Biographical notes on Danny Yung

Danny Yung was born in Shanghai, China in 1943 and moved to Hong Kong with his family at the age of five. He studied Architecture at the University of California University, Berkeley, and completed his master degree on Urban Design and Urban Planning at Columbia University. In 1979, he returned to Hong Kong and held his first one-man cartoon exhibition. After which he became deeply involved in all aspects of the arts, including experimental films, cartoons, conceptual art, installation, video and performing arts. He formed the avant-garde arts collective Zuni Icosahedron in 1982 and he has been Artistic Director of Zuni since 1985.

Yung has been involved in over 100 theatrical productions as director, scriptwriter, producer and stage designer since 1982. His "Journey to the East" series, "Two or Three Things" series, "Hundred Years of Solitude" series and "Deep Structure of Chinese Culture" series were staged in many countries, including Japan, Taiwan, Belgium, Germany, England and the United States. In 2000, Yung organized an eleven weeks Festivals of Vision a cross-cultural festivals and conferences in Berlin and Hong Kong, which involves 1000 artists and cultural practitioners from some thirty-five cities in Asia and Europe.

Yung is also a keen advocate of new art forms. His experimental films, video work, and installation works have been shown at festivals in Berlin, London, Rotterdam, Edinburgh, Tokyo, Los Angeles, and New York. His artwork is selected as one of the 56 Chinese visual artists for the Inside Out: New Chinese Art in 1999. His one-person show "Tree and Man" opened at 1A Space in 2003.

Since 1987, Yung has initiated a series of public forums on cultural policies on arts. In 1990, he organized the Cultural Policy Study Group that has since produced several influential reports, including In Search of Cultural Policy, 1991, and In Search of Cultural Policy, 1993. He has also founded two pressure groups to work on cultural policy issues. From 1997 onward, Yung has initiated several important arts network in Asia, among them, Asia Arts Net, Chinese City to City Cultural Forum, Asia Pacific Performing Arts Network.

In 1993, Yung was appointed by the Hong Kong Government as a founder member of the Hong Kong Arts Development Council (ADC) and was the first chairperson of its Arts Education Committee, which was involved with the formulation of Hong Kong's arts policy. He was reappointed to the Council in 2000. In 2001, he co-organized the World Culture Forum, and became the vice-president in 2003. He is currently a part-time member of Central Policy Unit, a Hong Kong Government Think Tank. He has written extensively on arts, culture, and the media.