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https://scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/3178160/taipeis-new-performing-arts-centre-finally-finished-late-and
Lifestyle/ Arts & Culture

Taipei’s new Performing Arts Centre is finally finished, late and over budget, but, as architect Rem Koolhaas said, ‘well worth it’

  • The building, inspired by a spicy hotpot, was seven years late and over budget, bankrupting the contractor and angering Taipei’s mayor
  • But, as architect Rem Koolhaas said, it was worth the effort, and the building has a spectacular line-up for its opening season
The new Taipei Performing Arts Center designed by OMA. Photo: Hsuan Lang Lin Photography

The outward appearance of the new Taipei Performing Arts Centre (TPAC) invites comparisons with a number of homely dishes popular in Taiwan. Some call it “Preserved egg and tofu”, others call it “Oden”, a broth often served with a boiled egg and fishcake. Its architect Rem Koolhaas says he was inspired by the spicy hotpot in the nearby night market.

But for a long time, the startling, whimsical downtown venue designed by OMA was such a headache to build that it was only likened to other cultural venues plagued by delays and overspends such as the Taipei Dome stadium and Hong Kong’s West Kowloon Cultural District.

After all, it bankrupted its contractor, regularly sent the mayor into conniptions and the construction time was three times longer than expected.

It took 10 years to build, but the NT$6.7 billion (US$226 million) landmark is finally completed and the official opening date is set for August 7.

From left: David Gianotten, Austin Wang, Kelly Hsieh of the Taipei Representative Office in the UK, and architect Rem Koolhaas. Photo: Billy Barraclough
From left: David Gianotten, Austin Wang, Kelly Hsieh of the Taipei Representative Office in the UK, and architect Rem Koolhaas. Photo: Billy Barraclough

“It is worth it for sure. Every single drop of perspiration has been worth it. We believe in it,” said OMA founding partner Koolhaas, who co-designed the playful agglomeration of geometric shapes with managing partner David Gianotten.

The building is groundbreaking for a number of reasons, he said at the international launch event in London on May 13. Technology, not human beings, was the “main client”.

From a large control room, a team of 12 can adjust the acoustics of each space depending on the type of performance, or move walls to combine the grand theatre and the black box theatre into a massive factory-like performance space with a stage up to 63m (207ft) long. TPAC is also uniquely “Taiwanese”, Koolhaas added, because many aspects of the finished product were decided in collaboration with local artists and it is situated right next to the famous night market in the northern part of the city.

In fact, Gianotten said that OMA never expected to win with their submission, which was designed to retain the night market as opposed to the city government’s plan to move it back in 2008. And so the team let their imagination roam free without giving too much thought on how to turn the concept into reality.

On the outside, TPAC’s stand-out feature is a large metal ball that sticks out on the side – it houses the 800-seat Globe Playhouse (a nod to the Globe Theatre in London) that has an unusual, circular proscenium opening. Inside, a “public loop” is a free passageway that runs through the entire infrastructure of the building, including typically-hidden backstage areas and offices.

Inside the spherical 800-seat Globe Playhouse, which has an unusual circular proscenium and boxes at the back. Photo: Billy Barraclough
Inside the spherical 800-seat Globe Playhouse, which has an unusual circular proscenium and boxes at the back. Photo: Billy Barraclough

The OMA design turned out to be a devil to build and construction took a full decade, as opposed to three years. By 2015, works were so delayed that the mayor Ko Wen-je threatened to “strangle every single one” of the contractor representatives if they couldn’t deliver. The next year, the main contractor, International Engineering and Construction, filed for bankruptcy, citing the complexity of the TPAC project. The final cost was well above the original NT$3.8 billion.

Austin Wang Meng-chao, chief executive officer of the arts centre, has been overseeing the project since day one.

“We just finished our soft opening in March to May. There’s some criticism. The signs are not clear, the seats are not comfortable enough. Teething problems. But overall, people are embracing it. They sit on the floor, or on the staircase. You can never see that happen at the national theatres. People are relaxed because of the accessible design of the building and I love it,” he said in London.

Architect Rem Koolhaas describes the concepts behind the new Taipei Performing Arts Centre during the international launch event in London on May 13, 2022. Photo: Billy Barraclough
Architect Rem Koolhaas describes the concepts behind the new Taipei Performing Arts Centre during the international launch event in London on May 13, 2022. Photo: Billy Barraclough

Opening season features a spectacular line-up including a theatre production called The Monk from Tang dynasty by film director Tsai Ming-liang, a world premiere of Still (Life) in Taipei by French choreographer Xavier Le Roy, and a virtual reality-theatre “fusion experience” that invites audiences into a gay male sauna. Also of note is Hong Kong writer and director Vee Leong’s In Search of the Miraculous, a new play about a personal quest for freedom in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

As Kelly Wu-Chiao Hsieh, head of the Taipei Representative Office in the UK, told the audience in London, TPAC’s opening season is a reminder to the world that the island is one of the freest and most progressive societies in Asia.

By contrast, given the recent changes in Hong Kong and the introduction of censorship under the National Security Law, the city is no longer open and free, said Wang. It has now become even more important for Taiwan – a small place compared to mainland China – to stand up and be heard through arts and culture, and TPAC is going to help do that, he said.