Thriving in an Either-Or World

Ihot Sinlay Cihek’s How Romantic: A Guide to Modern Pangcah Life. Photo by Hsin-Che Lee.

Ihot Sinlay Cihek is a Taiwan-based Pangcah theatre artist whose work confronts the intersecting realities of Indigeneity, womanhood, and urban life. How Romantic: A Guide to Modern Pangcah Life follows a young woman struggling to readjust after returning from the city, and The Knife tells the story of a Pangcah woman who, out of love for her late grandfather, breaks a taboo by stealing a hunting knife. These two comedic solo performances marked a major breakthrough in her career, with the former earning her a nomination for the 2022/23 Taishin Arts Awards.

This year at the Prologue New Play Festival, Ihot Sinlay Cihek is set to steal the spotlight with her latest work, Neo-Ilisin. As in her previous pieces, Indigenous women navigating urban life take center stage, but this time she explores dialogues within Indigenous communities by bringing women from two different Indigeous groups—one Pangcah and the other Atayal—together onstage. After she completed the writing phase, Kuan-Ting Lin, Literary Manager at the Prologue Center for New Plays, caught up with her to talk about her new comedic two-hander and her views on mythologies, Indigeneity, and playwriting.

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