Tong Men-g and What's been happening with us !!

Plenty of things indeed in the last few months!! We have not been able to find any time (believe it or not) to write or pretty much do anything on the website as a few little projects kept us happily wondering away from screens. 

One thing is for sure, we start posting again and in the next couple of weeks, as mentioned on our facebook page, we will show you a few of the things (at least the ones we can ..) we have been busy with. 

Between the mountains and Glaciers of North Eastern and Western Italy, the open seas of Capri, Sicily  and the mediterranean Islands and the many friends I would like to start with a request we received to shoot some footage of a wonderful performance of a Young Actor that goes by the Name of Shi Yang Shi. 

Performances are being done in different place right now, and the one we have been at, was in a relatively small Venue inthe Center of Bolzano.The size of the room had absolutely nothing to do with the magnitude of the performance that we witnessed. Two hurs of really interesting and captivating monologues that under the direction of "Cristina Pezzoli" kept everyone present (it was a full house) completely ... enchanted.

"TONG-MEN-g puts you in front of a split reality. On one side the harsh side of Chinese work and life in our cities, for example Prato, that holds the world record for number of immigrants from China, or Milan, a city that has a full scale "china-Town" district; And on the other, China the first economic world power that has become a fundamental client of the Western Market. Moreover: the Chinese communities that have established tehmselves during a long stretch of their history in our Country. Communities that have given birth to second and third generations of young people that are living that "Italian Reality" without the benefit of being really considered part of it, while on the other end, neither China considers them Fully, her Citizens. Two faces of the same reality.  

In a divided situation Yang finds his place as the Protagonist of the Evening. Yang was born in Jinan, in the North of China, in 1979 he arrived in Italy when 11 together with his Mother. He has been a dishwasher, a door to door salesman of Chinese herbs and creams on the national beaches; A Bocconian Student, an interpreter for Ministers, Businessman and Directors, an Actor himself on TV, at the cinema and Theater and recently also a special guest at the "Iene". 

Yang is a Chinese that "stands apart", he is 1.89Mt. tall, good looking, but he does not know who he represents, in Italy he is a "Yellow Face", in his country a "Banana", White inside and Yellow Outside. Yang will do on the first part of his performance, a travel back in time in the midst of his ancestors and traditions in search of his identity until Mao's Cultural revolution. In the second part he will tell us about his "cultural reprogramming" in Italy, starting with 1990 and the contraddictions that his "italian Citizen" status (from 2006) imply. 

The last chapter of Tong Men-g starts with a video and a date: 1st of December 2013, day in which in Prato a fire starts in a Chinese Factory where 7 workes were found dead while caught asleep by the flames. 

For years Yang, together with other artists from "Compost", an indi-production based in Prato,  creates "social art actions" that serve the purpose of improving the communication between the Chinese and Italian communities...."  --- FROM A COMPOST PRESS RELEASE

All in all we are glad to be back and we hope whomever keeps up with our blog is too.

We also hope you enjoy our small contribution to Yang's performance in Bolzano and to the Fantastic Work Cristina Pezzoli and her staff are doing at COMPOST!!