Professor Kun-Yang Lin Retires After 19 Years Of Dedicated Service To Temple University

At the conclusion of this 2021-22 academic year, esteemed Professor Kun-Yang Lin will retire from his position at Boyer College. The dance department will celebrate Lin's 19 years of service through a special, end-of-semester, free event entitled Dancing Mind, Thinking Body.

Lin is well-known in the dance community as the founder and artistic director of Kun-Yang Lin/Dancers (KYL/D), based in Philadelphia. He also co-founded KYL/D's CHI Movement Arts Center, a product of his devotion to artistic excellence and movement research and his commitment to education and community. Lin has received numerous grants and awards in his native Taiwan and in the U.S., where he has been widely recognized for his dancing and choreography. Critics describe his dancing as "extraordinary" (The New York Times) and his choreography as "deeply spiritual, remarkable" (Dance Magazine).

Lin holds a BFA from the National Institute of the Arts in Taipei, a dance diploma from the Laban Centre for Movement and Dance in London and an MFA from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts. He joined the Temple University faculty in 2003.

Dancing Mind, Thinking Body will take place on Sunday, April 24 at 2:30 PM in the Conwell Dance Theater (1801 N Broad Street, 5th Floor). The event honors the many ways that Kun-Yang Lin has impacted students over the years, through teaching, mentoring, and inspiring students to be mindful of the magical interplay of body, mind, and spirit. The afternoon will consist of performances, reminiscing, and wishing Lin well during the next phase of his remarkable career.

Hailed for its superbly trained dancers and inventive choreography, the internationally-active KYL/D probes at the limits of national identity. The company has performed around the world, including at the Tanzmesse International Dance Festival (Dusseldorf), Busan International Dance Festival (Korea), Jogia International and AsiaTri festivals (Indonesia), Festival Internacional de Danza in Queretaro (Mexico), Victoria Theatre (Singapore) and HsinChu Performing Arts Center (Taiwan).

In the U.S., KYL/D has performed at Lincoln Center Out of Doors Festival, Interlochen Festival, Columbia Festival, Kaatsbaan International Dance Center, Jacob's Pillow Inside/Out, the Painted Bride Art Center, The Egg, PennLive Arts, the Kimmel Center, the Forrest Theater, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Barnes Foundation and Philadelphia's City Hall. KYL/D has been supported by numerous funders including the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), the Jerome Robbins Foundation, The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, the William Penn Foundation, MidAtlantic Arts Foundation as well as support from the U.S. Department of State.

KUN-YANG LIN (Founder and Artistic Director of KYL/D & Co-Founder of CHI Movement Arts Center) views dance as his first language. Raised in a home where his parents never spoke the same language, Lin learned to communicate most articulately through gesture and action. Many other tensions in his life have shaped Lin's artistry - he was raised in the faith of his father (Catholicism) in an environment steeped in the traditions of his mother (Buddhism and Taoism); he navigates life as an Eastern immigrant in a Western society. Lin is deeply invested in the dialogues between innovation and tradition, the individual and collective, the visible and invisible - "in-between spaces" that he finds to be fertile ground for exploration.

Among the primary impulses nourishing Lin's artistry are Buddhist and Taoist world views and the internal energetic flows of many Eastern arts he has practiced over the years including tai chi, martial arts, chi gong, calligraphy, meditation and Chinese opera movement. These impulses are filtered through his extensive training and performance experience across a broad range of contemporary dance techniques and improvisation practices and framed by Lin's ongoing cross-cultural research in dance as a medium for the integration of body, spirit and mind.

Lin has received numerous awards in his native Taiwan and has been widely recognized in the U.S. for both his dancing and choreography including, in 2002, BackStage selected Lin as "the year's most promising choreographer." Lin has been called "an extraordinary dancer" (The New York Times) and a "theatrical visionary...outstanding choreographer and a compelling performer" (The Inquirer). Lin's devotion to artistic excellence, movement research, education and community building inspired him to found the CHI Movement Arts Center (CHI MAC), described by former Governor Ed Rendell as "a place where the entire Philadelphia community can experience the art of multicultural creative dance expression." In 2009, Lin was named an "Artist of the City'' for his outstanding contributions to the arts and culture of Philadelphia by the Painted Bride Art Center. In 2010, the Mayor of Hsin-Chu, Lin's hometown, honored him as a "son of the City'' for his cultivation of artistic excellence at the international level and in 2011, he was named a "Creative Connector'' through a nomination process coordinated by Leadership Philadelphia. In 2017, Lin was also selected by NBC News as one of 30 LGBTQ "changemakers, innovators and rising stars" for its inaugural Pride Month list of leaders nationwide.

Lin's work has been presented throughout the U.S. as well as in Asia, London, Vienna and Mexico. His choreography has been commissioned by numerous companies including Dance Ensemble Singapore, Ballet Nacional de México, Ballet Philippines and Cleo Parker Robinson Dance. Highly sought as a teacher, Lin is regularly invited to offer masterclasses and workshops throughout the U.S. and abroad. Since 2003, Lin has been a professor at Temple University's Boyer College of Music and Dance in Philadelphia. 2022 marks Lin's final year as a full-time professor.

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