2024/2025, Vermilion Theater
Vermilion Theater’s bilingual project explores how the intersection of theater, visual arts, music, and mental health awareness can support cultural expression and wellness among immigrant families in Boston. Working closely with the Families Services department at BCNC, Vermilion Theater engages Chinese-speaking (or Mandarin-speaking) participants of Karaoke and Ping Pong Nights by creating a welcoming space for connection and outreach to address critical issues such as well-being and sense of belonging in a fun, supportive environment.
Each week, Vermilion Theater builds community by working with 8-15 participants on visual mapping, culturally relevant arts crafting, movement, and cognitive mapping. They are also developing a toolkit of self-guided worksheets that integrate Social Emotional Learning (SEL) with engaging theater activities, for future Family Services staff and other practitioners to foster creativity, connection, and emotional well-being within the community.
The residency will culminate in a community showcase and festival, SenStory: Home as a Verb, featuring performances, visual documentation, and a guidebook on creative practices, leaving a lasting legacy of resilience, belonging, and empowerment for AAPI families.
SenStory: Home as a Verb
Exhibit | January 13 – 18, 2025
Festival Day | Saturday, January 18, 2025 | 11:00 AM - 2:00 PM
About Vermillion Theater
Vermilion is an AAPI women-led non-profit organization that aims to uplift the voices of the Chinese diaspora by producing multilingual plays and hosting community engagement workshops that facilitate cross-cultural conversations.
With the power of theater and creative storytelling, Vermilion aims to increase minority artist representation and instill a sense of social safety within the Chinese diaspora community.
In recent years, Vermilion has expanded its community engagement effort collaborating with existing grassroots organizations and hosting art-based workshops, to create a safe space for the Chinese diaspora and promote collective healing through creative mediums – especially during the recent political shift and uncertainty.
Wisteria Deng (she/her)
Wisteria is the associate artistic director of Vermilion Theater and a Clinical Psychology PhD Candidate at Yale University.
Specialized in trauma-informed care, she serves as a therapist at the Yale Gender Program and Yale Psycho-oncology/Palliative Care. She carries fond memories of the Singapore rain, the Ann Arbor snow, and the Boston potholes.
Photo credit: courtesy of Vermillion Theater
Xiran Li (they/them)
Xinran is the artist in residence of Vermilion Theater and a graduate student of Media, Medicine, and Health at Harvard Medical School.
Trained in community-driven filmmaking and medical anthropology, Xinran aims to represent health-related human experiences via multi-modal storytelling.
Photo credit: Lin
Yolanda Yang (she/her)
Yolanda is a theatre designer and educator who graduated from Harvard Graduate School of Design. She is the Director of visual art and media at Vermilion Theater, whose interest and practice focus on intervention of art, design, curation and performance in public domain and urban context.
Photo credit: courtesy of Vermillion Theater
Zilu Wang (she/them)
Zilu is a tenth-semester Music Therapy student at Berklee College of Music, starting her internship at The Center For Discovery. She has composed and played live accompaniment in Vermilion Theater's productions. She explores new ways of combining acoustic and electronic sounds into therapeutic sessions and theater scenes.
Photo credit: courtesy of Vermillion Theater
Supporters:
This project is supported in part by the Barr-Klarman Arts Capacity Building Initiative
