Qingyang is an actor, writer, movement practitioner, multi-disciplinary artist and creative producer. From Chengdu, southwestern China and now based in London, she has a bilingual literature background in Chinese and English while having performed and created for stage since a young age.
Her current performance practice is interested in the intercultural, interdisciplinary and art as healing.
Before studying MA Theatre Practice at the University of Exeter (graduation with distinction, 2020), Qingyang read BA English Language and Literature at Sun Yat-sun University (Guangzhou, China) and The University of Manchester, where she had studies in creative writing and comparative poetry research.
As a producer she has produced workshop projects with various groups through her company Waterway Workshop, from a movement & wellbeing series to workshops with international teenager groups. As for theatre productions, she is most recently the producer of Baklâ by Max Percy + Friends, now on tour.
Her movement approaches have received influences such as Anna Halprin, Jerzy Grotowski, Phillip Zarrilli, Laban technique, Contemporary dance and Chinese traditional dances. She facilitates movement-based workshops for either creative or wellbeing directions.
She has written performance texts, plays, immersive real-time game scripts, as well as poems, bilingually in Chinese and English.
Creative translation: she has translated poetry between English and Chinese, such as Norwegian poet Monica Aasprong’s poems at SYSU International Writers' Residency (Yangshuo & Guangzhou, 2018) , children's animation scripts and worked as a project manager and copy editor at a London-based cross-cultural consultancy.
Selected Works
Upcoming:
Bamboos Waiting
Performer, Writer, Producer
Developing this interdisciplinary intersectional performance piece in spring 2025.
The Cloud Messenger
Movement Director, Performance Consultant / BARBAROUS Production
Movement-based process-focused artist film funded by Canada Council for the Arts.
Journey of Whispering Dreams
2020 - 2023 - ongoing
Performer, Writer & Lead Artist
FUSE International Festival, July 2023 / Etcetera Theatre, May 2024
currently in further development, to return spring/summer 2025!
A young woman’s healing journey from a period of mental turmoil and depression in adolescence is interwoven with the way of life she has made since leaving her hometown in southwestern China, crossing natural landscapes such as waves of the very south of China and snow of northern England, crossing cultures and borders. The dreamy inner journey of ups and downs reaches a snow land in the middle of nowhere when the woman ‘wakes up’ once again and thereafter an ancient stage is found, where appears the melancholic maiden character, Du Liniang 杜丽娘 locked up in the spring garden in family home a thousand years ago, from the Chinese Opera classic, Peony Pavilion 牡丹亭, performed by a Ge Ji 歌伎 (professional female performer in ancient China), who pursues ‘freedom to be bound with happiness’...
Encompassing the intersectional themes of mental health, women’s coming-of-age, oppression in education systems, cultural diaspora and immigration, a one-woman physical theatre piece blending spoken word, movement, Chinese Classical dance, soundscape and ancient Chinese folklore, borrowing from Kunqu Opera and Chinese classical poetry.
Performer, Writer & Lead Artist: Qingyang Wang
Music: John Pierce O'Reilly
Choreography for Water-sleeve Dance: Yuan Feng
Stage Manager: Bri Wong
Voice Participation: Ruobing Zhao
Dramaturg: Max Percy
Reviews:
“Such rich and amazing textures within this piece”
"The performer's changes through different emotions are so captivating"
"It's a beautiful piece with many clever designs in it"
"Amazed by the artist's incredible performance capabilities—dance, body movements, facial expressions, and emotions are all extremely rich and captivating."
-- Audience Members
Liu Rushi's Moon Poetry Party
09/2023, Kingston, London
Autumn Moon Festival/ ESEA Cultural Festival
Invited by Korean British Cultural Exchange
Short performance, a mix of mime, poetic text, monologue, physical movement and Chinese Classical/Contemporary dance fusion.
