An audience of 50,000 showed up at the open-air plaza of the National Theatre for Huai Min Lin’s final performance in July 2019. Lin was stepping down after 46 years as the artistic director of the Cloud Gate Dance Theatre, a company he founded in 1973—back when there wasn’t even an audience for contemporary dance, much less any kind of dance, in Taiwan. The company has since been such a force in Taiwanese culture, that a street and a day—August 21—has been named in its honour.

Cloud Gate was formed at a time his generation was searching for its own national identity. Lin composed pieces that echoed Taiwan’s history and culture, drawing from diverse forms such as ballet, Chinese opera, martial arts, modern dance, and calligraphy. Cloud Gate has toured theatres all over the world, dazzling international audiences with its particularly Taiwanese point of view told through the universal language of movement.