Guling Street Avant-garde Theatre Introduction
During the Qing Dynasty, traveling between Taipei City and Guting Village would pass through Guling Street. During the Japanese period, it was named Sakuma Town in honor of the fifth governor, Sakuma Samata. After Japan's defeat and the forced repatriation of Japanese people, they came here to sell books and paintings for money to return to Japan, which became the precursor of the old bookstalls on Guling Street. Later, when people from mainland China came to Taiwan, they imitated the Japanese by setting up street stalls selling old books and antique paintings, thus spreading the fame of Guling Street old books. It was renamed Guling to replace Sakuma Town, removing the colonial connotation. The entrance of the Guling Street Small Theater faces northwest; it was built by the Japanese for surveillance purposes, watching for potential threats from the plains. Therefore, the structure differs from the neighboring houses. The Nationalist government continued to use this building for surveillance duties as a police station, symbolizing state power. The Zhongzheng Second Police Station has since relocated to Nanhai Road, and this building has become a performance space for the small theater, developing cultural and artistic activities. The space is planned for offices, service counters, promotional material areas, experimental theaters, detention rooms, conference rooms, cultural and artistic spaces, audiovisual rooms, and rehearsal rooms. Various performances and activities are held here from time to time, making it an important venue in the history of small theater development in Taiwan.
