's highest dance award. Emerging independent choreographer Lin Pin-shuo interprets his solo experience of challenging Nepal's high mountains through 'The Body of Tossing and Catching.'

Artistic Director Cheng Tsung-lung stated that the core of 'Spring Riot' is to bring creators back to the most direct creative site, using the body to verify ideas. This year, creators from different cultural backgrounds and with different physical training were specially invited to share the stage. 'The body of the Paiwan tribe, the body of European contemporary dance, and the body starting from physical movement,' Cheng said. 'Putting these three languages together creates a dialogue.' The three choreographers start from cultural memory, contemporary fatigue, and the perception of gravity, respectively. 'They all choose to answer their own questions with their bodies.'

Using 'FATIGUE' as an example, Cheng noted that Szeri starts from his own fatigue but touches upon a situation recognizable to almost everyone in this era. 'No translation is needed; the body can understand.' It is this penetrating power that allows 'FATIGUE' and the other two works to form a genuine dialogue tension on the same stage.

Cheng expressed that after Cloud Gate restarted 'Spring Riot,' he hopes to create a different atmosphere for the platform. Since changes in the body and the maturation of works require time, he encourages creators and dancers to establish longer-term cooperative relationships, giving works the opportunity to be continuously advanced and deepened at different stages.

'Spring Riot 2026' will be performed at the Cloud Gate Theater on June 6 and 7. (Editor: Li Ming-zong) 1150605