Embodied 柳如是Liu Rushi, the first of the historically 'Eight Beauties of Qinhuai' (秦淮八艳）, one of the most famous courtesans/Ge Ji (female entertainers in some dynasties of ancient China), also a great poet.
我见青山多妩媚，料青山见我应如是。”When I see the green mountain I see charm, green mountain looks at me and should be seeing the same.” She named herself after this classic poem, Rushi (“The Same”).
In the chilly moonlight she stands on the deck of her own Painted Boat (画舫 Hua Fang). On the contrary to misery, does she have a glorious badge of freedom?
Desire under the Elms | Live-action role play game/immersive theatre
Writer
10/2021 - 01/2022, China
Wrote the script, Desire under the Elms, a piece of live-action role play game/immersive theatre, booked for distribution in 2022, which tells the story of a group of six people with complicated relations with each other and secret stories across different ages coming together for an experimental production of Eugene O'Neill's Desire under the Elms in 90s' Beijing, the past of each of them somehow echoing with the theme of the play.
The Good Woman of Sichuan | Film, Interdisciplinary
Performer (as role of 'Theatre Director'), Deviser and Theatre Facilitator
Film by Sabrina Ruobing Zhao 2020 - 2021
Selected to premiere as part of Forum, Berlin International Film Festival, presented at Seoul International Women’s Film Festival, Mulan International Film Festival among others
Provided theatre consultation on Brecht's play (The Good Person of Szechwan) and methods as creative input for the experimental interdisciplinary filmmaking process. Led an improvisation workshop with director Sabrina and lead actress Weihang which became part of the film. Performed the role of 'Theatre Director' in the film.
Reviews:
“The new staging of the play that the actress in Zhao’s film discusses is supposed to be abstract and fluid. The director
works with improvisation. The performers have been asked to depict an animal in the first rehearsal.' -- 'Essay: Between Wakefulness and Sleep' by Nicolas Wackerbarth, Arsenal - Institute for Film and Video
Art E.V
'Of the women we hear in voiceover, one is an actress, she talks about the play she’s working on, an abstract, fluid staging of Brecht’s “The Good Person of Szechwan” being put on by a female director that’s also set in Leshan. What’s fluidity anyway? If it weren’t for the intertitle saying this isn’t an adaptation, the actress could be talking about this film too, it shares those qualities as well as others from the play.' -- James Lattimer, Cinema Scope Magazine
Flowing Poetry Radio
05-08/2020
Creator & Voice Performance
Born in the midth of Covid lockdown, Flowing Poetry Radio are tiny voice pieces featuring fragmented poetry, sometimes featuring a monologue, or, images, aired via online platforms
Coming back soon!
Training on MA Theatre Practice (with distinction), University of Exeter 09/2019 - 09/2020
Modules include Contemporary Performance Practices and Performance Projects with Dr. Konstantinos Thomaidis and Prof. Rebecca Loukes. Dissertation titiled ‘The Director and the Actor in Process: Women and Approaches to Actor-Centric Directing’ was supervised by Prof. Rebecca Loukes and included an interview with renown theatre director Julia Pascal.
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Trained in advanced approaches to performing and directing as well as advanced methodologies in performance research
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Studied devising, embodied acting, dramaturgy and immersive theatre
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Made two full-length performances as part of modules
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Residency at Shakespeare Globe with training in voice, movement, stage combat and classical acting
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Created and performed a digital scratch of solo show Your Whispers Fly at Exeter T3 Festival 2020
 Role: Emma Lee (Lead) Director: Sieun Lee 2023 Short Film |  Assistant Director, The Fear the musical Manchester & Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2018 (sellout runs and 5-star media reception) |
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Forest of Adolescence | Play Guangzhou, China 2018
Writer, Director, Producer, Performer
Guangzhou Drama Festival
Rouge of the North 怨女 | Play Guangzhou, China 2016
Performer (Lead)
Second-prize winner of Sun Yat-sen University Drama Festival
Director: Jiajie Ni
An adaptation of short story by Eileen Chang
