Feature Zimbabwe
Africa’s new partner in development, China, despite its new economic clout, faces the same dilemma that Africa has faced since coming into contact with Europe. This is what The Blue Dragon explores. It is a play in which Chinese artists try to find new ways to express their creativity, but much like their African counterparts, they find to their chagrin that what actually sells is simply a copy of what has been done before in the West, reports Beverly Andrews.
The Blue Dragon F
OR MANY COUNTRIES IN AFRICA today, the presence of China is unmistakable. With Chinese in- vestment in Africa growing rap- idly and China set to overtake
America in the near future as the world’s dominant economic super power, China’s current impact is hard to ignore. But as China’s dominance grows throughout the world, it is rare to see contemporary Chi- nese life depicted in art. It is a shortcom- ing that the Canadian director, Robert Lepage, tries to correct in his latest play, The Blue Dragon. In his startling new work, Lepage looks
at the life of a Westerner living in China today, and through the eyes of this West- erner, he lets the world see the economic juggernaut that China has become hur- tling to the future, albeit being forced to take very hard decisions about what it leaves behind. The Blue Dragon is the sequel to
Lepage’s legendary second play, Te Drag- on’s Trilogy, produced in the early 1980s, in which he looked at the impact Chinese migration was having on Canada’s French- speaking province of Quebec. Lepage says: “When we created Te
Dragon’s Trilogy, none of us had ever been to China. Back then the Middle Kingdom was the ‘great unknown’, an ever-shifting mirror that allowed us to see and under- stand ourselves better. As we toured, this fascinating land – which until then we had explored only in our imaginations – opened itself to us, revealing its wonders,
94 | October 2011 | New African
we see a very different China. A China determined to achieve progress at all costs, a juggernaut hurtling to the future.”
its ancient cultures and, of course, its con- tradictions and paradoxes. “For years, Western countries wanted
China to open its borders, to allow the free passage of people and goods, to get in step with the global market economy. Now that it has embraced profound change, we realise that China, the country we so longed to align with capitalism, now has the power to set its own agenda.” In the play, Lepage plays Pierre, a
French-Canadian artist and gallery own- er, who moves from his native Quebec to China where he hopes to start a new life. Feeling perhaps more secure in his new home than he has ever felt in Canada, he embarks on a passionate love affair with a radical young Chinese artist who he exhibits in his gallery. Te two worlds of his past and present collide when an ex- lover from Quebec arrives in Shanghai intent on adopting a Chinese baby. Te
complex emotional web these characters weave around each other and themselves forms the touching basis of this extraor- dinary play. Cultures collide, misunder- standings take place, and through it all we see a very different China. A China so determined to achieve progress at all cost that it is happy to destroy its past, feeling that it has no value. Pierre ironically falls in love with, and
makes his home in, the old district of Shanghai, a district earmarked for demo- lition by a government determined to build yet more skyscrapers. Pierre romanticises China’s past while the Chinese themselves are determined only to look forward. Te character of Claire, Pierre’s former
lover, is no less complex. An art dealer, she is determined to adopt a child she has only seen in photos, despite the fact that as an alcoholic she is not really suitable to be a parent. Ironically a China they both see
“Through the play,
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100