TAN-KA plays on TAN (dialect pronunciation of Chen – Stephen’s last name) and KA (Egyptian hieroglyph depicting “soul” or “spirit” of a person that survives the death of the body) with Stephen’s music settings and singing of Yosasno Akiko’s tankas.

Using motion capture to animate male manga characters to make them sing the words of Yosano Akiko, TAN-KA simultaneously highlights the melancholy and heartbreak that imbue Yosano’s and Stephen’s work, as well as brackets and critiques the fetishization of gay Asian males by straight Asian women in their production and consumption of Yaoi characters and media.

CREATED BY: Stephen Chen | COMPLETED: 04/06/2021


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dissonance productions

Started by trans-discplinary art-ivist Stephen Chen to consolidate his recent work; as well as facilitate collaboration with others. Stephen’s oeuvre is often allegorical as well as simultaneously deconstruct and hybridize the very forms he works in. Disdaining academic and esoteric expressions, as well as institutional conventions and practices, Stephen explores complex ideas and issues immanent in his works through experiments in form and technique.

dissonance productions