Team and Contact

Dr. Yumin Ao is the editor-in-chief of the Journal of Ying Ming Theater in Göttingen, Germany. In addition to her editorial responsibilities, she has organized public lectures on Asian theater, inviting scholars and artists from around the world. In 2022, Yumin Ao initiated the 1st International Symposium on Contemporary Asian Theater and the Forum of Young Asian Artists in Europe. She authored a monograph titled “Study on the Thematic, Narrative, and Musical Structure of Guan Hanqing’s Yuan Zaju Injustice to Dou’er” in 2015. Her directorial credits include theatrical productions such as Folding Cities (2023), Hello Strangers (2022), Plärren (2021), Love Letters (2021), The Last Laughs (2020), and Tough (2020). In 2020, she conceptualized and directed the project titled “The Sound Topography of Göttingen” as part of the 1st New York International Virtual Performance Festival, as well as a series of short plays called “Thunderstorm 2.0.” Yumin Ao previously taught at Kennesaw State University and George Mason University in the USA.

Dr. Rongjun Yu, also known as Nick, Doctor of Arts, is China’s most-produced living playwright, an award-winning playwright, as well as the artistic director of Shanghai Dramatic Arts Centre, the Vice President of Shanghai Performing Arts Group, the director of Shanghai International Comedy Festival and Shanghai ACT festival. He has about 80 plays, musicals, and operas produced in China and overseas including Behind the Lie, Perfume, 1977, Captain, Das Kapital, The Insane Asylum Next to Heaven, The Crowd, House Guest, and WWW.COM. His writing has been staged and published in English, Turkish, Spanish, German, Japanese Italian, Hebrew, and other languages and dialects. Nick has also translated and/or adapted foreign-language works into Chinese that have been performed in China and abroad. He has written dance theatre, physical theatre, and screenplays for film and television as well. As the manager of the Shanghai Dramatic Arts Center, he hosted more than 400 projects for three stages in Shanghai. Nick received Asian Cultural Council Fellowships in 2004 and 2007 to conduct research on cultural exchange programs in the United States and was a fellow for International Residency of the Royal Court Theatre in 2008. Received the 7th Fellowship in Russia Program by the Likhachev Foundation of the First President of Russia Boris N. Yeltsin. He participated in Iowa IWP (International Writing Program) in 2019. German-language musical theater: “Das Kapital: The Musical” by Nick Rongjun Yu had its premiere at the Theater Dortmund in 2023.

Xiaoyi LIU is considered one of the most promising figures at the forefront of the experimental theatre and cultural exchange network in Asia. He was the recipient of the Young Artist Award by the National Arts Council of Singapore in 2016. The artistic director of Emergency Stairs (Singapore) and the artist-in-residence at Zuni Icosahedron (Hong Kong), he has been involved in over 70 theatrical works in various capacities, such as curator, director, playwright, and actor over the past two decades. Since 2017, he has served as the artistic director of the cross-cultural arts festival Southernmost. Since 2018, he started to develop collaboration between digital technology and arts, including AI, AR, VR, and more. In 2020, he established the international cultural leadership development platform Emergency Academy.