As part of the Ministry of Education’s 2025 initiative to foster innovation and industry-academia collaboration in the humanities and social sciences, Associate Professor Yi-Jen Tsai of the Department of Drama and Creative Application at National University of Tainan (NUTN) launched the year-long course series Theatre and Sustainability. Designed to nurture future professionals with the knowledge and skills to drive sustainable innovation and entrepreneurship in the performing arts, the course takes students beyond the classroom to explore how sustainability can be integrated into theatre production, venue management, space revitalization, and the broader cultural and creative industries.
On May 12 and 13, the course brought NUTN students to several representative performing arts and cultural venues in northern Taiwan. Through site visits and exchanges with industry professionals, students explored diverse approaches to sustainability, including venue operations, adaptive reuse of spaces, prop sharing, local cultural preservation, and the reuse of theatrical costumes. The visits enabled students to connect sustainability concepts learned in class with real-world practices in Taiwan’s performing arts sector.
On the first day, the group visited the National Theater and Concert Hall, where students learned about venue operations and management and exchanged ideas with Hsuan-Chen Lin from the International Development Group of the Programming Department. The discussion introduced students to how a national-level performing arts institution incorporates sustainability into its future development and programming, while encouraging them to consider sustainable practices from administrative, production, and operational perspectives.
The group then visited Shancheng Secondhand Bookstore, a historic house transformed into a multifunctional cultural space. Founder and manager Cheng-Chung Wang shared the development of Shancheng Productions and its creative projects. Combining a secondhand bookstore, bar, theatre, and arts venue, the space also incorporates local ingredients into its signature drinks and is developing additional cultural spaces, including an arts-oriented residence and a late-night café. The visit demonstrated how historic buildings can be revitalized by connecting cultural production, creative spaces, and local communities.
On the second day, students visited Shancheng Productions’ scenic and prop warehouse, where Founder and Executive Director Hao-Cheng Yuan introduced the facility and its operations. The warehouse makes use of a former industrial space and provides storage and rental services for theatre companies. Its collection includes large-scale stage props, artificial fruit, specialty tableware, and everyday objects used in productions. By sharing and renting these resources, the facility extends the useful life of production materials and helps reduce waste. Students discovered that a former storage facility could be transformed into a functional “prop museum” through thoughtful organization and resource sharing, demonstrating how sustainability in theatre can begin with reuse and collaboration.
At Nan Xiao Xuan Café in Tamsui, students explored the history and cultural heritage of the local community. Director Hui-Yun Chen of Ji-Shi-Teng Dance Theatre and Wei-Hung Weng, Secretary-General of Tamsui Nanbei Xuan, introduced students to Beiguan music, traditional culture, and the development of local arts along the Tamsui River. The final stop was the Shining Theatre Costume Sustainable Coexistence Space, where founders Pao-Kang Lee and Chien-Kuo Hsieh shared their approach to collecting, preserving, and renting costumes donated by theatre companies. Students also participated in hands-on activities involving quick costume changes, color coordination, and character styling, creating costume designs based on assigned colors and exploring how color can be used to express stories and life experiences. Through these activities, students came to see that costumes are not simply performance materials, but also important tools for character development and storytelling.
Associate Professor Yi-Jen Tsai noted that theatre production has traditionally involved challenges such as energy consumption, printed promotional materials, and the frequent replacement of sets, props, and costumes. Sustainability may once have seemed like a distant challenge for the performing arts, but an increasing number of theatre professionals in Taiwan are now taking concrete action. Through industry visits and professional exchanges, students learned that sustainability is not an abstract concept or slogan, but something reflected in everyday decisions about how materials are produced, used, shared, and preserved. Sometimes, sustainable action begins simply with a reluctance to discard something that still has value.
The Department of Drama and Creative Application emphasized that the Theatre and Sustainability course series combines classroom learning, industry visits, and professional exchange to encourage students to examine the connections between theatre, the environment, cultural heritage, and industry development. NUTN will continue to strengthen collaboration between the University and the performing arts sector, preparing a new generation of theatre professionals with creative abilities, practical experience, and sustainability-oriented thinking, and supporting the development of performing arts that are both innovative and socially and environmentally responsible.